Programming as an occupation

gobby

As I'm sure some of you are aware, I have been on work experience for the past few months. I am writing VC++ code. I still have a year to go in college (studying computer engineering).

The course is based on electronic engineering but with a couple of subjects that are soely about computing.

I actually transfered into this course. I have a diploma in applied electronics.

So when I finish the course I have two possibilities that I can see. Either go into programming or into electroni engineering.

So far my work experience has had its ups and downs. The company is fantastic and the work that is done here is extremly interesting.

However, I am unsure if it suits me. I have always had quite an interest in computers and programming. (I learned GWBasic when I was 7). But I dont know if I could stick sitting behind a computer screen for the rest of my employed life.

As I was good at programming when I was studying for my diploma I never needed to study for any programming courses I was undertaking at the time. The result being that I got quite lazy and uninterested with programming.

I had to apply myself a bit during the work experience (and I will still have to do more, of course) but I dont know if I really like being fustrated all the time wondering why something isnt working and constantly debuging.

So, I'm kind of unsure about what a programming job is really like. I have had a small taste of it but I am also quite sure that there must be quite a bit more to it than I have seen.

So, to all the programmers out there in boards land...

Did you feel like this when you first started working in the industry?
Does it get better?
Is programming quite a high pressure job?
Do you find that you enjoy it?
Is the money good?
Do you get sick of sitting behind a screen all day?

Thanks people. I'm just unsure of what direction I should be looking to at the moment. Any input is appreciated!

[edit] Appologies if I am rambling a bit. Bloody knackered today! [/edit]

silverside

Did you feel like this when you first started working in the industry?
Yes

Does it get better?
Yes, when you know what you are doing it gets more fun as you try to find the best way to do something and design and code it, not just get it working

Is programming quite a high pressure job?
Can be, depends a lot on who you work for

Do you find that you enjoy it?
Sometimes, sometimes not, again depends on whether the end product is interesting and what the work environment is like.

Is the money good?
Not as good as it used to be, but it is still a steady office job with reasonable pay. There is a limit on how much a programmer gets paid so you will have to move into management / analysis / working for yourself to get lots of money.

Do you get sick of sitting behind a screen all day?
Yes, I did, very much so. after 5/6 years I wanted a change so went back to college. In some places there is more design/discussion/variety in the working day.

The Corinthian

Originally posted by gobby
Did you feel like this when you first started working in the industry?

Not really, but it was a hobby for me or years (I even got a prize for it in the late eighties in the Young Scientists), but it only became my profession in my late twenties, after years of working in numerous other areas. By that stage I had a much clearer idea of what I wanted to do than I had in my early twenties.

Is programming quite a high pressure job?

Depends on where you are and what your role is, just like any trade or profession. SME’s will tend to be more deadline orientated, so the pressure and hours will be higher and larger corporations or, in particular, the civil service will often be more laid back and burocratic. Additionally, the more responsibility you take on in a job the more pressure you have and so accordingly an IT director will be under more pressure than an analyst or team leader, who in turn will be under less pressure than a rank and file coder.

Essentially it can be the most laid back or the most high pressure job depending upon your circumstances, ability and vocation.

Do you find that you enjoy it?

Generally, although as with any job there’s always ****ty projects and difficult clients that must be tackled. While I may change profession again at some stage in the future, but I doubt if I’ll ever stop programming for fun.

Is the money good?

It can be, but it depends upon both your ability as a programmer and your ability as a negotiator in job interviews and salary reviews. It’s certainly not as easy to command a big salary as it was a few years ago, but that’s not such a bad thing as you can still command those salaries if you’re good enough and there were too many people in the industry because they thought it was the new Wall Street - wannabe Gordon Geeko’s, as it were

Do you get sick of sitting behind a screen all day?

Of course I do, but I’m not a pure programmer, so I don’t have to. I spend as much time talking to the carbon units as I do coding. If you don’t fancy the idea of sitting behind a screen all day, you can (with experience) move towards more management, sales or analysis roles that will get you away from the screen for much of your time.

gobby

Thanks a million for the replys lads... Plenty of food for thought now!

