Lessons learned in 30 years of programming | Hacker News Reader

Lessons learned in 30 years of programming

crazyontap.com

56 pointswvenable7 comments

Give people credit, even if they don't deserve it.

This, a thousand times this. I'm constantly surprised by the effect that a simple, heartfelt "good job" can have on motivation. I'm regularly surprised by the effect it has on me.

We're social animals, this kind of response is wired in deep.

Nice article. I sometimes feel like the youth focus in tech really robs us of getting the perspective that grizzled old timers who've seen it all and done it all have. Bonus points if they still cut code more than they attend meetings.

The comments on that post are reasonable, but the comments on the linked stories about

the most negative people in my thirty years of programming

are really god awful. That's pretty screwed up community there.

> "It pays to share everything you know."

The article states something about a "boss" not being too happy with you if you don't share everything...but my question is, do you guys think it's best to share everything you know even if you're self-employed or own a small business? Or does this statement/suggestion only hold when being employed by someone?

Specially when you are self-employed you should open up the barrier. This brings interchange of ideas. It is not only you who gives knowledge away, you also receive insights and ideas from people _inside_ your target industries. How else do you want to stay up to date in your race against an ever faster changing worldwide knowledge base?

In fact, I am quite curious if there is a certain connection between Kirkhoffs law and opensource software (well, open-idea-software, but giving out ideas is almost as good as giving out source, but giving out source definately is more than giving away an idea). Recall, Kirkhoff's law dictates that the security of a cryptosystem must not depend on the secrecy of the system itself, but on the secrecy of the key's involved (and probably P != NP). And now, remember again: There are some ridiculous well-going open source programs (linux, gcc, ...) and even more, there are certain really well going commercial open source systems (such as mysql). Thus, I am pretty curious, if there is a similar kirkhoffs law for software (as in: the commercial success of a software can be achieved even without keeping the source secret, or something similar).

not really sure about the validity of your overall point, but at least for mysql I would say that's a one off.

most open source software is not going to be ridiculously profitable, and buyng mysql was a desperation for sun which didn't pay off.

not every startup can open source their code. some can, as reddit did, but this would not seem to be advisable from time zero, more something you have the luxury of after you dominate the brand/space.

that said, I tend to share everything knowledge related and not worry about it, trust to karma.

there are many forms of wealth.

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