If you could go back to before you became a developer, would you still do it?
Posted by Leopatto@reddit | ExperiencedDevs | View on Reddit | 175 comments
Recently, I gave a talk and a lesson at my old secondary school to a class of 14–16 year-olds learning IT - simple things, learning HTML, using Scratch, etc.
When I asked how many wanted to be software developers, almost all of them raised their hands. I didn’t have the heart to tell them the job market’s cooked and most of them probably won’t find work easily.
One kid asked if I regret becoming a developer. I told him no, that the money’s great, especially as an owner, but I couldn't really answer the question.
It’s just gotten kinda boring. Everything’s “AI this, AI that.” Before that, it was “big data,” before that something else. It just feels like we’re constantly chasing the next buzzword. Cyber-Sec is probably the next big thing.
I honestly had more fun showing them how to build bar-charts in Jupyter Labs using Python and teaching them some simple SQL syntax than I did in the last couple of weeks attending client meetings.
Fuck, maybe I'm depressed?
pa_dvg@reddit
When I was in college 24 years ago it was “all the development jobs are getting shipped to India”
Despite our collective poor track record at predicting the future people still seem to think every bump in the road is a forever thing. It simply isn’t.
Things will always change, to me that’s been the best part of being a developer. My mom was a city school secretary. My dad painted cars. Their entire professional lives were more or less the same every year. I’ve always had new things to learn, new industries to play in, new ways of working. It’s been a great way to spend my career. I’d happily do it all over again
DisneyLegalTeam@reddit
There’s a whole list of times this industry or others have been “ruined”
When excel came out people were dropping out of CPA programs.
Each time. Demand went up.
onceunpopularideas@reddit
One day the chicken gets its neck wrung.
clotifoth@reddit
Okay now I get why programming and developing are different. Only took forever. Thank you!
balanced_humor@reddit
Aka Jevons paradox
drakeallthethings@reddit
Yeah, I graduated college as the dotcom bubble burst. This was back when there was real concern that maybe the internet as a marketable thing was just a fad. Maybe it’ll just revert back to being for hobbyists building websites for fun and for piracy. That didn’t happen. The market recovered and grew.
There will always be people saying the sky is falling when things are bad. My personal experience has shown me the people who love this profession will find a way to survive in it. The ones who see it just as a paycheck will find another way to get a paycheck.
To the original question, the only thing I’d do differently is get a math degree instead of a CS degree and then get a masters in CS. Waiting a couple of years to go into the professional workforce wouldn’t have cost me much and I loved the upper level mathematics courses and wish I had taken more of them.
TheTacoInquisition@reddit
I mean, even when the doomsayers are actually right, it's always just a shift in how things work.
When cloud started replacing onsite infra, it didn't get rid of the need to sys admins, they just changed job title and got on with it.
When "big data" came along, it didn't kill off the need for regular data, it created a new segment of the tech industry and got lots of analysts further into tech as data scientists.
When factories got automated it killed off some jobs, but created a bunch more, and made a lot more demand for factories as consumerism ramped up.
Change is a part of life. The people saying the sky is falling are welcome to go find a different career, it'll make it easier for the rest of us to adapt and reshape the industry with some new ways of doing things.
pydry@reddit
And got a pay rise with that new job title.
theDarkAngle@reddit
I mean, I'm sure 24 years ago some people did say the field would be ruined by outsourcing in the near future, but that would have generally been considered a poor prediction even then.
And beyond that, in general we hear a lot of predictions at any given time, of varying. So you'll always be able to look back and point to a bunch of previous times when you heard something said by a few people that was just way off.
bicx@reddit
I heard the same thing as I was choosing my college degree in 2004. I’d already been working on software projects as a teenager, and I knew that’s what I liked, so I did it anyway. Had no idea what an adventure it would be in this industry.
TruthOf42@reddit
Ditto. It was the only thing I was good at. Even if the pay was shit, I think I would have still done it. My first software job was in 2005. I got fired during the Great Recession, and didn't get a software job for another almost 3 years. The job hunt since then has been easy peasy since then.
boreddissident@reddit
I am a college dropout with exactly one employable skill, regret isn't an option.
MattKeycut@reddit
Nope, I’d go to medical school as I initially wanted. 🤷♂️
Away-Progress6633@reddit
Yes
Longjumping-Light177@reddit
Sounds like you should go into teaching
nikpmd@reddit
No, I’d get a specialization in a different field like material science or chemistry and add programming as a minor.
AntiqueConflict5295@reddit
i would probably try something different.
sleeping-in-crypto@reddit
Not for a second. I’d find something else to do not on computers, something with my hands. Even if I used them as a tool I would not want to be a software engineer, neither the career I’ve had nor as a new one now.
Garbage profession that has built every horrific tool with which we now find ourselves embattled and embittered.
newEnglander17@reddit
There's tech jobs outside of the tech industry though. Being in IT in healthcare is different than being IT at Uber
vom-IT-coffin@reddit
Id go back to being a developer over becoming an architect a 1000x over.
djslakor@reddit
Software architect? How come?
The_0bserver@reddit
Yes.
patrislav1@reddit
Sounds like your issue is that you transitioned from technical work to management and found out it’s less fun. Duh.
I stay on the technical side even if it makes less money than non technical work. What is a couple bucks more if you’re miserable for it.
_indi@reddit
Some developers are so out of touch. We are privileged to work in such an exciting field that is well paid and generally very comfortable - working in an office or at home.
Some people are working jobs that absolutely destroy their bodies, long hours every day, or just straight up hard work.
