modbait

10 ms·

91.
by modbait 8y ago
Really sad. Everyone suffers.
92.
by modbait 8y ago
I believe the "old == stagnant" meme is largely a myth. It sounds right somehow, so it sticks with us. Over the course of a long career, though, I've seen this kind of stagnation distributed pretty evenly across people of d
93.
by modbait 8y ago
After many rejections during my job hunt last year, I did seriously consider it, yes. Despite having a pretty solid skill set and experience, no bites, which is rather demoralizing. You can argue whether candidates in their 50s are less vi
94.
by modbait 8y ago
No idea. The "good" news is that you'll rarely be able to choose who you work with in any case.
95.
by modbait 8y ago
Unlike infection, depression is not curable in general. If you had an incurable infection, taking Tylenol and using band-aids might very well be a reasonable approach. Everything's a trade-off. Everyone is different, but often after
96.
by modbait 8y ago
I'll probably be flamed into the ground for saying it, but I do get a pretty reliable mood lift from drinking alcohol. That's not a great long-term strategy, but if the alternatives are making it through another day and not, it&#
97.
by modbait 8y ago
Unless you're astoundingly good, if companies are interviewing around N candidates for each position, you should expect a hit rate of around 1/N. Doing significantly better pretty much requires all three of those to be simultaneo
98.
by modbait 8y ago
As a partial solution, carefully describe the reality of the work they'll be doing. For example, "We're building a bespoke web server using our own in-house programming language based on COBOL. The project has already been
99.
by modbait 8y ago
This is being down-voted for the shots fired, but the underlying point is almost certainly true to a degree. People aren't ideologically invested in (say) the weight of electrons in the same way that they are in IQ curves across demog
100.
by modbait 8y ago
General Linux programming, in a variety of fields.
101.
by modbait 8y ago
I never believed the tales of woe, until it happened to me. Guess I'm doing my penance. Can't imagine how much worse it could be for those with kids.
102.
by modbait 8y ago
If nothing else, it's a check on your thinking. A good one will also look at things from more exotic angles. For example, if you have a lot of stock from an employer, how can you hedge that risk. As life proceeds, finances can get v
103.
by modbait 8y ago
After alimony and Social Security deductions, I have just enough money left over to get to work and back each day. Probably not the answer you were looking for... (Advice: Make sure your maxing out any 401k match, then dump as much as you c
104.
by modbait 8y ago
That's been my experience as well. In addition, people are generally pretty honest about where they're at, skill-wise. That said, I have seen several people who were open about lacking the basic requirements for a position get hi
105.
by modbait 8y ago
The reality is that grammar is one way that people are judged. Instead of throwing a fit, realize that it's an easy way to get a leg up on the competition.
106.
by modbait 8y ago
Your list sounds a bit corporate-y, but certainly not objectionable. As a guess, if there's a problem with you specifically, it's not anything you're mentioning here. Maybe send your cover letter and resume to a trusted con
107.
by modbait 8y ago
Unfortunately, mentioning this politically sensitive issue in such a manner would have been career suicide. (And I suspect that this is not rare for such black swans.)
108.
by modbait 8y ago
Good insights. In addition, there are good reasons to think that the value that programmers produce isn't even measurable in any practical way. A couple of years ago, I spotted a latent bug in a piece of core infrastructure software t
109.
by modbait 8y ago
Keeping your skills sharp is a good idea. That was my thought as well. Now in my 50s, I believe it's helped some, but less than I might have guessed, and I've heard similar from older colleagues. I'd suggest in addition pla
110.
by modbait 8y ago
A company that feels it needs to know the beliefs and opinions of its employees is a company that I do not want to work for. Professionalism is the standard--nothing less is acceptable, and requiring more is creepy. Violation of this boun
111.
by modbait 8y ago
Exactly.
112.
by modbait 8y ago
No--a ten-minute conversation with no coding, not a pop-quiz.
113.
by modbait 8y ago
If you can't tell in a ten-minute casual conversation whether or not someone is grossly lying on their resume, you probably shouldn't be an interviewer.
114.
by modbait 8y ago
In my experience, Software Developers that can't configure/diagnose/fix hardware/networking issues are usually pretty mediocre at development as well. And vice versa for "IT" guys that can't program. Spe
115.
by modbait 8y ago
Reminds me of that quote about Puritanism being the fear that someone, somewhere is having fun.
116.
by modbait 8y ago
From dictionary.com: 1. unusually or comparatively large in size or dimensions: A great fire destroyed nearly half the city.
117.
by modbait 8y ago
One good bout of alimony will put a stop to that.
118.
by modbait 8y ago
For me, it's some of both. Flow is spectacularly useful when I'm working on a chunk of something and have a pretty good understanding of what needs to be done and how. The times when I'm contemplating dramatically different
119.
by modbait 8y ago
I'm not sure. As a guess, it's probably a bit easier to get a higher salary as ops than dev. This doesn't have much to do with value, since corps usually cannot perceive your value. Rather, it's more that you're
120.
by modbait 8y ago
Lack of humility. Over the course of a long career, you will (must) discover that many of the things you learned early on aren't so, or at least don't apply in some situations. Most tech problems are actually complex design prob

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