Manach

Did you feel like this when you first started working in the industry?
I did not release the software engineering also needed as much people skills as it does, and also the emphasis it places on bug fixing

Does it get better?
If you get the chance to move on to other different projects and keep changing skills, yes it does


Is programming quite a high pressure job?
Normally not, if you can work out a decent flow chart of work for your project and get an agreement with your manager - if not .....

Do you find that you enjoy it?
Work is work, but you get occasions where you come up with a clever hack that saves time/effort, and then you really feel good.

Is the money good?
It is indoor work with no heavy lifting - Money is ok but there is always the sense that Upper management would like to explore the option of outsouring.

Do you get sick of sitting behind a screen all day?
What, and miss reading boards.ie, never.

gobby

Originally posted by Manach

Do you get sick of sitting behind a screen all day?
What, and miss reading boards.ie, never.

LOL

Evil Phil

Did you feel like this when you first started working in the industry?
I started as a tester before becoming a programmer but yes I knew it was for me.

Does it get better?
Yes

Is programming quite a high pressure job?
Sometimes, its like any job that involves deadlines.

Do you find that you enjoy it?
Yes when I'm working on something interesting. Sometimes you end up working on boring, uninspiring projects. Those projects can drag a bit.

Is the money good?
Since I started working for myself its good. Not millionaire good but it provides a middle class salary.

Do you get sick of sitting behind a screen all day?
No, I have other interests and like TC my work isn't just pure programming. I don't know if this is what I'm going to do for the rest of my life. Come the next recession I'd like to have other business interests that can carry me through.

gobby

Originally posted by Evil Phil
Is the money good?
Since I started working for myself its good. Not millionaire good but it provides a middle class salary.

Do you get sick of sitting behind a screen all day?
No, I have other interests and like TC my work isn't just pure programming. I don't know if this is what I'm going to do for the rest of my life. Come the next recession I'd like to have other business interests that can carry me through.

Thanks for the replys everyone.

@Evil Phil:

You are working for yourself. Hmm... Never thought that it would be possible as a programmer to work for one's self. Who do you get work from? Do you work from home? Was it tough going at the start? How on earth do you advertise yourself to potential customers?

Recession... Christ, never thought of these. I'm guessing that programmers get hit pretty hard when one of these comes around. How badly have people been affected by recessions in the past?

Morpheus

heh...

Did you feel like this when you first started working in the industry?
Loved it initially, I was trown in at the deep end, began coding on my first day of real world work.

Does it get better?
After my 3 years, I hope so
See my thread
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?s=&threadid=173942


Is programming quite a high pressure job?
Sometimes, generally i find that in small fininacial companies with small IT teams it can be extremely high pressure, especially if your on crap wages.

Do you find that you enjoy it?
I did at one time, but right now? lets put it this way, all i want to do is join the army!!

Is the money good?
Muck, complete and utter muck, my mates a plasterer and he's earning STACKS of money for his 2 year apprenticeship, meanwhile id 4 years of hard slog in college, and now im earning less than when i began.

Do you get sick of sitting behind a screen all day?
Really sick, i cant even play computer games at home because i get flashbacks of work... dont mind glancing at boards.ie over the weekend though!

Hobbes

Did you feel like this when you first started working in the industry?

I started it as a hobby, and was amazed people were paying me for stuff that was so easy to do. I also had one my programs showcased in Young Scientists (although I wasn't told about it, found out when I got there).


Does it get better?

Depends on what you define better as. If your in it for the money your going to have to move away or work to a management/architect role which means less coding and more design.

Is programming quite a high pressure job?

It can be. Depends a lot on the project and deadlines. You also have to be continually learning new technologies both for work and what is upcoming. Otherwise you can see youself becoming redundant to those who do know the technology.

Do you find that you enjoy it?