Our biggest complaint is “too much AI hype - I wish I’d never done this”. Come on.
screwnarcbtch@reddit
Tech is destroying both my mind and my body
qxxx@reddit
yes... not just now because of ai but I have phases where I regret not learning something better, something maybe more simple. Engineering is stressful af and if you get comfortable with tech / project, something new comes around and here we go again... I always wanted to become a butcher or zookeeper.
godwink2@reddit
I might have done EE instead. That seems to have a solid mix of coding, problem solving, and can’t be off shored or replaced by ai
Militop@reddit
NO!
dauchande@reddit
The market will recover from AI hype in a couple of years. They’ll be fine.
local-person-nc@reddit
First it was covid and now AI. Sure it'll recover one day but fuck that doesn't help me for an entire decade of garbage. Like is that really the justification to not worry? Oh the market will be shit for TEN YEARS but after that it'll be fine...
vailripper@reddit
COVID was the craziest tech market I’ve ever seen, if you were struggling then I don’t know what to say…
local-person-nc@reddit
It was the right after that turned into a shit show. Then came AI to close the deal.
LoaderD@reddit
It's so funny to see this sentiment because you instantly know the person isn't a good dev.
I'm not even a 'strong' developer, but I know people working at top tier companies and none of them are doomer-pilled about AI. The only ways AI is cooking the future is it's making learners lazy/dependent and it's become the boogeyman that reddit-doomers blame for the bad job market, when it's really saturation due to spiked demand from low interest rates during covid.
local-person-nc@reddit
It funny to see this sentiment because you know instantly the person can't think outside the box. It doesn't matter if AI is good enough to replace jobs or not, it's if investors think AI is good enough to replace jobs. 🤡
LoaderD@reddit
Try investing some time in building your skills instead of doom-posting on reddit. You need to talk to some people who actually understand finance. No serious investor thinks AI will replace all coders, unless they’re shilling to pump and dump something before the bubble pops.
You definitely should worry though because even the smallest OS models can follow the prompt “you are a redditor. Tell me about how bad the tech job market is due to AI.”
dauchande@reddit
Yes, silver bullet syndrome. Bean counters always thinking that software engineering is like currency, fungible, when it’s not. They eventually figure it out when their stock eventually tanks because they cannot get offshore to build as well as onshore. They’ll eventually figure out the same with AI. It’s just gonna take some time.
It won’t be ten years, it’ll be five. It doesn’t help that we’ve been in a recession for two years that no one will admit.
Amerella@reddit
That's why I'm quitting tech to become a stay-at-home mom. My husband is also a software developer. He's better at it than I am, and he has the CS degree (I have a math degree and was recruited into it in 2008). This shit is becoming too intense for me. Too many unreasonable deadlines. Too many assholes. Too many people desperate for work and willing to work hard for crap wages. Well guess what?! I don't need to deal with this shit anymore because we have built up a good savings as DINKs for a good long time before having kids, and now we don't need to settle for this shit. He can continue having an income and I can manage things at home. It's too much to have two intense full-time shitty jobs and two demanding little kids!
Oh no, I'm giving up on my SHITTY fucking software career. I fucking HATE it at this point! It's absolutely miserable and I have no more fucks to give. I'm sick and tired of being treated like shit and constantly living in fear of getting laid off so that some dumb company can try to replace me with AI only to discover years down the road that good developers were not in fact able to be replaced with inferior technology that they are incorrectly labeling as "AI".
local-person-nc@reddit
Damn wish I could just give up like that. Must be great to take all that and give it all to your husband to worry about by himself.
Amerella@reddit
Being a stay at home mom is a lot of hard work even though it's not paid work. We are consciously choosing to separate duties. He appreciates that I will be taking on a huge amount of work at home so that he can focus on paid work. One day when you have kids you'll understand. I'm actually taking a big risk by giving up my financial independence, but I trust him.
local-person-nc@reddit
Have kids thanks. Ain't all that plus once they go to school then what? You're done in tech.
Amerella@reddit
Yep! I'm ok with being done with tech forever. I have made peace with that. I am planning on starting a second career after my kids are older. One of them is already in school. Actually, the fact that he has summers off now was a big part of our decision. We tried signing him up for aftercare and summer camp through YMCA and he hated it! There was a bully who was twice his age and twice his size at aftercare, so we had to pull him out. He also hates babysitters, so it was causing so much stress to have to figure out what to do when school is closed (which happens all the time... Teacher work days, summer, winter break, spring break, Thanksgiving break, holidays that most people don't get off, etc. And the school day ends at 2:55 when I still have a couple hours left of my work day!) Now we won't have to stress about this. I can just be with him during those times.
He also most likely has some type of neurodivergence (either ADHD or autism or both), so he was starting to need to have to go to a lot of specialists which was eating more into our work hours and stressing us out. I'm coming to terms with the fact that I have a special needs child and that will absolutely impact my career. My kids come first. When I decided to become a parent, I realized I was taking this risk and I knew there may come a time when I would have to make this choice. I had seen it happen to so many moms that came before me, especially when they had more than one child.
Having kids isn't for everyone. In fact, when we got married, we were both adamantly against having kids because we heard how hard it was and how ridiculously expensive it was. But we changed our minds because we realized we really wanted it and started to hear more positive things from people. They conveyed that although it's hard, it's also very rewarding and absolutely worth it. All of that turned out to be true. I'm glad I didn't have kids before I was ready. I'm an older mom now and that's ok. There's downsides to that, but there's also downsides to having kids young.
