in reply to Oh, this wonderful place

I'm not going to say I disagree with the above, but as far as "9 to 5" programmers, while I don't understand the mindset, I would like to offer this article:

They write the right stuff

This is a little background on the people who write the 400,000+ lines of code that make the Space Shuttle work. They're a "9 to 5" lot. They have no "star" programmers. They don't believe in the chaos theory of programming. They don't write in Perl (*gasp*).

Now, I do have a friend, who is a "9 to 5" programmer. She's an interesting woman, extremely intelligent, graduated highly in her class, makes a damn lot of money hacking Oracle as it relates to PeopleSoft. She only recently got a PC at home, and it's a company laptop, at that. She uses it to check her e-mail, and the weather before her flights (she commutes weekly to Kentucky). She doesn't tinker at home with it, does no educational programming, doesn't surf the net. She's long been a dear friend of mine, but I've never understood this mindset. I'm a total freakin' geek. When I'm not at work playing with PCs, I'm at home playing with PCs, or messing with embedded systems design, electronics, or tearing apart PCs.

How can this be? How can someone who is so capable with what she does have no interest outside of the office in computers? I know I don't understand, and knowing her for 18 years hasn't answered the question.

--Chris

e-mail jcwren

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(ZZamboni) RE: RE: Oh, this wonderful place
by ZZamboni (Curate) on Sep 14, 2000 at 01:36 UTC
    Great article, jc. I find this whole thread very interesting, and I would like to add the story I know. My wife is a mathematician and actuary by education, but has been involved with computers for a long time, and now works as a sysadmin at the same place where I study. She is very geeky in some aspects - she enjoys technology and gadgets and never misses an opportunity to check her email. She is intensely focused in her work and very capable - she keeps a large network running, and she will stay late and come early as necessary to achieve that objective. But she also plays the guitar, likes to run and work out, is prepping for her upcoming GMAT exam, and has many other interests. Which means that she leaves at 5 and completely forgets about work to pursue other things. She almost doesn't tinker with the computers at home, and does not program for fun (although she uses Perl at work, of course). Me, I'm a complete and absolute geek, and find it difficult to stop thinking or talking about technology. Sometimes I find her "lack of geekness" disturbing, and sometimes she finds my obsessivity disturbing. We are very different in that respect, but that doesn't make her any less capable or technically able. It's just that she sees technology as a tool, while I see it as my life.

    So I agree that being a "9 to 5er" has nothing to do with the hours you keep, but with the attitude you have.

    --ZZamboni

[reply]
RE: (jcwren) RE: Oh, this wonderful place
by mirod (Canon) on Sep 13, 2000 at 21:46 UTC

    Does this make her less of a programmer than you?

    Lots of people have a life outside of their job, or outside of computing. I know it's a difficult concept to grasp but they do exist. And those people are no less interesting or valuable than pure geeks.

    The problem is not with people that only work 9 to 5, it's just with people who have no idea what they are doing, people who write crappy code and don't care, programmers who try to preserve their little kingdom, managers who change their mind every other day, you know them...

    Working 9 to 5 or 7 am to 12 pm has very little impact on how good a programmer someone is and how easy it is to work with them.

[reply]
      Working 9 to 5 or 7 am to 12 pm has very little impact on how good a programmer someone is and how easy it is to work with them.

      I completely agree. i alternate between being a full-time, non-stop, do-anything geeky possible programmer and leaving it all at work so i can have a life that doesn't involve computers. and i still write good, strong OO-perl, learn whatever i can to get the job done, and care ( almost neurotically ) about the quality of my code. but sometimes, people just need a break from it, clear out the mind, and go back to it fresh.

      some people just want the cash ( esp. here in Sillycon Valley ), some people like the work, and some people can only do nerdy stuff. it all depends on the individual.

[reply]
      jcwren has grasped my post nicely. Some folks are taking my "9 to 5er" title a little more literally than I expected. Thank you jcwren for reiterating what I meant. ++ for you :^)
[reply]
      "Lots of people have a life outside of their job, or outside of computing. I know it's a difficult concept to grasp but they do exist. And those people are no less interesting or valuable than pure geeks."

      I can definitely see jcwren's and BastardOperator's point. Perhaps it's not the issue of having a life outside of work, but an issue of having *curiosity* outside of work. The end of learning is the beginning of death.

      redmist
      redmist.dyndns.org
      email::redmist
[reply]

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