There is a lot more to coding. Bug fixing, testing, reports, etc. The coding/design/bug fixing ends of things I like. Teams and processes make a big deal well to enjoyment. I've worked with teams who have their stuff together so keeps stress down and development clean. But I have also worked with teams with bad planning and has been a nightmare.

Is the money good?

Again it depends on the coding you are doing and where in the world.

Do you get sick of sitting behind a screen all day?

Not really but it isn't all work.

gobby

Originally posted by Morphéus

Is the money good?

Muck, complete and utter muck, my mates a plasterer and he's earning STACKS of money for his 2 year apprenticeship, meanwhile id 4 years of hard slog in college, and now im earning less than when i began.

What exactly was it that you studied in college?

Well, I knew it couldnt be all sugar and candy! It's good to see a negative response even just so that I know that it doesn't always work out well!

Anybody else got any negative experiences from this industry??

Earthhorse

Can't say I've had a negative experience in the industry (only been in one job anyway!) but recently I've been feeling a bit like Morphéus.

Did you feel like this when you first started working in the industry?

I felt excited to be taking a new career direction. My degree was in commerce and I had nothing to loose.

Does it get better?

Well recently I got new responsibilities (not a promotion as such) which has added valuable tools to my skillset but...I'm doing less interesting programming at the moment so it can go either way.

Is programming quite a high pressure job?

As others have said this really depends on where you are working and the people involved.

Do you find that you enjoy it?

I did at first but recently I'm just not getting interesting programming challenges. To a certain extent this up to yourself and how willing you are to work on acquiring skills that open up interesting avenues for you.

Is the money good?

I'd have to say yes because in my previous job the pay was rubbish. Again it depends where you end up working but on average I'd say most programming jobs provide you with a comfortable lifestyle.

Do you get sick of sitting behind a screen all day?

Yep. But it's up to you to get up from your desk and take regular breaks. It's not against the law you know.

Evil Phil

You are working for yourself. Hmm... Never thought that it would be possible as a programmer to work for one's self. Who do you get work from? Do you work from home? Was it tough going at the start? How on earth do you advertise yourself to potential customers?

Well I contract most of the time so thats done through an agency. Large companies advertise for contractors through these channels. I've also got some contacts through a business services company who send development work my way. The more work I get through them the more they send me. This is the direction that I want to go in moving away from contracting. When I started the first system I developed I developed for free! Pain in the backside but it helped get me established. Took about 3 months to put in. Then I went into contract development. I'm about to finish up another contract an hopefully I'll be out on my own again, should an opportunity go my way.

I prefer to do things on my own, that way I'm the project manager and am responsible to myself. In general project managers are good but occasionally you get one who's background is non-development. Then you have some hand holding to do, its easier without that. Not sub contracting for an agency also means I can charge more as there's no middle man.

Recession... Christ, never thought of these. I'm guessing that programmers get hit pretty hard when one of these comes around. How badly have people been affected by recessions in the past?

I lot of programmers were out of work in the last (current?) recession but I blame the dot.com bubble bursting on that. Got rid of a lot of dead weight in the industry too. I however fecked off for a year and avoided the misery. Profit is really why I went out on my own and if I get the chance to make profit outside of I.T. then I'll take it.

JohnnyBravo

if you want to get lots of money the place to go is project management

Stark

Did work experience in a major multi-national software development company based in Dublin. Turned out to be complete and utter ****e. Basically anything interesting was done over in the US and the Irish team would just test (no automation was available) the software as it went through each revision (about a 2 week turnover then do the same tests all over again).

JohnnyBravo

i do that now as well as numerous other software projects
Minumum wage people

gobby

Originally posted by Stark
Did work experience in a major multi-national software development company based in Dublin. Turned out to be complete and utter ****e. Basically anything interesting was done over in the US and the Irish team would just test (no automation was available) the software as it went through each revision (about a 2 week turnover then do the same tests all over again).

Just testing!!! I'd say that drove you up the wall! Don't think I'd ever want to be in a job like that.

Are you sure that the whole company only did testing or maybe thats all you saw as you were simply on work experience?

