Comment by scarface_74 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by scarface_74 | Hacker News Reader

I’m sorry as someone who is 50 years old and started programming as a hobbyist at 12 in assembly and professionally at 22, I have no sympathy or advice for anyone who is not willing to transition to newer tech and according to you is actively ignoring clear transition paths.

My advice is for her not to be lazy and take advantage of the opportunity to transition to some newer tech.

Context: I got my first and only job at $BigTech at 46 based on my decades of experience as a bog standard enterprise dev + two years of AWS experience at a startup as a (full time) consultant working in the Professional Services Department. I didn’t open the AWS console and didn’t know anything about “cloud” until I was 44.

When I got Amazoned three years later I was able to find a job in three weeks working full time at another consulting company where I am leading “Application modernization” initiatives (cloud + app dev).

If she isn’t at “a stage in life” where she can retire and she hasn’t gotten over her addiction to food and shelter, if she wants to stay in the industry, she has to evolve.

The career path you're describing is exactly what she's trying to avoid. That's what "downshifting" means.

I am all for downshifting:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36306966

I never intended to make a life long career at BigTech and was never planning on staying at Amazon for more than four years.

I was always planning on going back to smaller less stressful companies and I’m still in the process of decontenting my life.

But “coasting” in the technology field is just not realistic. Eventually as she has seen, the ground underneath you is going to change.

Coasting is entirely realistic. There are still many jobs that require knowledge that has been releatively stable, that are not stressful. And it is perfectly fine to want them id you realise pay is going to be less than you could get in other positions. You are just being an asshole.

Agree with that. Look at the rest of the world. A car mechanic, electrician, teacher or chef would need to keep up to some extent, but not to the crazy levels of tech. Using the Chef example "Yes you are cooking 1920's Chinese cuisine this week, then next week we'll chuck you on a 3 course meal for vegans that is suitable for orbital space flight"

I said “in technology”.

> addiction to food and shelter

Pretty funny way to put it, yet very sad that this is the reality.

Isn't Oracle SQL still one of the most advanced databases? To some it may be the "new tech" you're talking about. I wouldn't use Oracle SQL for other reasons, but purely from technical standpoint it's one of the most advanced things in it's niche.

As part of a job yes. The original poster just said that the company she is working for expects her to do more than just write sql.

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