We are fortunate enough to be able to make this decision because we are now in a strong financial position. We have the luxury of losing one of our two incomes because that one is enough to afford everything. Plus we have a large amount in savings/investments. If and when I do go back to paid work, I won't be choosing a career out of financial necessity. That opens me up to a lot of different options - perhaps working at a public school, perhaps working with kids with disabilities, etc. I don't know yet but I don't need to decide right now!
MsonC118@reddit
This. I'm a self-taught software engineer, worked at FAANG, and joined because I loved it. The one thing I never expected? My pure hatred for what it has become, the management, and all the other BS to boot. I'll never go back for any amount of money. I came from basically nothing, had food stamps, had to build my network from scratch (no friends, relatives, etc... to ask for help), and more. I earned everything I ever had, including the knowledge I have. Screw this industry.
So, I left, built my own companies, and also self-funded and ran my own hedge fund doing stocks and futures. Work hard, then work harder. Just never work hard for the wrong people. These types of "I went to an XYZ school and my daddy got me an interview" drive me insane, so I beat them the only way I know how. My companies also have a *strict* rule on *not* hiring from Ivy League schools. We even prioritize self-taught devs over traditional. That's the beauty of running your own business, you can do whatever you want.
Amerella@reddit
I love this!
MCFRESH01@reddit
Im self taught but never worked at FAANG. I’m at a decently funded startup with a big valuation. I hate it. I’ve been doing it for a decade now and this job has destroyed my will to work in tech anymore
MsonC118@reddit
Yep! Startups are a crapshoot, I've worked in a few. It's usually got a few pros, but the cons are usually way worse than corporate. Startups are fun for me due to the creativity and impact you have.
I agree, I genuinely want to buy a farm, a prop plane, and just leave modern-day society.
peach113@reddit
Hahaha ur funny 🤣
KremBanan@reddit
Covid was good for tech. Market has only been down about 3 years like any other sector, following interest rate trends (real reason).
ares623@reddit
It’s a good thing the human body can survive on nothing for 3 years
MissinqLink@reddit
Everything follow the interest rates. I thought I was learning tech. Ended up learning macroeconomics.
mq2thez@reddit
Interest rates and Trump’s tax changes hurt the industry, yeah.
boomer1204@reddit
Obviously no one can tell the future but i'm with you on this. I hate when ppl are going into College and ppl are like "don't bother what a waste".
Moleventions@reddit
Spending a few hundred thousand dollars for an "appeal to authority" credential isn't worth it anymore.
Objectively you'd do so much better learning CS on your own.
Obvious exception for MIT / Stanford / CMU
Sporkmancer@reddit
If you're spending a few hundred thousand dollars to get a comp sci degree you got fleeced. If you don't have a degree, it's really hard to get interviewers to listen to how much you've taught yourself.
greensodacan@reddit
I'm finally starting to hear finance podcasts talk about the bubble. How the same handful of companies are investing in each other, how the big AI companies (Anthropic, OpenAI) aren't profitable, how searches for generative AI tools are way down ("slop" isn't fascinating anymore), and of course how software companies are realizing it doesn't actually save that much time.
Supposedly, the big question at this point is who the next AOL or Yahoo will be.
TheTacoInquisition@reddit
I think the most telling thing is that the quarterly projections based on AI performance are just not possible. So the companies who invested themselves on those promises and are not actually getting the outcomes and are starting to get pissed off. This is possibly going to have some backlash on devs in general ("why did YOU make it fail?"), but ultimately, will stop the purchasing of AI tools and solutions to the extent we're seeing right now.
When the dust settles, and companies realise that spending on AI credits just doesn't give them the return they wanted, they'll limit it accordingly, and some of the grifters will go away.
necrothitude_eve@reddit
AI will survive and be useful, but the current LLM technology has the appearance of a several-billion-dollar industry, not a multi-trillion dollar reshaping of humanity.
RedbloodJarvey@reddit
IMHO AI is taking all the blame for the economy slowing down.
Before AI was such a big deal Musk started the massive layoffs when he fired half of twitter and the site didn't immediately crash [I do not, and never have used twitter, I have no info on it's reliability]. They used to say "Nobody Gets Fired For Buying IBM". Now you can say "No CEO is going to get fired for copying Musk."
We're still recovering from measures taken during COVID to prevent a global crash. The economy is slowing down, companies want to cut costs, and at the moment AI is a socially acceptably excuse for laying people off.
20 years ago if a CEO didn't have a game plan for off shoring everyone he risked losing his job. That seems to have stabilized. I suspect AI will as well.
PeachScary413@reddit
Your car doesn't immediately break down if you stop servicing it. Fortunately, most CEOs are still intelligent enough to realise you should probably keep servicing your car anyway.
Top_Cryptographer363@reddit
I don’t think it’s AI. It’s unstable political conditions, tariffs, inflation, interest rate. Seems like it’s largely more of USA problem
Slggyqo@reddit
No lol.
Before I got my first job a developer making $130k, I was making $70,000 dollars a year.
I get that the job can be boring and that many of the bits that appealed to us are abstracted away or automated.
But let’s not be dense yeah?
This is still a great job, even if it’s not a great job market.
Leopatto@reddit (OP)
Perhaps I should have added 'aside the money part' in the title 😅
SolFlorus@reddit
If money didn’t matter, I’d be mowing lawns. Money very much plays into why I’m a software engineer.
Alkyen@reddit
You also ignored the hours part. Or the 'being treated like shit part' many others jobs have. Not even talking about working conditions. I wonder OP, have you only worked as a dev professionally? No other jobs? I've noticed most people who complain about IT have never spent any time doing another profession.
Leopatto@reddit (OP)
IT has been my whole life. Never worked anywhere else.
