[edw519]

57, programming for 33 years with hardly a day off, and having more fun than ever.

My motivation? It's not about the technology, the tools, the apps, the business, the customers, or even the money, although any of those can provide plenty of motivation. And believe it or not, it's not even about the happy dance feeling I get when something I built works for the first time.

It's about the achievements of those who use what I built. Hopefully that'll keep my busy for another 33 years.

[IanDrake]

Frankly, there aren't enough of you out there.

As a consultant, I've rarely met a developer over 50 who's still interested in their job (however I wonder if they ever were).

In the few cases I have, it's been amazing. The stories someone with 33 years of quality experience can tell you about are eye opening. They can remind you of how far we've come, how what's old is new again, and how to adapt in an ever changing tech scene.

My father is 73 and still works in sales because he loves it. I'd hope to do the same thing in IT.

[tptacek]

I've met developers over 50 who were passionate not only about their job but about their prospects for learning new things. I think that's a character attribute that you either have or don't have, and I don't see a lot of evidence that it fades with age.

I have also met a lot of developers who are passionate about the lifestyle features of being a startup software developer but who are also willfully stuck in ruts like spending months cultivating positions about which testing framework best expresses the right testing methodology, or whether HTML is best generated serverside or clientside. They don't read papers, they plan on maybe one day learning C, but they wear the right t-shirt and are on the right IRC channels. These are things that might matter a lot when you're just starting out in your career but don't so much matter at all when you've got your sea legs.

There are a lot of those people and I think that may color our impression of which age bracket is most engaged.

[marquis]

The older programmers I know are in niche fields, like audio effects processing or hardware hacking. It's not a job, it's what you get up and do with your brain every day.

[dumb-dumb]

In other words, the interesting stuff! :)

[mehulkar]

Something's level of interestingness is more a decision on my part than a property of the something, I've found.

[gliese1337]

23, programming for, what, 14 years, maybe? And I hope I still have as much fun when I'm 57. I can certainly imagine myself doing so, for much the same reasons; it is partially about the happy dance feeling when something I built works, but long-term happiness and satisfaction come from seeing it getting used. It's really, really cool to see someone's masters thesis and think "I helped make that!" or drive by an elementary school and thing "they're using my stuff!" I may not be writing the same kinds of programs for the rest of my life, but I hope I don't ever get tired of writing useful software.

[Wintamute]

I think it makes more sense to start measuring from the time you started professionally programming ... so if the 57 year old parent has been programming for 33 years that suggests that he's measuring from when he left full time education (24). My apologies if you've been coding professionally since you were 9 though :)

[fooandbarify]

I wouldn't put it past gliese1337. I turned 24 yesterday, and I can honestly tell clients that I've been programming professionally for over a decade. (Obviously, my abilities/standards have changed since then, and so have my rates... hopefully that trend will continue!)

[robryan]

I picked up a few jobs online around that same age, 13-15. I don't think I really had enough drive to start picking up better jobs or taking on follow up work for the clients.

Was a better time in a way, not really needing money I was actually more happy just doing my own stuff and helping out with sites online I was interested in.

[mkramlich]

disagree. I have it on good authority that education begins from around year 0. And the folks that begin learning how computers work, and programming, at say age 10 are generally going to be much better off, and better hires, than folks that don't begin that step until age 18 or 22 or what have you. Getting a paycheck doesn't inherently teach you anything more about CS or engineering or development practices. It's just money. Having a job means you do get exposed to a lot more stuff around programming, like politics, bureaucracy, personalities, management, corporate shenanigans, methodologies, clients, customers, etc. Yes maybe even more exposure to certain technical things you might not have had exposure to it. But its more shit than shine.

[Wintamute]

My point is that if you go into your first job interview from college and say that you have 15 years experience then that's going to count against you because for right or wrong the question you're being asked is how many years have you been working in a professional work environment. By all means convince them of your passion, and explain that you've been doing awesome things with computers since forever. But "work experience" and "time from first exposure to computing" are two totally different things. Aside from that I agree with every thing you said.

[gliese1337]

Good point, but I'm not really sure how to judge that. I've been getting paid for it for about 5 years, but that doesn't encompass all the stuff that I've built that other people have found useful, which is the metric that I care about. So, 8-ish, maybe?

Anyway, the point is that I don't have 33 years under my belt, so maybe I'm wrong about how I'll feel in the future, but based on the experience I do have, I just don't imagine it ever getting old.

