HYPERAXE

I stumbled upon this blog and was stunned by this line:

“I found myself working with ‘day coders’, people with no passion, people that knew how to program and had learned how to do so simply because the money looked good.”

For several years of my career, this had been very true to me. I just couldn’t see the same passion I have for programming and computers in most of the people I’ve worked with. It’s just so likely that they are more concerned of how much they are earning (and maybe how to spend it as well) rather than how much they really know. I think I’ve seen it all, programmers that are like puppets of the company that only does what they are asked to do as long as they are getting their paycheck, server administrators who call themselves “administrators” when in fact all they know is setting up a linux/windows box or basic knowledge of networking or server commands, but doesn’t have the slightest idea of how an email server or DNS server works, and team leads who are more concerned of how to impress management or meeting deadlines to the point of forgetting that like their team, they too have a lot to learn and the greater responsibility upon them is not for themselves but for their team.

Seldom do I encounter someone I can truly call a “hard core programmer”. Yup that’s the term I use for a programmer that continuously improves on his skills and knowledge (I guess that term is influenced by my background as a heavy metal lead guitarist for a couple of bands during my younger years). When I meet this kind of programmer, I get excited knowing that I can finally have an intellectual conversation with someone, and also another challenge for me to level myself with his expertise. It’s not that I’m trying to compete, but I just want to know what he knows and also try to learn what we both don’t know. It’s as simple as that.

What I usually hear from ‘day coders’ is that they are too busy with work to learn new things or create mini-projects, or there’s really no point on learning new technologies right now since it’s not being used by the company, or better yet they already think they are already good enough, when in fact they haven’t even touched the core surface of the programming language they have been working for in years. I even know programmers working for more than 3 years, and still doesn’t understand thread behaviors or even how to create one, or doesn’t thoroughly understand DB connectivity. I must admit though that living in a 3rd world country would somehow make you prioritize your financial over anything else. I can understand this, but it’s still not an excuse for you not to spend some time to improve yourself. Besides, if you have a lot of competence to back up your application for a new job, your price becomes higher as well. Trust me on this, I have personal experience on how impressed companies are when you know more than their expectations.

This is not to start a discussion or debate of some sort. I am just one of those that believes in what real programmers should be. We are not here to solely earn money, or to be controlled by the companies we work for. Programming is supposed to be fun, and in having fun we get to be more creative, our drive to learn new technologies would be more enjoyable, and our love for what we do is never lost. Companies should understand this but most of the companies I know are more concerned of making money than helping their programmers improve. For me it’s not really trying to master everything, but trying to learn something new each day or even every week makes a big difference. In my case, I usually spend 2-3 hours a day trying to learn new stuffs because I’m having fun with what I do and in its sole simplicity..”I want to learn more!”.

I think it’s just a matter of reality check. Let me leave you with this question, “For the n years that I’ve been working, how much do I really know?”. You can then see if you are a “day coder” or a “hard core programmer”.

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