software engineers

[Kat Kid]

Sounds like being a software engineer sucks.

    I'm a software engineer.  It is well-known and not disputed by anyone who works in the field that the most effective professional programmers can be thousands of times more productive than the least effective.  If this seems unlikely, keep in mind that one programmer who writes a lot of bugs that other programmers have to fix actually has negative productivity, and it can be hard to figure this out until after the damage is done.  I used to teach classes for professional programmers, and even among my students, this was easy to observe.

    I am not aware of a single organization anywhere–not even here in Silicon Valley–that has come close to a pay scale where programmers' pay varies by even one order of magnitude, and certainly not three.  In fact, what we tend to do is lay off and refuse to consider hiring anybody over 35.  The reason often given is that they demand more money.

    This makes sense in a way.  If you can't tell who is good, you should hire whoever is cheap.  Measuring programmer effectiveness is really hard.

    A good programmer will solve a problem in fewer lines of code and take less time to do it than someone else.  So counting lines of code or hours spent doesn't work.  Counting bugs not found also doesn't work--other programmers, upon seeing an elegant solution, all agree that it's exactly how they would have solved it, and are blind to the rejected alternatives and the problems that would have arisen.  More than once, when I have gotten something finished on time and it works without needing a lot of bug fixing, I've been told that's because it was an "easy" problem.  Meanwhile, the team that misses the deadline and spends a week of all-nighters is rewarded for their obvious dedication and hard work.  The good programmer who just solves the problem may not even be aware at how difficult the problem would be for some of their colleagues.

    Within a company, you develop a reputation and people see your work.  But the code you write is a trade secret, and you can't easily take it with you.  Whether you're good or bad, nobody who wants to hire you can see a complex version of your work.  They can try weeding you out by making you write code on a whiteboard, but that's sort of like asking a pianist to hum for an audition.

    The brilliant thing the Indian outsourcing industry did was to throw out the idea of programmers needing to be the best.  (I don't mean to insult Indian software engineers--some are as good as anybody else, but just by sheer numbers, it's safe to say that most would have chosen another line of work if they had as many other opportunities as Americans do.)  They realized that if you can hire a lot of mediocre programmers in India, you can quote a low hourly rate, and even if it takes 20 times the effort, it doesn't matter if the cost is about the same and the delivery is predictable.  And it's a lot easier to predict how long it's going to take 20 programmers to do something than to tell if the one guy you hired is at the top of the field or the bottom.  With the 20 average programmers, it might take twice as long.  With one programmer, it might take 1/20th of the time of the average team or it might take 100 times as long.

[Rage Against the McKee]

Yeah, but just think of all the tail those guys pull.

[Saulbadguy]

The ones that are good aren't happy people.  The ones that suck are pretty happy.

[pissclams]

it is as it should be, the majority of it takes place overseas at very low rates that americans can't be bothered with.

[Jeffy]

PC Load Letter?  WTF does that mean?

[hemmy]

I am a software engineer

It is a field with an extremely high number of high paying jobs available. The outsourcing stuff is bullshit, most of those are just low end programmer positions.

[Catchacold]

I have a friend (from Halifax, you don't even know) that develops software from home, and travels around the country working from pretty much anywhere.  Think Colorado, Bay Area, Oregon, etc.  Works in comfy clothing, distributes elite emawness nationwide.

technology.    go cats.

[slimz]

I have a friend (from Halifax, you don't even know) that develops software from home, and travels around the country working from pretty much anywhere.  Think Colorado, Bay Area, Oregon, etc.  Works in comfy clothing, distributes elite emawness nationwide.

technology.    go cats.

Guessing he has lots of time to make awesome PakHead photoshops.  Sounds like he's living the life.

[Kat Kid]

I am a software engineer

It is a field with an extremely high number of high paying jobs available. The outsourcing stuff is bullshit, most of those are just low end programmer positions.

check back when you are middle aged (re: point of the article)

[Catchacold]

Guessing he has lots of time to make awesome PakHead photoshops.  Sounds like he's living the life.

Except for the "lots of time" part.  Guy has been awol lately.  Needs to get with the program.