Alkyen@reddit
Yeah that makes sense. I'm all for looking to improve things and I do think complaining is useful. But it's also good I think to get some context about what other jobs look like. You'd be surprised how much they are just as boring or even worse, only they also have a couple of other disadvantages. We got it pretty good in terms of new technologies coming and stuff. I used to be a teacher in a school and also a fitness trainer before I started professionally in software engineering. The first thought of going back to either of my previous jobs is 'I will be really bored'. We got it pretty good as far as jobs go.
Tehloltractor@reddit
Me reading this in the UK and crying. It's much harder over here to use salary as a justification for staying in a career I'm losing my passion for.
SableSnail@reddit
It’s still better than the alternative jobs though, as all the jobs pay significantly less than in the USA.
But yeah, it’s still painful, especially when you look at net pay.
_predator_@reddit
Even if you make around £60k which I think is a realistic salary for seniors, you still enjoy many perks and / or don't suffer from as many of the drawbacks of most other jobs. And pay is still good, relative to what value we all actually add to society, which is not a whole lot if I may say so myself.
basicallydan@reddit
Yeah, I’d do it again but I’d also tell myself to focus on some other, more people-focused career paths on the side too instead of just spending my free time on software side hustles.
fissidens@reddit
I was working 10hr night shifts as a CNC Lathe operator before switching careers. I'd get home at 3:30am covered in machine oil, slept terrible, and was only making around 65k.
I also met my wife through software development.
I could get laid off tomorrow, never make another cent as an SWE, and I'd still not regret it.
midnitewarrior@reddit
In 6-8 years the pendulum may be swinging back in the other direction a bit. People will retire, people will exit the industry. The new technology wave of what comes after AI may be starting in its infancy by then.
yaboyclifff@reddit
No
marzer8789@reddit
AI this, AI that.
pffft.
AI dog shit. AI still can't do what I do. AI fucking bubble.
chain_letter@reddit
So a non technical type person just needs to ask for exactly what they want? With detail, and all the corner cases thought through?
Phew yall had me worried we'd be replaced for a second
canuck_in_wa@reddit
And know when it’s wrong. And how to fix it.
If anything, the skill of being able to go deep on a problem - meaning understand enough of systems and hardware to design, build and debug - will become rarer as more people outsource their thinking to LLMs. I am not anti-LLM, but rather treat it as a sharp/dangerous tool to be approached with caution due to its potential cognitive impacts.
pl487@reddit
In the end, it wasn't that they didn't have the technical knowledge to do it, it was that they didn't want to because it was hard.
muuchthrows@reddit
Yes, and it's not even technical knowledge at this point. Understanding and breaking down a complex system into manageable parts is hard work.
pl487@reddit
I would argue it's work that's not even that hard. It's just thinking. I used to consider it the easy part, before the coding part got easy too. I always wondered why people wouldn't engage and just write down all the things they want the software to do instead of waiting for me to code it and then tell me why it sucks. Now I understand. It's easier.
muuchthrows@reddit
What is easier? The coding or designing the software?
Because I feel like the more I see stakeholders vibe-coding the more I realize they don’t have the patience nor honestly the skill to do either the coding or the thinking… They refuse to actually design the system regardless of if it’s in code or to an LLM.
cool_and_nice_dev@reddit
Oh my god how have I never thought about it this way before. This makes so much sense
tommy_chillfiger@reddit
Lmao well said.
raralala1@reddit
My problem is not exactly with AI thou, my problem is with how easy it is to retain software once its made, big company start doing this one they notice rapid continuous development is not necessary, better mass hiring and mass firing rinse and repeat, we are in mass firing era, the people who get fired will make similar product rinse and repeat. I am not complaining, and most industry is like this but I think in tech everything just happen so quick.
mmahowald@reddit
They can ask for one piece of a complicated puzzle. The second one they ask for a second one to properly integrate with the first one it will burn to the ground. Source: I use AI quite a lot. I play with it a lot too.
mattp1123@reddit
What do you mean by owner. I’m new into tech currently pursuing my Bs in IT and curious what type of businesses I could eventually start 5-10yrs down the line
Leopatto@reddit (OP)
My company is mostly specialising in logistics and how IT can improve these kinda companies. Mostly custom built software but lots of implementations and maintaining third party that's already available
mattp1123@reddit
I’m in BSIT right now at WGU but debating on doing logistics and supply chain management I was a truck driver for 15 yrs would you do that instead of it. I know it’s personal preference but are remote jobs available with the logistics and supply chain degree
Leopatto@reddit (OP)
Sure, my company offers remote-first. But yea, I personally know lots of companies that do offer remote opportunities in logistics & supply. It's there, but it's a battleground with people from all over the world so it could be tough.
Glittering-Alps-3573@reddit
my mother was a small town librarian and my father a middle class federal worker in the 80’s-90’s. we lived a modest but fine life. my current self built net worth from my career is 7 million. so, no, i wouldn’t
Expensive-Storm-3522@reddit
Honestly, yeah, I’d still do it, but I’d approach it differently. When I started, coding felt exciting because it was about creating stuff and solving problems, not just keeping up with trends. Now it’s easy to get burned out chasing whatever’s “hot” in tech. I think the trick is finding a niche or side project that reminds you why you started in the first place. Those small, fun builds are what keep it from feeling like just another job.
jaktonik@reddit
Knowing what I know now? 100%. I'd major in psych, or get certified in electrical and HVAC, and either way own my company and do my own work. I'm a weirdo that hates remote development for money, it feels like the shittiest version of being paid to play a text-based video game. Working in an office with the community of coworkers is great, but then you have to be careful to be well-liked unless you want to improve your chances for being a severance candidate, and most tech companies have the bizarre-but-pervasive habit of disconnecting engineers from their positive impact. Code is really easy for me and all the concepts come naturally somehow, but I just hate the emptiness of being disconnected from the people I'm actually doing the work for. The users, clients, etc. Of course there are a number of B2C software companies out there that I could find that sense of connection with, but it's a rigged dice roll to get an interview these days even when fully qualified, and most B2C companies are a small fraction of the opportunities out there.