[Wintamute]

Yeah totally agree. I've got about 8 years under my belt (first proper coding job in '04 and I'm 32 now, notwithstanding a lifetime tinkering with computers though). Still loving it and learning new things every day, hope it stays that way :) I guess the point I was trying to make is the metric people expect to hear, especially in a work environment is years of experience in the Industry (capital "I") getting paid. I don't dispute that you have a internal metric too, which is awesome. I guess you have to compare like with like though.

[mkramlich]

I've concluded that the "years of work in [industry|<tech>]" meme is a fuzzy, noisy, unreliable and (close to) meaningless metric. Note I said "(close to) meaningless", because it is not completely. It makes the classic error of making an apples-to-oranges comparison. For example, too many people talk about "5 years of Java" as if they were talking about a 5 meter long pole. If pole lengths were measured in the same way as "years of Java", and you went to buy 10 different poles from different stores, each "5 years of Java" in length, you are going to be in for a nasty surprise. Humans are not commodities like a pole, brick or gallon of water can be.

[daliusd]

So it is about achievements of your paying customers using your technology business's apps you wrote using tools at your hand. Simply put you are happy that you have created something useful to others or there is something more?

[127001brewer]

My father worked with his hands for his entire working life; at the time, he tells me, he worked on the U.S. Coast Guard Eagle more than anyone else (such as replacing the entire decking, etc). It's something that he's extremely proud of and something he can actually show his grandchildren.

On the other hand, I build things that are, for the most part, abstract and virtual. I enjoy what I do because it allows me to be creative using technologies and tools that I enjoy working with. (And I really enjoy building entire applications from scratch, so much so that I will be creating businesses to really scratch my itches.)

I'm proud that an application that I built half a decade ago is still being used. But, for the most part, most of my work has a limited life-span. Is that so bad?

[ken]

I think that the example of a military sailing vessel (!) shows that almost everything people build with their hands has a limited life-span, too.

In many cases the lifespan is longer, but in other cases it's shorter. My malloc() is older than my car, even though they both still get regularly used.

[IanDrake]

I had a poster of that ship on my wall for about 10 years. It's beautiful. Your dad should be very proud.

[brc]

You should learn how to work with your hands as well. There are a lot of similarities to programming, and the things you make will last your lifetime.

[edw519]

That's pretty much it.

I'm one of those guys who comes to Hacker News, reviews what others have built, and immediately thinks 2 things:

  - That is so cool!
  - So what?

Like most others, I love playing around with widgets and technology just for fun and to see what happens. But the satisfaction from this is usually short lived.

I liken playing around with techology to running around and having lots of good sex with strangers. It's fun and it feels great, but sooner or later, you'll want something more substantial. For me, that requires the satisfaction of others. (This applies to both programming and sex.)

[goatforce5]

I build things that can help others have sex with strangers. I can quite clearly remember the first time someone came up and told me they were getting married because of my spare-time project.

[tluyben2]

My first big side project was that; I have received over a 1000 cards/mails/etc of people who are married and/or have babies because of that side project I created with my wife on vacation on the canary islands. We expected it wouldn't get more than a handful of members, but it had 10.000 after a few months and kept growing. Very satisfying feeling for something just built for fun.

[bubbleRefuge]

Link please ?

[proex]

Well, I'm going to get into the work of a real life programmer in a year or so, finishing my degree.

Quite frankly, I wouldn't want to be sitting in front of a desktop for 33 years of my own life. Not to criticize you or anything.

But coding my entire life, just doesn't feel right, well as of today and the classic cubicle/desk/chair environnement, maybe I didn't pick the right job, it just feels like a very individualistic/selfish job unless maybe your stuff is open-sourced. How much do you feel you contribute to the society , for example ?

Then again, I'm just starting in the domain, talking from 1 year of work experience and 3 of school experience.

[jebblue]

>> But coding my entire life

What about a brick layer, painter, electrician, school teacher, is there anything wrong with those people if they enjoy their work and dedicate their work passions to those professions?

>> How much do you feel you contribute to the society

Society doesn't pay the bills, companies do. Society is appreciating art, going dancing or having a barbecue.

[potatolicious]

edw519 is right - software as a field offers tremendous opportunities to create a positive impact on society. If you're not doing that, consider getting another job (it's not as if it's hard right now).

