Desafinado

Java. It's old school enough that it gives you a sense of real programming, while also shielding you from the lower level elements of C++ and C. It's also still widely used.

This isn't a trivial topic. You guys might not understand how terrifying the prospect of joining a country where 6 year olds get shot in their classroom is. It's not a joke.

Please, let's not normalize this idea. No Canadian in their right mind wants to become American.

Trump is a lunatic, end of story.

I drink coffee that's a mix of 33% regular / 66% swiss-water decaf. It's the best of both worlds, you can keep yourself awake but you're not getting the huge highs and lows of regular coffee.

My flow has been massively stable since I started doing this.

Leonard Cohen's 'Book of Longing', because life is about more than work and money.

I agree with this, although I'd add that study becomes exceptionally useful after you've reached the senior level.

Until you've seen most of what the software industry can throw at you, study isn't that useful. But after you've seen it all you'll be quick to glean the relevance and importance of new concepts when studying.

The book 'Positive Discipline' by Jane Nelsen was also instrumental to our approach.

Acted as an actually good parent, not just someone who plays one on social media.

Read books about parenting, paid attention, did required medical tests and advocated with healthcare.

Purchases? Healthy food, mostly.

Underground Empire by Henry Farrell.

FWIW, I'm a vegetarian and drink fair trade coffee. Some of these decisions aren't things from which we have a choice. I need clothes / a computer, I can't function without them. I can function without working for Meta.

Ah, the space is key. Thought my count was off.

The U.S. election is going to reverberate around the world, it's not just apathetic Americans who are impacted. And misinformation absolutely contributed to the result, but I'd call the bigger player Fox news. All that being said, harms from Meta aren't limited to misinformation.

When I'm at the pearly gates I don't want to be someone who 'maximized his salary and didn't give a fuck'. To each their own.

I'm trying to find the name of Mr. ____________. Would love if there was a name attached to your comment. Any takers?

I think it can depend on who's using it.

Personally, I live in a city with no natural community. I'm married but have no family here and only a couple acquaintances. I tried to quit Instagram a couple years ago but just ended up more isolated than I already am.

I think this type of situation is common for a lot of people. Social media is the glue that ties us to friends in distant places, which is why it's successful.

If you have actual community available to you quitting is much more doable.

Social media has it's uses. For most people it's a way to kill time, which they usually have too much of. I don't see anything wrong with that.

Like you I find a lot of what people share boring, but I have had a few nice friendships made possible by social media. Without it we would have lost touch a decade ago. And there are many others who are only a click away because of it. Maybe some of these relationships aren't that important, but so what? Why not maintain ties?

To me the real enlightened view is to use social media as a tool while not letting it consume your life. Take advantage of the ways it adds, while avoiding the negatives. But to each their own, if people prefer to get off of it completely that's ok too.

I need Facebook for Messenger, all of my contacts are there. It would be unwise to delete Facebook completely, which is why they still have so much market share.

Instagram is for staying in touch with fringe friends, it's mostly awful now but stories are still genuinely pleasant.

But I mostly spend my time on forums, RSS feeds, Mastodon, Reddit, and e-mail newsletters. That's where smart people can be found.

A question like this can only come from someone who doesn't know how specialized books can get.

'Ten things to know about being a manager' and similar aren't specialist books.

I think among programmers (introverts) a lot of them just don't want to leave their house. They're happy sitting at home, gaming, and drinking beer. Which might account for why the interest isn't always reciprocated.

If you're someone who actually likes to go out and do things, introverts make terrible friends. The extreme extroverts I know are always doing things together, because they want to.

In my life I eventually realized that I'm a thoughtful and sensitive person in a world that generally doesn't think of others. I'm the one who reaches out first more often because I'm genuinely interested in and curious about my friends.

I think the key in this situation is to recognize when the interest isn't reciprocated. If someone consistently disrespects you or pays no attention to you then you're barking up the wrong tree and need to move on.

That is if you consider things like joining a running club a normal and natural way to find long term companionship. That's not really how our brains work.

Poetry, although I wouldn't say that I started with no natural talent. I was already a good writer.