JohnnyBravo

Actually after todays miserable progress on my current project id say go be a teacher

Evil Phil

Originally posted by gobby
Are you sure that the whole company only did testing or maybe thats all you saw as you were simply on work experience?

Thats a good point, I doubt a multi-national would allow an intern to work in development. Particulary in product development as apposed to bespoke. Its not unusual to start and the very bottom and have to work you're way up.

kayos

Did you feel like this when you first started working in the industry?
When I first started I loved the work. I did Electronic engineering in College and going into programming as a breath of fresh air. But then again I was doing what I considered interesting such as programming Palm's first (this was back in 98), then some stuff with biometrics and of course the NCR informa's.. all very interesting to start with as I got a lot of R&D to do. Then came my first banking conference where I got shipped over to give techie talks on the app I wrote.. even got a sale out of it . This was all back when I was very young (19) so this made it all the more interesting/exciting.

Does it get better?
Well all depends on exactly you mean here. If your getting fustrated at having to figure why things dont work or all the debugging you have to do I would honestly say this might not be the job for you! Its a core part of any programming job and to be honest I love nothing more than the feeling after I solve problems.. the harder a problem is to solve the better I feel


Is programming quite a high pressure job?
This is very much down to where you work and your position.. At one point I was was physically suffering due to stress/pressure.. basiclly one manager had an over dependence on me and it took its toll which ended in me leaving and moving to London for another job (even then I was getting flooded with mails from them asking for help).

Do you find that you enjoy it?
Yes overall I do!! I've gotten to work on some very interesting projects for some very big name clients down through the years and I enjoy doing that!! From something as small as having some software published on a national broadsheet to sitting down in front of 12 techie's/architects from a client and working on things its all good. Not only the work side of things but the constant learning of new tech's I find enjoyable.

Is the money good?
At the start for someone so young yes the money was great but I started when the times where good. Its only been in the past 2 years I have been not over the moon with money but I still can not complain.

Do you get sick of sitting behind a screen all day?
Na I dont get sick sitting behind a screen all day (I leave work and end up playing games all night!!) but I do get sick of writing documents all the time.. I just want to do some funky coding you know code that writes code and stuff like that

Stark

Originally posted by Evil Phil
Thats a good point, I doubt a multi-national would allow an intern to work in development. Particulary in product development as apposed to bespoke. Its not unusual to start and the very bottom and have to work you're way up.

No the entire department I was in was involved in donkey work and it was the largest department in the place. There was a small department alright where they worked on a project of their own but you'd need to practically family to get in there.

gobby

Well, I seem to have gotten some very interesting opinions. Thanks to all for posting. I do, however, have just a few more questions...

How easy is it to progress up the ranks and how long might it take?

Is it generally better to work in a smaller company or bigger? (Regarding both pay and how quickly promotion occurs)

Thanks again!

Gob.

The Corinthian

Originally posted by gobby
How easy is it to progress up the ranks and how long might it take?

How long is a piece of sting? All depends on the company, your own talent, skills and aptitude not to mention office politics.

Is it generally better to work in a smaller company or bigger? (Regarding both pay and how quickly promotion occurs)

Difficult to say. However I might suggest starting in a small company where you’ll be thrown in at the deep end and develop your skills quickly first. Then move to a blue-chip to both familiarize yourself with corporate culture and large scale project processes. After this you will be able to either rise in the ranks there or return to an SME to take up a far more senior position.

gobby

Originally posted by The Corinthian
Difficult to say. However I might suggest starting in a small company where you’ll be thrown in at the deep end and develop your skills quickly first. Then move to a blue-chip to both familiarize yourself with corporate culture and large scale project processes. After this you will be able to either rise in the ranks there or return to an SME to take up a far more senior position.

Good advice! Cheers...

Gob.

Evil Phil

Originally posted by Stark
No the entire department I was in was involved in donkey work and it was the largest department in the place. There was a small department alright where they worked on a project of their own but you'd need to practically family to get in there.

Um, thats kind of what I was saying.