I've been in-industry for 3 years, and in that short time I have written software that:

- substantially reduced plastics, paper, and metal usage in packaging for the largest e-tailer on the planet.

- decreased fuel usage for shipments coming from said e-tailer.

- made air travel better by letting travelers know about delays, cancellations, and last-minute changes before the airlines even know about them. I even help them pick better seats on their flights.

- help people go on more fulfilling, more interesting dates.

I look forward to doing a hell of a lot more than that.

If you don't feel like your work matters, and you don't feel like you have impact on the world, do something else. Software is wonderful in that way.

[edw519]

1. Critizing # "Not to critize you or anything."

2. open source # the only way to contribute

My quick & easy response is #137 of my ebook (see my profile):

137. How do you put your skills to good?

I’ve always thought that the best way to put your technical skills to the greater good is through your day job, not instead of it.

Some of my days jobs have been to write software to ensure that:

  - people get the right prescription medication on time
  - firetrucks and ambulances get to where they're supposed to be
  - parts that go into cars and planes are properly certified
  - prisoners are kept in jail
  - those same prisoners get proper medical care
  - electronic equipment gets assembled properly and on time
  - medical supplies get dispatched to where they're supposed to
  - insurance claims are processed properly
  - quality data is properly maintained for food items

You don’t need to do charity work on the side in order to contribute to the greater good.

On the other hand, if you don’t think that the work you do during the day contributes to the greater good, then maybe you should consider doing something else with your valuable time.

Do good and get paid. You can do both at the same time.

[gknoy]

It is _tremendously_ inspiring to see that you can find such joy in things which are so very important (all of the things you listed) but which so many people would consider boring. It helps me put my own work in a better persoective. Thank you for sharing your insight and experience.

[jackbravo]

You just hit the nail. Yes, of course this makes much more sense if you are working with open source and you know your works helps you, your customer, and countless others that you even don't know about. How do people NOT working with open source keep up? I don't know, probably that's why they want to move on to something else.

And also, being a programmer in open source or free software is not only the programming, its also the community and bonds you make while contributing.

[testing12341234]

Completely agree. I've turned down many offers to move in to management positions over the years. People start giving me weird looks until I explain to them that coding is my passion, and I want to do it until the day I die. Any position that takes me away from coding is pretty much an automatic no.

[Tichy]

What kind of dev practices do you use? Would be interesting if certain habits keep coding enjoyable.

[wumpushunter]

Check out chapter 4 of his book, "Work Habits".

Available at http://edweissman.com/53640595 and as a PDF (top of the linked page).

To summarize: Use simple tools and eliminate distractions. At the end of the day, code and refactor away from the computer (on printouts). This forms the basis of the next day's work at the computer.

[crag]

49, programming since I was 15. I'll admit, now I'm in management. I still code. When I want to. And that's a luxury I can afford myself; "coding when I want too".

My days of 48-hours-staring-at-a-screen are over. Thankfully. I enjoy code much more now. Back when it was my job, it was a job. You know what's funny? I comment my code more now than I ever did when I was in my 20's.

[mengine]

This sounds pretty depressing to me. You're building the software that allows others to retire while you're a cog in someone else's wheel for another 33 years.

Why not build your own achievements?

[jerf]

You're presuming an awful lot in that analysis there.

Besides, who is not a cog in some wheel or other? In civilized countries, there is nobody who is at the top of all hierarchies, no King. It's a pejorative with no bite if it applies to all.

[JoeAltmaier]

Pretty cynical? You can have more or less autonomy in your life, that's very important. You don't have to be King to be your own boss; you don't have to be poor to be a cog.

[jerf]

I am a natural cynic, yes, but people tend not to pay you unless you are doing something that makes you a cog for some period of time. It's not a criticism you can just fling at someone when you don't know their context. An experienced software contractor who is picking and choosing their own jobs is still pretty autonomous. It's more about whether you can pick where you are a cog and for whom you are a cog, than whether you are doing something that somebody can point at and screech "COG! COG!". We live in a highly interdependent society, and I think that's largely a good thing.

[slurgfest]

Although I don't really use the word 'cog,' you are being uncharitable here; the word isn't completely meaningless and using it isn't "screeching".

The poster seemed to be distinguishing not on the basis of interdependence but on the basis of who has control over your life and the context of your work, and where the resulting profit would go. (This is, of course, my reading).

