"So, why do you want to work at our office in mexico?"
"I want to be a señor developer."

Have you ever wondered we programmers have so many strong communities.... Stackoverflow, devRant, Reditt, etc...
No other profession has such communities... Why? Why?
Because, we haven't built one for them.... 😂😁

Interviewer: Welcome, Mr X. Thanks for dropping by. We like to keep our interviews informal. And even though I have all the power here, and you are nothing but a cretin, let’s pretend we are going to have fun here.

Mr X: Sure, man, whatever.

I: Let’s start with the technical stuff, shall we? Do you know what a linked list is?

X: (Tells what it is).

I: Great. Can you tell me where linked lists are used?

X:: Sure. In interview questions.

I: What?

X: The only time linked lists come up is in interview questions.

I:: That’s not true. They have lots of real world applications. Like, like…. (fumbles)

X:: Like to implement memory allocation in operating systems. But you don’t sell operating systems, do you?

I:: Well… moving on. Do you know what the Big O notation is?

X: Sure. It’s another thing used only in interviews.

I: What?! Not true at all. What if you want to sort a billion records a minute, like Google has to?

X: But you are not Google, are you? You are hiring me to work with 5 year old PHP code, and most of the tasks will be hacking HTML/CSS. Why don’t you ask me something I will actually be doing?
I: (Getting a bit frustrated)  Fine. How would you do FooBar in version X of PHP?

X: I would, er, Google that.

I: And how do you call library ABC in PHP?

X: Google?

I: (shocked) OMG. You mean you don’t remember all the 97 million PHP functions, and have to actually Google stuff? What if the Internet goes down?

X: Does it? We’re in the 1st world, aren’t we?

I: Tut, tut. Kids these days. Anyway,looking at your resume, we need at least 7 years of ReactJS. You don’t have that.

X: That’s great, because React came out last year.

I: Excuses, excuses. Let’s ask some lateral thinking questions. How would you go about finding how many piano tuners there are in San Francisco?

X: 37.

I: What?!

X: 37. I googled before coming here. Also Googled other puzzle questions. You can fit 7,895,345 balls in a Boeing 747. Manholes covers are round because that is the shape that won’t fall in. You ask the guard what the other guard would say. You then take the fox across the bridge first, and eat the chicken. As for how to move Mount Fuji, you tell it a sad story.

I: Ooooooooookkkkkaaaayyyyyyy. Right, tell me a bit about yourself.

X: Everything is there in the resume.

I: I mean other than that. What sort of a person are you? What are your hobbies?

X: Japanese culture.

I: Interesting. What specifically?

X: Hentai.

I: What’s hentai?

X: It’s an televised art form.

I: Ok. Now, can you give me an example of a time when you were really challenged?

X: Well, just the other day, a few pennies from my pocket fell behind the sofa. Took me an hour to take them out. Boy was it challenging.

I: I meant technical challenge.

X: I once spent 10 hours installing Windows 10 on a Mac.

I: Why did you do that?

X: I had nothing better to do.

I: Why did you decide to apply to us?

X: The voices in my head told me.

I: What?

X: You advertised a job, so I applied.
I: And why do you want to change your job?

X: Money, baby!

I: (shocked)

X: I mean, I am looking for more lateral changes in a fast moving cloud connected social media agile web 2.0 company.

I: Great. That’s the answer we were looking for.  What do you feel about constant overtime?

X: I don’t know. What do you feel about overtime pay?

I: What is your biggest weakness?

X: Kryptonite. Also, ice cream.

I: What are your salary expectations?

X: A million dollars a year, three months paid vacation on the beach, stock options, the lot. Failing that, whatever you have.

I: Great. Any questions for me?

X: No.

I: No? You are supposed to ask me a question, to impress me with your knowledge. I’ll ask you one. Where do you see yourself in 5 years?

X: Doing your job, minus the stupid questions.

I: Get out. Don’t call us, we’ll call you.

All Credit to:
http://pythonforengineers.com/the-p...

Developer: We have a problem.
Manager: Remember, there are no such things as problems, only opportunities.
Developer: Well then, we have a DDoS opportunity.

When a hiring manager wants 5+ years experience in Swift.

Swift release date = June 2, 2014

😂👍🖕

"You gave us bad code! We ran it and now production is DOWN! Join this bridgeline now and help us fix this!"

So, as the author of the code in question, I join the bridge... And what happens next, I will simply never forget.

First, a little backstory... Another team within our company needed some vendor client software installed and maintained across the enterprise. Multiple OSes (Linux, AIX, Solaris, HPUX, etc.), so packaging and consistent update methods were a a challenge. I wrote an entire set of utilities to install, update and generally maintain the software; intending all the time that this other team would eventually own the process and code. With this in mind, I wrote extensive documentation, and conducted a formal turnover / training season with the other team.

