Ask HN: Interviewed for Developer and offered Tester position | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Interviewed for Developer and offered Tester position

2 pointsbluerail3 comments

First off, I am a beginner programmer trying to break off into a programming career.. I am currently in a SysAdmin job..

I recently interviewed with a company for a developer position and after all the Interviews are done, their CTO suggested me to get into Automation Tester position before moving into development since they are using Python (I program using python) for tests and GO and Node.js for development..

What do you think of? Is it possible to switch to development once I'm in? How much coding will I do at the Testing job?

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I'm a software engineer at a gaming company and have never worked as an 'Automation Tester' but have worked with them on my team so I can only speak from my observations.

You will write code and are encouraged to build well designed software. However, the problems you are addressing are slightly different and there will be less emphasis on writing quality software compared to writing production code (a bit ironic). On the other hand, you may get some exposure to the codebase in which you could learn from.

Knowing a particular language is handy but that is hardly ever my concern. Your goal should be to master software design principles. You want to know what patterns will make your solution the most performant, maintainable, reusable, etc. With that in mind, pick whatever path will teach you that the fastest.

Depends on the company.

I would not hire any programmer who only knows python. I am a silicon valley CTO. This shows a technologist at the very earliest stages of their development.

Going carefully through online courses in Node/Javascript, Java, Scala, Objective C, Go, Ruby, PHP and writing example programs in each one should take you more than a few months of nights and weekends, but is the kind of work a programmer enjoys. In my first 10 years in the valley, I worked most weekend on my own projects, I would occasionally take a full weekend off. I still have to learn new things many weekends, just to keep up.

The good news: no one cares about "certification" or "classes". The bad news: you're on your own. Learn a few languages.

Should you take the job? If you want to be a programmer, what's the environment where you'll be able to learn on your own? Which gives you the most free time, and access to Gurus?

Thanks.. The company is a pioneer in Movie industry and they have various software products ranging from editing tools to projection technologies at theaters...

As you said, it would exactly give me the environment to sit with like minded programmers and learn from them, but I am little skeptical whether I will be able to pick up another language for development while doing the testing job... Also, not sure how much programming is required as part of a Tester's job...

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