One part is your freedom. If you want to take a trip for a couple weeks once a year, or change your hairstyle or get a tattoo, and this is impossible because of company regulations unrelated to workload, this is coggy. Of course, everyone acknowledges that you have to work a certain amount of time and that if you are facing employees it helps not to have a swastika tattoo on your forehead, etc.

Another part is the alignment of what you are doing with your interests. If you are putting in 60 hours to pay the bills and learn a lot about SOAP on the way, that's coggy; it is not the same as choosing work that involves SOAP because it gives you a hard-on, which is less coggy.

Another part is what determines the broader role your work plays. Yes, everyone is doing work which fits into other people's wants (even the arctic explorer is playing to an audience somehow). But if you work for 8 months on something and it fails because customers hate it, you were still the one who chose that context - less coggy. It was trying an idea. If you work for 8 months and then it is permanently scrapped because the company came to a deal with Microsoft and your project was just a bargaining chip, that's coggy.

For the same reason, profits - if you are working in Hollywood and get paid an incredibly tiny amount for a hit movie because they got you with Hollywood accounting, that is coggy; it's less coggy if your profit is tied

Of course, this also means it's less coggy if you are taking on greater risk (financial, reputational, whatever). If you are very risk averse then you may prefer a coggier position. If you are very focused on one specialized skill, a less coggy position might force you to pick up other ones, so again certain kinds of people will rationally prefer coggier positions.

If the norm is for employees to be hired at low rates, dominated in every way possible, artificially hampered from building useful things, and fired on a dime, that is pretty coggy. If you are happily choosing your own jobs, leaving when you want, dictating terms, that isn't very coggy. Which is why you used it as your example.

[jerf]

In context: Do you have any reason to impute any of these issues to edw519?

The accusation of him being a cog without any apparent basis for flinging that accusation is what set me off, and made me use the word "screeching". You appear to have simply expanded on my point that there are ways of being more and less coggy, which is nice, but you seem to think you were arguing against something I said, though I can't find what. Yes, I already said there's a general point that could be made there, but the point wasn't made without a heaping helping of presumptions.

[sjf]

I love your terminology, I'm going to use this in the future instead of just saying 'corporate'.

[mengine]

I just find it sad people write themselves off as never being rich or running their own business. There are 16 year olds making 6 figures writing their own iphone apps yet people view their only alternative to programming is moving to middle management.

[stevewilhelm]

"16 year olds making 6 figures writing their own iphone apps "

The reality is there are very few people making six figures writing their own iphone apps. Even fewer that can sustain that level of income as a sole proprietorship for a couple of decades, which is what you will need to do to retire at fifty.

For every programmer who does create a sustainable business, fewer still get rich doing so. One reason, creating a wildly successful business is a completely different skill set from programming. Another reason, it takes a fair amount of luck for a company to become wildly successful.

Goog luck.

[Evbn]

"goog luck"

Great Fredudian typo, or greatest Freudian typo?

[georgeorwell]

Definitely a Fredudian typo, Freudian would have been "Good fuck".

[jerf]

You're continuing to presume an awful lot there. I don't see edw519 saying those things.

[bmelton]

Not everybody wants to be rich. Would it hurt anything if I had more money? Of course not, but I have everything that I need in life and I'm not that materialistic.

The man has been doing a job that he loves for 30+ years. Having had to work in places I hated to 'pay the bills' enough times in my life to grow weary of it, I understand the value of working on a good team with people I like and respect, doing what I love.

As the adage goes: Get a job doing what you love to do, and you'll never work a day in your life. Startups are fine and dandy, but trust me when I tell you, they're a ton of WORK. Even serial entrepreneurs will tell you that it's taxing, and not for everyone. I for one would be much happier nestled up to a keyboard, solving a problem than I would be doing many of the things one needs to do to make a startup viable.

In summation, everybody's priorities are not the same as yours, and I'd wager that you could stand to learn that lesson sooner than later.

[Evbn]

It's OK, one day you will get over your insecurities and inferiority complexes, and not fear people who are capable and comfortable of working on a team.

[mengine]

Be sure to thank your employer for their insecurities and inferiority complexes with your next paycheck.

[trotsky]

Being smarter than everyone else is awesome while it lasts. Be sure to come back in 20 and let us know how your plans worked out.