Of course if my own software ideas take off and make real money, my tone's gonna change overnight, but up til now it's all been emotionally downhill from college. Still wish I'd been a psychologist or tradesman.
Grandpabart@reddit
I would but I'd be looking out for new companies, new opps and trying my own things.
bobsbitchtitz@reddit
When I grew up it was always become a doctor or lawyer. Then people said go into tech it’s great money with no degree why bother with the other two. I never believed the whole no degree thing but i loved tech so I became a Swe. Being a software engineer is a lot of fucking work.
You have to spend countless hours of self study and countless hours of continual learning to keep your job, stay competitive and get paid well. This track is a lie to tons of people who are simply pursuing it for the $$. I used to teach too and I could tell the difference in the students who wanted to do it purely for the money and the ones who genuinely enjoyed the work. Not that you can’t do it purely for the money, it’s just going to be a massive slog.
DaRubyRacer@reddit
I would make it clear that communication and coordination are far more important than development itself.
potatolicious@reddit
Psst. This is the same for every other profession they can choose from.
If I can get something off my chest - and OP, this isn't solely targeted at you, it's just a general attitude that I find really annoying.
We had a few years of the hottest, easiest job market known to mankind in any field where you practically just had to put your hand up for someone to start throwing money at you. And now that it's over we have a whole set of people treating anything-but-that-job-market as a nuclear wasteland. Let's all touch some grass, yeah?
The job market isn't 2021, but it's humming along. Hiring is picking back up after the layoff waves of the last two years.
More importantly, when it comes to people choosing a career, what are their other options? You think lawyers, doctors, and non-software engineers have it easier? What we do is still one of the cushier gigs on this planet, even without the ZIRP money cannon.
Massless@reddit
I made the decision to go into software instead of being a professional classical musician. It haunted me for a long time but I don’t actually have any regrets.
At its best, my job is building Lego all day. I love the stability and I have time to pursue my interests outside of work.
Somebody pays me to do something I enjoy — that’s basically the definition of a dream job
Low-Imagination-4030@reddit
I did the flip, spent 20 years making less than $30k a year ‘making it’ as a classical musician, and hustling side gigs and teaching to not starve. I’m almost 8 years into it work and I will gladly endure the cringiest code reviewer or insane project manager for the rest of my working days.
AIR-2-Genie4Ukraine@reddit
I was working in construction before getting my degree in the early 90s, every time I take a coffee break and look at the poor crew working their asses of under the rain I remind myself that I could be in a wayyy worse place
whipdancer@reddit
I was working as a warehouse supervisor 2p-2a, 6 days a week, before I decided something had to change. After I learned the basics of programming, the worst temp job I had as a programmer was still better than the warehouse work.
Zapsy@reddit
Same lol (somewhat). It amazes me how unaware some people are about how good they have it, and how they would like to "work with their hands'. Unaware that that means monotonous tasks for long days in crappy weather.
Alkyen@reddit
It's always funny how the most vocal haters have never worked another job in their lives. If they did - they wouldn't complain nearly as much about the job being 'boring' or 'uninspiring'.
DannyOdd@reddit
If I could go back, I would change my major to CS or ECE - I went for Informatics, which was billed to me as "CS but with less math", but really ended up being more of a "tech generalist" degree.
whipdancer@reddit
To answer the question - Yes. Unequivocally.
I don’t see what OP’s describing as boring. It’s par for the course.
Background - no college, taught myself how to program using the record macro feature in MS Excel 5.0 in ‘95 working a temp office job at some corp for $7-ish bucks an hour.
I spent the next 7 or so years working as a temp programmer, staying at a given assignment anywhere from 4 weeks to 6 months.
My skill set has been obsolete at least 4 or 5 times in the intervening 30 years - I don’t see this change as being any different. It’s up to me to adapt or not. Regardless, the developer role is changing, but no one knows what that will look like. Most importantly, it is not going away.
beachandbyte@reddit
Of course, I get to understand how the new “world” works and build toys in it. I couldn’t imagine going through all this crazy change and just looking around me and not understanding how it all worked.
RedditNotFreeSpeech@reddit
I wouldn't. I'd start a company building high quality American made ovens and live in a van down by the river.
kasakka1@reddit
When I was younger I wanted to become a graphics designer.
I am so happy I became a software developer instead. More work opportunities, better pay, still creative work.
VulgarExigencies@reddit
I would still be a developer but I wish I could enjoy programming again
HaveAVoreyGoodDay@reddit
Nope, I should have become some form of mechanic like I originally wanted. Software development was the backup plan I settled for.
It's not even a case of the grass being greener it's that that type of work suits me far better.
Elementaal@reddit
We need to go back and start teaching kids from where it all started: hardware
HTML,CSS,JS became a gateway drug for everyone to get into software dev. People are just chasing whatever is the newest thing on the frontend. Hardware and backend dev is not quite as trendy.
No_Try6944@reddit
Where is data analytics still currently “the hotshit”? Seems like data science and analytics jobs have been hit even harder than swe
pwnrzero@reddit
Software goes through heavy booms and busts. Finance is much the same. By the time those highschoolers graduate college they may well be in another tech boom.
gardinit@reddit
I'll be that one. Yes I would have went into another engineering discipline. The university I graduated from had the same track of courses for the first two years for all engineering pretty much. I would have problem chosen civil engineering.
