6 things I like and don't like about programming
6 things I like about programming
1 - Work everywhere.
There is a huge market out there, and you can write apps for different platforms, different kind of devices and you even can work by yourself at home by creating startup or freelancing.
2 - Boredom free.
You never will be bored because programming requires consistent studying of new technologies.
3 - Good profits.
Payout is awesome. You can make a lot of money coding. According to statistics software engineer makes $96,000 - $147,250 in 2015. I believe this is not bad result and the opportunities keep growing.
4 - Programming enhance your memory.
It makes you smarter and your brain becomes more plastic, it consistently creates new connections while you’re solving specific tasks, and this leads to stronger memory.
5 - It becomes easier to learn new foreign language.
It was actually quite interesting. I found that the actual process of learning the programming language is similar to learning new foreign language. That means that if you’re are willing to learn at least 1 programming language, you have better chances to learn any new foreign language. Sound so cool.
6 - Amazing surroundings.
You are working in a great team of intelligent people. And also you can work in almost every country in the world cause this career is in a high demand and will only grow.
6 things I don’t like about programming:
1 - Learn at home.
Frequently you won’t have time to learn something at your work, especially when there is very clear deadline. Hence, you will be forced to learn a lot at home. And most of the time after you came from the job you’ll be tired and won’t have any desire to learn additional information.
2 - Bad documentation.
Most of documentation of brand new technologies or sometimes even commonly used technologies may not be great at all. And you’ll spend extra time to figure out how a particular method supposed to be used.
3 - Problems in family.
If you have a family you probably will have some issues too. My step-dad is a programmer and there were a lot of times when my mom argues with him because he don’t spend so much time with his family. Be aware of that too.
4 - Projects may suck.
Besides, not all of the projects will be interesting. You’ll have a lot of projects that you don’t like but you have to finish them anyway.
6 - May cause disgust or hatred of a particular thing.
One more thing that I discovered recently is that if you have some targeted project, in particular animals, chances are you’ll have that animal at the end of the project. I had a friend that was creating a social network about fish. It was a long-run project. Due to this he become obsessed with fish and he told he will never eat fish anymore) It was fun listening but I doubt it was fun for him.
Although I'm studying for a programmer now, I personally have a neutral attitude towards this industry.
Anyways, programming is an amazing job that opens you a lot of possibilities and I totally recommend it if you are such kind of person that likes sitting at the comfortable office, dealing with challenging tasks and responsible by all means.
I would add, that programming is fun because it's easy to get instant gratification..solving small problems one at a time.
Yeah, that's true :)
Great post but I disagree in some points. As I'm also a student in computer science and I can not prevent me to keep a critical mind on what I read on my future job.
Good profits :
You should precise the country because in mine it's far less paid. Still a good paid but not really as good as you said.
Programming enhance your memory :
Our brain is platics whether you are a programmer or a taxi driver and will become more efficient in the task you have the habit to solve.
There is a scientific document that proves that taxi drivers has a better memory than the average population thanks to their hippocampus that gains 25% volume.
It becomes easier to learn new foreign language :
I didn't know that. Have you read a paper that says the same thing as you?
Because I'm just correct in english, still bad in German and lot of my geeky friends are not so good in natural language. But still we could be just an exception.
Nevertheless, programming train you to logics and this is something people often miss. Learning logics changed a lot of things in the way I communicate to people. Because It structure the way I think and then the way I speak and write. It's help me a lot to understand what is wrong and what is right in a demonstration.
Learn at home :
This is a good thing ! You can do everything at home. I have some friends in chemistry, they need a lab if they want to practice ! This is someting we don't need. Plus, something cool with developpers is that you can work at home. This is someting unique I gess. We are very fortunate to be able to stay at home and still have everything we need to work.
You don't speak about pressure !
This is something very common in the computer science word. Projects are often over-sized for the developpement team and the dead lines are really hard to keep up. Specification are often wrote by non-programmer and this is really dificult to really understand what the customer really want... This is a paper about success in IT projects. Only 19% of projects are successful : 27% are Failed and 54% will cost more than 150% of their original estimates.
Programming is not easy as you think
I just had an absolute drama this year and got into fights with other programmers about Saving and Loading in Unity so I completely agree on the issue of documentation.
It was alarming, because saving and loading is one of the most common and demanded features in singleplayer games in particular and I noticed a lot of indie developers didn't even seem to bother with it, understandable for small games but with bigger games that have lots of progression mechanics you're fucked!
Thankfully though there were still people patient enough to take the time to explain it to me and now I've got proper saving and loading going on in my game which will mean gamers who play my games won't be hugely frustrated at not being able to save at difficult points if they die and I made sure to keep everything all in one thread so they can look it up.
It's not difficult once you see everything in front of you but the professionals seem to forget how much of a problem the scale of code like this is for newbie programmers. It's a piss take really, because you see literally hundreds of tutorials on all of the other mechanics of a game and on FPS' and so on, even AI, but does saving and loading get that many tutorials? Nope, glad I finally got to deal with it though.
Man, I totally understand you. Hopefully there always those who are willing to help us :)
Like they said to me, sometimes just searching through google and the documentation is a skill in itself, I found this nice little piece about patrol points for navmesh agents buried away in the Unity documentation fairly recently, had no idea it was there at all, it's obvious once you saw it on the menus but this is the problem with all these hidden menus and so on.
I'd say Maya is far worse though for that kind of thing.
https://docs.unity3d.com/Manual/nav-AgentPatrol.html
You're so right on this stuff
Thanks :)
Haha...totally agree! My boyfriend is a programmer, I don't see yet all the bad parts but I will suggest him to read this post:)
All of the professions have its own benefits and drawbacks, so I suppose that's fine :)
Nice post. Totally agree.
You might be interested in the book Tao of Programming https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tao_of_Programming
Thats nice post ! You are right . I am also a programmer and i see my life in your post. I live with my girlfriend and we stay together just for 2 hours in a better day . I try to work from home but i got lazy and now i go to starbucks to work and it is good because here is like a cowork space!