That's certainly true, about bad habits, tilly. Ego is another issue that can be poisonous. My personal experience is that the need to solve problems on multiple levels does more good -- by a large measure -- than the bad habits do harm, and I'll comment more about ego down below.

My definition of greatness (or 'senior programmer' status) is based far more on one's ability to gauge what parts of a problem are worthy of more applied brilliance than others. That does not appear to be yours, though. You seem more concerned with ability to work to an API defined by a team and write elegantly maintainable code. These are admirable traits in my book also, but (honestly) I've never worked much in group development environments. I am, I suppose, much more a rough-and-ready programmer with lots of odious habits. ;-]

As for your 'group shop', if we turn it around, how many kids are you (collectively) mentoring? We all know that you can generally write code faster than you can explain menial coding tasks suitable for learning experiences. If you're not supporting some, you're making my point: that small-to-medium groups cannot support mentorship opportunities, and big ones are not worthy learning environments. I heartily agree with another responder who said that many bigger shops have dead-end programmers who can't shine a dog's @ss. One of the reasons I rarely get in to larger shops is that those are the ones who get chosen to give interviews. ;-]

Be that as it may, I don't disagree with anything you've said, but I stand on my case that anyone sharp enough to survive the hot seat is capable of learning to code defensibly and in a shared environment. The ego is the sticking point. They can, but will they? It took me a lot of years to learn humility. I never wore my ego on my shirt, but it was definitely riding on my shorts. I "knew" I could solve anything in programming, given tools and time. Now, at least I know that not all problems are made of bits and neither are all solutions. :D

I never really had a mentor, because I was a better coder and analyst than anyone I worked with, but I did have some good (non-programming) teachers who were proud to point me towards the prize rather than the competition. I guess that's the real key in integrating a team member: is the achievement worth more to him than the race?

Now, I'm getting to the point in my career where the young guys are definitely better coders than I am. Here in Austin, they grow up speaking C at the breakfast table and C++ at tea. (Perl, of course, takes up Saturday afternoons out in the garage). However, I'm still valuable because of that early seminal training in recognizing the prize. It isn't really about how much syntax you can crunch before noon, but rather how much closer you get to release by 5.

Don Wilde
"There's more than one level to any answer."

In reply to Re^3: Where are future senior programmers coming from? by samizdat
in thread Where are future senior programmers coming from? by tilly

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