YouDoHaveValue@reddit
I think I'd prefer to be an engineer or an electrician.
More practical work.
SableSnail@reddit
Yeah, I think if I did something else it’d be Mech Eng or Electronic Eng or something.
It’s nice to actually build real things. Plus the pay for engineers isn’t too bad either.
prb613@reddit
I hate the uncertainty. I'd probably go to med school.
SableSnail@reddit
That has its own problems though like unsociable hours depending on your post, having to be on-call etc.
EquivalentAbies6095@reddit
Yup same here. I did a master in cs and if I just shut up and did another 4 or so years of schooling I coulda been a doctor. Not counting residency of course.
EuroCultAV@reddit
Hell no
slgard@reddit
Yes.
It's been a very interesting journey from HP3000s to Google Compute. From Fortran and BASIC to Haskell, Rust and now Copilot.
Would I become a developer if I was starting now?
Absolutely not.
Everyone is going to be a developer to some degree so you need a specialism.
Now, I think I'd be a materials scientist or a micro-biologist instead. Or an astronaut of course.
thekwoka@reddit
Yeah, and I'd buy more bitcoin.
superdurszlak@reddit
Possibly, though I'd avoid the career path I ended up with - stuck at various corporate, dealing with more and more politics with zero success at that - Java as leading language, it really keeps my options limited and the projects usually aren't that interesting - doing backend development, with some DevOps, CloudOps, security and whatnot sprinkled on top of it
I'd either go into academia, doing much more interesting STEM work when I had a chance (computer simulations for terminal ballistics and such) OR I'd push to get into more interesting fields than some Java corporate mumbo-jumbo, OR I'd push for a DevSecOps or similar path from the beginning.
dc0899@reddit
I'd still do it.
It's fun to build systems.
xmBQWugdxjaA@reddit
Of course, what else would you do? As a Europoor, tech is the only field that lets us access American capital and be paid up to 100k instead of 30k in most other fields.
randomInterest92@reddit
I was lucky and had an easy time finding a job but even today I would still go for it because I've tried many things before I got into software development and everything made me depressed as fck. Software development is actually very enjoyable to me
frankieche@reddit
No.
gyosko@reddit
I feel you. All this AI shit hype is driving me insane as well.
UtopiaRat@reddit
I was in law/compliance before. Coding is more fun.
CyberDumb@reddit
As others said market slump is not forever. Secondly I must add that developer definition (at least in reddit) and the doom and gloom about AI has to do largely with web development. I work in embedded and I do not see much impact either from slump and AI. Embedded does not pay as well but I enjoy the low competition and I genuinely chose this field because student me liked learning how machines work.
However, my biggest problem and disappointment with this career (and I suspect with everything around us) is the enshitification of the field. Most (even technical) decisions are led by business people and this makes engineering harder and miserable for everyone. During my 9 yoe I only had two projects that more or less engineers made most of decisions, with minimal supervision and it was the best time ever. Out of these projects, one was also a big success the other was cancelled after two years because of political reasons even though results were great. The rest of projects kind of have the same success ratio but business people made most decisions which made the work miserable (ever-growing bureaucracy, meetings to organise meetings, stupid decisions that set us back and running to catch deadlines, unrealistic deadlines, being in a position to always justify yourself, ticket-factory organisation etc.). As business people falsely believe they understand tech and bureaucratize it more and more, I expect the situation to get worse and worse.
I love engineering. I am glad I have the chance to do it professionally. I do it as a hobby anyway. When I was unemployed and doing gigs I still did it because I love it. However I do not want to deal with the people-drama of the job. If money was not a factor and I could be unemployed I would just do it for a hobby or contribute to open source.
Adorable-Fault-5116@reddit
Probably not.
I don't think talking to magic sand all day is the best idea for your mental health.
In retrospect I wish I had trained in something that was more attached to real life.
The grass is always greener though :shrug:
whooyeah@reddit
I didn’t choose to be a developer, it chose me. I majored in biology. But the code, it calls me.
RegrettableBiscuit@reddit
I love my job. The only thing I would do is to tell my young self that loyalty to a company is a one-way street that will only hurt you, and never be rewarded.
gomihako_@reddit
Yeah. But I would chase FAANG hard, invest in nvidia, and now be retired.
Noah_Safely@reddit
If I could go back I would focus on my physical health and financials. Once you get financially independent you get the freedom to make choices about what you wanna do with your life. At this point it makes zero sense to do a career change so I'm grinding another 3-5 years and trying to retire early.
Then you can do what you want. Consult, work on OSS, get a non-tech "hobby career".
So I probably wouldn't change anything, I did a bunch of startups that were fun, but I'm not where I should be financially or with health.
DadJokesAndGuitar@reddit
Of course. Having a fully remote job these past years has been unbelievable. What other career pays you to sit and home and solve puzzles all day?
TopSwagCode@reddit
Ages ago when I was studying they recommended people not to study computer science. Because there was already enough. I went and did it anyway. When I was finished there was huge need for developers because people didnt study it.
No one knows what the market looks like in 2,5,10 years.
But cool you went out talking to kids. When I was 15 I was reaching myself Html, javascript, php, photoshop etc
otakudayo@reddit
Hell yes. If anything I would have tried to get into it earlier. I was late because I always thought you had to be really smart to be a programmer.
I love what I do. My corporate job is fine, pays well, and I have amazing WLB and awesome benefits like 100% WFH.