I've been doing it seriously for twelve years now. Three years ago I finally took my writing to a professional critiquing site to refine the skill. Now I'm pretty much where poets hope to get to.

I've produced three books, one public.

The problem with this logic is that our working conditions are a part of society, and in the modern age are a major source of our well being or lack thereof. So if everyone's suddenly trapped in their basement that's just yet another problem with modern society that we now have to deal with.

What I find more disturbing is that in my company's case the result of the pandemic seemed to be random and based on nothing but financial logic. My department supported a hybrid situation almost entirely but the powers that be didn't care, they did the easiest thing. Before the pandemic we couldn't get one day a week remote because it was a 'security risk'.

I have to admit, since the pandemic started the entire conversation around WFH has centered on economics and efficiency, and I've found that very disheartening.

When my company went remote I was suddenly cut off from a handful of friends who I haven't spoken with in four years now. I'm bored and socially disengaged, lacking friendship and largely isolated to my wife and children.

Nobody ever talks about things like this, only what's the most 'productive', which I think is a glaring mark on how people operate and think. There is now an entire class of people who are being excluded from social camaraderie because the majority is happy working in pajamas.

All of that being said, now that my kids are in school I've realized that WFH is far more convenient. But can we please stop pretending that the lifestyle is the dream it's made out to be? If companies aren't offering opportunity for social engagement it can be a real problem.

In any sustainable role you should get some natural lulls here and there where you can do a little extra during work hours. I don't intentionally block time out, but if a few hours present themselves I'll often take advantage of the extra time.

It's not entirely unrelated to your job if it's making you better in your current role. And if your employer doesn't contribute to your growth, you really need to take it into your own hands.

I'm not sure I'm in full agreement with this. Yes your network has a big impact on your success, but your network is going to be a lot more helpful if you're a skilled developer who delivers.

Put another way, if you put in the effort to become a consistently excellent developer, that's most definitely not going to hurt your career prospects. If you're mediocre and cause problems people will be less likely to refer you.

Problem solving ability is proportional to the pre-existing knowledge you have. So if you continually learn more, you'll naturally become a better problem solver.

This means reading, mostly. And I'd add that sometimes the gold can come from very unlikely places. So read widely.

One good way to do it is to follow Kent Beck on Linkedin. He's constantly reacting to other software influencers, and if you like the point of view of the other influencers, follow them too. Over time follow who you like, unfollow who you don't like. I'd also recommend following Jason Gorman.

And sign up for a Mastodon instance and create a software list. These people are much more candid there than they are on Linkedin.

97 Things Every Software Architect Should Know. Hands down. I just came across A Philosophy of Software Design and it looks good, but I haven't finished it yet.

My experience has been that 'programming' is largely about learning best practices, single responsibility, modularity, writing efficient, clean code. There are no real special books necessary for this, just read the industry standard recommendations.

But if you want to set yourself apart from others you need to study software design and architecture, and follow the big industry names on social channels. Designing software is more of an art and figuring out how to do it isn't immediately obvious or easily attainable from books. It takes years of experience and wide reading, and a lot of what I've learned about it has come from social media, not books.

I'd echo this advice. It's a tale as old as time, young workers chasing money, status, and prestige, only to realize later that they gave years of their life and energy to a faceless corporation.

If you want to optimize for money and time, what you're looking for isn't how much money you can make, you're looking to find the perfect balance of money/stress that will satisfy your financial needs. What is the lowest salary you can make which will still meet your lifestyle needs. You want to aim for that.

Try not to lose sight of the fact that we pursue money for financial independence and leisure in the future. But if your job is one that you enjoy and doesn't burden you, then you can fast forward to the leisure part right now. Every day of your working life will be easy and stress-free. That's huge.

I'm not quite sure you understood the question. I didn't say I was capable of building Firefox, I said that what I have been paid to build has never been complex. I'm wondering if that's common. People building Firefox or Linux isn't the typical programming job.

I'd say that having an active Github and Linkedin account is a good idea. Github to show at least something, and Linkedin to collect contacts and skill endorsements.

Endorsements may seem trivial, but if you have a boatload of managers and devs endorsing you it does lend itself to your credibility.