[outside1234]

Being a cog in the machine allows you to focus on the code (in a good company) in a way that being in a startup doesn't. I can totally understand and respect that.

[drumdance]

THis seems really short sighted. I consider IBM's Watson a great achievement, but the people who built it are all technically cogs in IBM's machine.

Achievement is what you feel inside. A large bank account is nice validation of a certain class of achievements, but not the only kind.

[nine_k]

Why is retirement worth pursuing at all?

If you do something that gives you no kicks and only pays your bills, then yes, throwing away that nasty but necessary source of subsistence feels liberating.

But if you enjoy what you're doing every day and have no problem getting up in the morning for that, you only want more, and "retirement" feels like having your favorite toy taken from you.

Imagine someone saying: "Mr. Tesla, when are you planning to retire from your burdensome and soul-crushing experimentation and retire to enjoy some front porch whistling?"

[mengine]

I agree with your retirement point but Telsa didn't exactly get satisfaction from the achievements of Edison while working for him.

[nine_k]

Tesla lest Edison's company in 1885, when he was 29. I think it's a bit too young an age for a retirement.

[mturmon]

Is your main goal to retire?

If you want to build big things, in most cases you can't work alone. In a big team, everyone plays a part. Call them a "cog" if you want.

And, sometimes the specialization that happens in big teams allows people (err...cogs) to really push the state of the art by engaging one hard problem for a long time.

[HeyLaughingBoy]

Everyone is a cog in someone else's wheel.

People don't get rich by simply taking from others (OK with a few exceptions); they get rich by offering something that another person/business/etc sees as a benefit worth paying for.

[bm3719]

Some people just don't have anything they want to achieve. Others may have that, but due to mortgages, child college funds, or other reasons, just have to make due with having their value extracted from them in an employee role. The most depressing of sights is those that have successfully convinced themselves this is a good parking spot to occupy the rest of their lives.

I'm pretty glad I realized what this article is talking about early on and started planning long term for my own exit, as I knew my tolerance for this was a finite resource that would be continually depleted.

[rfrey]

Your reply gives an impression of both a shallow and narrow definition of success and achievement.

[jackbravo]

Who says you will do this only while you are not retired? If you really enjoy it then you will want to keep doing it even after you retire.

And a programmer today earns enough to be able to do so at a good age.

[rehack]

I turned 41 yesterday. Have been programming for over 18 years. Like you I also love it. And since work coding does not offer me enough of a challenge always. I like to do some fun (challenge kind of) coding on my own. Some random examples of the fun programming I have done:

1) When I started out programming, some two decades back, I did a program which was tough for me then (I believe its a pretty standard program given to people who are learning programming). It was - 'How to place 8 queens on a chess board so that they don't attack each other'.

2) A C -program which prints itself.

3) More recently I read Norvig's solving every Sudoku puzzle (http://norvig.com/sudoku.html), so went ahead and wrote my own (without looking at his solution of course).

4) Solving this ('Going Office' on Interview Street : https://www.interviewstreet.com/challenges/dashboard/#proble...) one gave me immense amount of satisfaction, when I did a couple of months back. As I had not done complicated graph stuff earlier. I game my family a treat, just because I was so happy when all my test cases passed :-)

So programming has been a joy of my life. Hope to do it for many more years. Will try.

[ralphc]

50, programming professionally for 28 years, still loving it, currently enjoying Odesky's FP class in Scala on coursera.

[pradocchia]

I don't know how many times I've read one of your comments and thought, "I should move to Pittsburg so I can work with this guy." Your sentiments about programming and what makes it so compelling resonate deeply with me.

[northband]

Very nice - you have meaning which is the best.

[pigboy]

That used to motivate me too. But when I found myself in a job where my work no longer made that happen, I quit and changed careers (mid-40s). I just turned 50 and I am in my third year teaching high-school math, physics and computer science. It's like being born again.

[jmadsen]

youngster at 45.

can't wait till I retire so I can finally learn some of the fringe stuff I want to play with but have no time.

to me, being a programmer is living the life of a perpetual student.

how can anyone grow bored with that?

[Toenex]

Great point. I think a lot of us who still love programming after 20 years or more enjoy the constant change in the industry and the never ending opportunities to learn.

[eda]

I think that older successful programmers are essentially life-long students of technology.

[jufo]

Dead right. I'm 60 and I feel the same.