But beyond that ... It's like knowing magic. I can do so many cool things with computers. I build my own tools for all kinds of things. I have various scripts I can quickly run from my terminal for some of my repeated workflows, I've built a bunch of different tools for my side hustle, and I do Unity3D game programming as a hobby, where in addition to building my own complex systems, I also build editor tooling.
And yeah, AI is a thing. It used to be like I was casting spells with a branch I broke off a tree. Now it's like I have a Wand of Wonder. It's amazing, but if I didn't already know magic, I'd probably burst into flames when trying to use it. (Ok, it's a poor analogy if you actually know D&D, but I think I made my point)
colonel_bob@reddit
I literally cannot imagine what I would be doing if I wasn't working with code to solve business problems... so I'm getting a little worried that I can't find a job related to this after 12 years of experience doing it
I'm much better at doing my jobs than I am at interviewing for them, and so if I can't interview successfully for a role I've literally done for the past decade, I have no idea how I'd successfully interview for something I've never done before
tommyk1210@reddit
I think there’s a critical difference between “would I go back to 16 year old me and tell me to do it differently” and “would I tell 16 year olds today to follow the path I did”.
The path I took was undoubtedly a great choice, at 32 I earn more than most, have a colleagues I love working with, work in a role that it challenging but fulfilling, and have gained excellent experience even outside of the software engineering part that is transferable to other roles.
Would I recommend people get into my line of work today? That’s much less certain. 15 years ago it was absolutely a great career choice, one of the most in demand and the market was great. AI, interest rates, macroeconomic factors and the like are definitely depressing the market, but also I’m just not sure it’s as great a career choice for those joining the bottom of the ladder today.
I’d definitely, therefore, exercise caution before recommending this path. If I did recommend it, I definitely wouldn’t recommend they do what I did (I had a non standard journey to where I am today)
Dissentient@reddit
No, it's the highest paying job that I have the aptitude for and that I don't outright hate. And considering that I'm now also remote, I can't imagine any alternatives that are even close.
The AI hype only helps because I invest most of my income.
the_aligator6@reddit
Seriously, what other job allows you to make anywhere from 100k to millions per year, work remotely from anywhere in the world, all without going to school for a decade or putting your health at risk?
I'm typing this from a farm in the middle of nowhere with a super low cost of living, working a remote job that puts me in the top 5% of earners nationally. Name a single other career that can give you that.
AIR-2-Genie4Ukraine@reddit
I started in the 90s, semi retired now charging clients a lot of money for not cleaning their tech debt a decade ago.
Yes, IT has been stupid money for mediocre results. 80% of what makes it difficult (coworker is lazy, management is clueless, the business is held by duck tape and tears, etc) could be said about ... pretty much any other profession, but without the confortable middle to upper middle class salary that comes with coding
the_aligator6@reddit
I work for an AI company and just got headhunted for a job at a one of the big AI companies for 800k/year in SF. Dev's bitching about buzzwords are so lame. Ride the wave and get that bread. AI sucks, so what? who cares? job market is cooked? yeah maybe for schmucks. I'm on schedule to retire before my parents do thanks to AI.
amareshadak@reddit
Every career has its waves. We adapt and keep growing, that's what makes us great engineers!
lostmarinero@reddit
No ragrets. Building stuff is awesome
justUseAnSvm@reddit
No, definitely not. I wish I did my undergrad in CS, not biology, and although I benefit from my academic bioinformatics work whenever we need to do any sort of statistics or experimental design, I spent a lot of time studying things which will never come up as a SWE.
People tell me the markets bad, but personally, my career has only grown over the last three years, and I have more projects/opportunities than I can actually fulfill. Good, economically focused engineering work will always be in high demand.
The one caveat I'd add to kids, is that going into CS commits you to a field where you need to strive to be the smartest person in the room. That's not going to be every room, and it's more than okay sometimes be the least experienced person, but overall the field requires that you learn today, learn tomorrow, and learn forever.
RedbloodJarvey@reddit
No.
But to be honest I don't know what I would have done. Sure learning new things and the power that being good at software gave was fun when when I was younger and full of energy.
But then life got busy, I have a house to keep up, kids to raise, family to visit, community organizations to support, places I want to go, things I want to see while I can still get out of a chair on my own.
Now I just want to go to work, put my time in, do an honest days work, then go home and live the rest of my life. I'm sick to death of yet another arbitrary deadline, yet another tech tool I have to learn, yet another design pattern to master, yet another domain to learn, etc.
Michaeli_Starky@reddit
Absolutely. Software development is amazing and fun. Can't see myself doing anything else in my life.
Smok3dSalmon@reddit
For every 5 tradesmen retiring there are 2 taking their place
Motor_Fudge8728@reddit
Heck yeah! I’ve always loved coding, Thanks to the different dev jobs, I’ve lived in South America, the Caribbean, NYC, San Francisco, Chicago, Atlanta… now I don’t travel but I work remotely do interesting stuff for a series of startup. I really enjoy learning new languages and paradigms, and apply them to build cool stuff and get paid pretty well. I would do it again in a heartbeat….
veryspicypickle@reddit
Absolutely. I knew this is what I wanted to do when I were that first qbasic program.
mq2thez@reddit
People have been telling me web development was a dead career for more reasons than I can count since the dotcom burst.
I watch so many people chasing hype cycles or following trends or whatever and I just focus on doing what I enjoy. Turns out there’s a lot of money in building websites at big tech companies, but even if there wasn’t, I just enjoy building things that people use.
anotherrhombus@reddit
I would have accepted the job working at an Inn in a remote location in Ireland. (I'm American). Being poor in Ireland is significantly more interesting than being afraid of being poor in Michigan. Truthfully, it was 16GBP an hour forever ago, which was more than I was making at the time. I was just too scared, probably would have been fine.