[hemmy]

I am a software engineer

It is a field with an extremely high number of high paying jobs available. The outsourcing stuff is bullshit, most of those are just low end programmer positions.

check back when you are middle aged (re: point of the article)

He is bitching that good programmers don't get paid 1000 times more than bad/mediocre programmers (which get paid good).

Also, I would refute his claim about > 35. No legitimate company will hire a recent college grad for any SE I, SE II, architect, or designer role.

I know, I really took the bait on this thread.

[john "teach me how to" dougie]

Sounds like being a software engineer sucks.

    I'm a software engineer.  It is well-known and not disputed by anyone who works in the field that the most effective professional programmers can be thousands of times more productive than the least effective.  If this seems unlikely, keep in mind that one programmer who writes a lot of bugs that other programmers have to fix actually has negative productivity, and it can be hard to figure this out until after the damage is done.  I used to teach classes for professional programmers, and even among my students, this was easy to observe.

    I am not aware of a single organization anywhere–not even here in Silicon Valley–that has come close to a pay scale where programmers' pay varies by even one order of magnitude, and certainly not three.  In fact, what we tend to do is lay off and refuse to consider hiring anybody over 35.  The reason often given is that they demand more money.

    This makes sense in a way.  If you can't tell who is good, you should hire whoever is cheap.  Measuring programmer effectiveness is really hard.

    A good programmer will solve a problem in fewer lines of code and take less time to do it than someone else.  So counting lines of code or hours spent doesn't work.  Counting bugs not found also doesn't work--other programmers, upon seeing an elegant solution, all agree that it's exactly how they would have solved it, and are blind to the rejected alternatives and the problems that would have arisen.  More than once, when I have gotten something finished on time and it works without needing a lot of bug fixing, I've been told that's because it was an "easy" problem.  Meanwhile, the team that misses the deadline and spends a week of all-nighters is rewarded for their obvious dedication and hard work.  The good programmer who just solves the problem may not even be aware at how difficult the problem would be for some of their colleagues.

    Within a company, you develop a reputation and people see your work.  But the code you write is a trade secret, and you can't easily take it with you.  Whether you're good or bad, nobody who wants to hire you can see a complex version of your work.  They can try weeding you out by making you write code on a whiteboard, but that's sort of like asking a pianist to hum for an audition.

    The brilliant thing the Indian outsourcing industry did was to throw out the idea of programmers needing to be the best.  (I don't mean to insult Indian software engineers--some are as good as anybody else, but just by sheer numbers, it's safe to say that most would have chosen another line of work if they had as many other opportunities as Americans do.)  They realized that if you can hire a lot of mediocre programmers in India, you can quote a low hourly rate, and even if it takes 20 times the effort, it doesn't matter if the cost is about the same and the delivery is predictable.  And it's a lot easier to predict how long it's going to take 20 programmers to do something than to tell if the one guy you hired is at the top of the field or the bottom.  With the 20 average programmers, it might take twice as long.  With one programmer, it might take 1/20th of the time of the average team or it might take 100 times as long.

That guy works for a shitty company.

[The Big Train]

I was searching for something else and found this thread. My Canadian friend says that being a software engineer is a lot of fun! It's always something new and different and solving complex problem are fun. I agree that whoever wrote that works for a shitty company. The people you work with can make the difference. I will also say that being a software engineer is still in very high demand and it's a growing industry, even if we are moving to less people writing code.

[Tobias]

"software engineers" are artisanal IT dorks

[Pete]

Functional software consulting is the real panty dropper.

[GregKSU1027]

I am for one excited to be a software engineer all thanks to @ksu_cis

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[GregKSU1027]

And yeah the guys works for a shitty company

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[hatingfrancisco]

Everyone knows that network peeps are the rock stars of the IT world. 

[The Big Train]

Everyone knows that network peeps are the rock stars of the IT world. 

I'd tell you a UDP joke, but you might not get it.

[The Big Train]

[GregKSU1027]

Everyone knows that network peeps are the rock stars of the IT world. 

I'd tell you a UDP joke, but you might not get it.

Get rekt nerd

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