Specific_Ocelot_4132@reddit
Yes, but I would have gotten into it in 2008 rather than waiting until 2016.
Specific_Ocelot_4132@reddit
Nobody knows if that’s true. Even if the demand for software developers goes way down, the number of kids pursuing careers in it is declining too, and if that declines faster than the actual number of jobs, the relatively small number of developers will still be in high demand.
Glad_Manufacturer_95@reddit
I think some people are made for this industry and some are not. I've come to the realization after all these years that I am made for this industry, but nobody else thinks so. I feel like I'm doing a little dance in these interviews over and over again and despite me being able to do what they ask me, because maybe I didn't do it the way they wanted or expected, I'm moot. It's people speaking from a place without context down to someone who is doing their best. It seems like my best is not enough, even though I personally think it's better than their best.
diablo1128@reddit
Yes. I majored in CS because I enjoyed solving problems with code. It never had anything to do with money or anything like that. I will keep doing something related to being a SWE for my entire career. That may mean management or something and that's fine.
ryaaan89@reddit
Hell no.
hand_clapping@reddit
Cloud destroyed the problem solving fun of coding by making us all glorified sales engineers for AWS and Azure while paying for their certs.
The current AI bubble is taking whatever fun was left out of it all.
It's a shit profession full of technically incompetent middle and upper management who are hyper focused on nebulous bottom lines that lead them to outsource and embrace "AI".
We're beyond fucked
mmahowald@reddit
Considering I got a home and can support my family for the past six years, I’d absolutely keep doing it.
Breklin76@reddit
10000%
dbxp@reddit
Yes definitely, but then I was the computer nerd who wanted to go into IT from like 5 years old, originally I wanted to be a video game dev but then pivotted to more general dev as I heard about all the issues in that industry. Maybe I'd go more into cyber as that was and still is a strong interest of mine and I've always enjoyed the puzzle of finding obscure bugs rather than shipping features and all the stuff which comes with general product development.
besseddrest@reddit
hell yeah
Re7oadz@reddit
I'm only 3 years 5 months in my career at a very big company but it changed my life. I would absolutely do it again, I have a talent for it
Tacos314@reddit
Being a developer is amazing and we will always need developers.
pl487@reddit
Maybe, maybe not. I had other options. I would definitely explore them more thoroughly.
If I was a kid today, definitely not. Even the most generous interpretation of the AI revolution makes us into code janitors who do work that anyone could do but no one wants to, not valued partners in the process.
shagieIsMe@reddit
There was recently some question on /r/genx about what the first post was and its early history on Reddit. Someone claimed to have found the post... and it was a link to an article about the troubles back then...
Chasing through web archive... https://web.archive.org/web/20090313032440/https://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29497408/
I have no regrets from '00... nor '09... nor '20.
cur10us_ge0rge@reddit
Yup. Best money around.
PixelPhoenixForce@reddit
probably not ;_;
AnotherAverageNobody@reddit
yes but I would have applied myself way harder. Start learning as a teen and try way harder in school and my first jobs. I feel like I'm playing catch-up with myself for just coasting along for most of my career.
boomer1204@reddit
I wish I would have started earlier. 2 job coming up on 7 years. I think I got super lucky. I truly truly just enjoy solving problems.
The first job was a Startup building something with Vue/web that really hadn't been done with Vue/web before so there was always a cool new ticket (and I was new so it was SOOO much fun).
Then I got my second job at a huge financial company. I got hired on by an internal only team again building something pretty unique which while i'm only coming up on 2 months the problems i'm solving are still REALLY FUN.
Now I do not all dev jobs have that and I might change my answer if I was doing boring stuff.
I feel like such a debbie downer too when my friends found out my new job (too me like 4 weeks to get it) and the pay everyone is like "teach me teach me" and it's like ehhhhhh if you had no interest until right this second I probably wouldn't LOL
I do think we are gonna see a swing back in a couple of years since the majority of ppl making the AI decisions are usually not the ppl that should so I think companies and their head w/e titles are gonna see it doesn't replace engineers as everyone thinks/says it does/will
GeorgeRNorfolk@reddit
You have no idea what the job market will be like when the kids are leaving college. And if tech is bad, many other markets will also be bad.
Your view does feel clouded by your personal circumstances. Being bored of buzzwords isn't a reason to dissuade kids from going into tech.
Leopatto@reddit (OP)
I don't think I dissuaded them. Frankly, I like to believe that I showed them something new and interesting as none of them had any previous experience with Python and data science.
Who knows, maybe one of them will become an ML engineer :D
WobblySlug@reddit
Yeah, for sure.
It's allowed me to live the life that I have now - which is work remotely and be around my family, and provide the financial support so that my wife to be a stay at home Mum while my kids are young.
I feel the same, the AI crazy is exhausting - but it's here and it doesn't seem to be going away any time soon, for better or worse. I like to think that one day I'm going to be paid shitloads of money to un-fuck all these vibe coded projects, but who knows.
My job ebbs and flows, but hey it's something that I get paid quite well to do something I don't mind 8 hours a day. It keeps me learning, and I'm proud of it. I'm also more than a software engineer, as in that's just one aspect of me - but saying that I would one day like to move into an industry that gives back to the community and heaps people directly.
AlaskanDruid@reddit
Nah. Getting paid $6/hr for a gov job isn’t worth it.
Alternative_Work_916@reddit
Yes, probably earlier. I don't have all the hangups other people do. But I never had any interest in FAANG or other such business.
livando1@reddit
Well said