So, fast forward to when the other team now owns my code, has been trained on how to use it, including (perhaps most importantly) how to send out updates when the vendor released upgrades to the agent software.

Now, this other team had the responsibility of releasing their first update since I gave them the process. Very simple upgrade process, already fully automated. What could have gone so horribly wrong? Did something the vendor supplied break their client?

I asked for the log files from the upgrade process. They sent them, and they looked... wrong. Very, very wrong.

Did you run the code I gave you to do this update?

"Yes, your code is broken - fix it! Production is down! Rabble, rabble, rabble!"

So, I go into our code management tool and review the _actual_ script they ran. Sure enough, it is my code... But something is very wrong.

More than 2/3rds of my code... has been commented out. The code is "there"... but has been commented out so it is not being executed. WT-actual-F?!

I question this on the bridge line. Silence. I insist someone explain what is going on. Is this a joke? Is this some kind of work version of candid camera?
Finally someone breaks the silence and explains.

And this, my friends, is the part I will never forget.

"We wanted to look through your code before we ran the update. When we looked at it, there was some stuff we didn't understand, so we commented that stuff out."

You... you didn't... understand... my some of the code... so you... you didn't ask me about it... you didn't try to actually figure out what it did... you... commented it OUT?!

"Right, we figured it was better to only run the parts we understood... But now we ran it and everything is broken and you need to fix your code."

I cannot repeat the things I said next, even here on devRant. Let's just say that call did not go well.

So, lesson learned? If you don't know what some code does? Just comment that shit out. Then blame the original author when it doesn't work.

You just cannot make this kind of stuff up.

!rant

After over 20 years as a Software Engineer, Architect, and Manager, I want to pass along some unsolicited advice to junior developers either because I grew through it, or I've had to deal with developers who behaved poorly:

1) Your ego will hurt you FAR more than your junior coding skills. Nobody expects you to be the best early in your career, so don't act like you are.

2) Working independently is a must. It's okay to ask questions, but ask sparingly. Remember, mid and senior level guys need to focus just as much as you do, so before interrupting them, exhaust your resources (Google, Stack Overflow, books, etc..)

3) Working code != good code. You are an author. Write your code so that it can be read. Accept criticism that may seem trivial such as renaming a variable or method. If someone is suggesting it, it's because they didn't know what it did without further investigation.

4) Ask for peer reviews and LISTEN to the critique. Even after 20+ years, I send my code to more junior developers and often get good corrections sent back. (remember the ego thing from tip #1?) Even if they have no critiques for me, sometimes they will see a technique I used and learn from that. Peer reviews are win-win-win.

5) When in doubt, do NOT BS your way out. Refer to someone who knows, or offer to get back to them. Often times, persons other than engineers will take what you said as gospel. If that later turns out to be wrong, a bunch of people will have to get involved to clean up the expectations.

6) Slow down in order to speed up. Always start a task by thinking about the very high level use cases, then slowly work through your logic to achieve that. Rushing to complete, even for senior engineers, usually means less-than-ideal code that somebody will have to maintain.

7) Write documentation, always! Even if your company doesn't take documentation seriously, other engineers will remember how well documented your code is, and they will appreciate you for it/think of you next time that sweet job opens up.

8) Good code is important, but good impressions are better. I have code that is the most embarrassing crap ever still in production to this day. People don't think of me as "that shitty developer who wrote that ugly ass code that one time a decade ago," They think of me as "that developer who was fun to work with and busted his ass." Because of that, I've never been unemployed for more than a day. It's critical to have a good network and good references.

9) Don't shy away from the unknown. It's easy to hope somebody else picks up that task that you don't understand, but you wont learn it if they do. The daunting, unknown tasks are the most rewarding to complete (and trust me, other devs will notice.)

10) Learning is up to you. I can't tell you the number of engineers I passed on hiring because their answer to what they know about PHP7 was: "Nothing. I haven't learned it yet because my current company is still using PHP5." This is YOUR craft. It's not up to your employer to keep you relevant in the job market, it's up to YOU. You don't always need to be a pro at the latest and greatest, but at least read the changelog. Stay abreast of current technology, security threats, etc...

These are just a few quick tips from my experience. Others may chime in with theirs, and some may dispute mine. I wish you all fruitful careers!

"A different error message! Finally some progress!"

A young guy I work with burst into tears today, I had no idea what happened so I tried to comfort him and ask what was up.

It appears his main client had gone nuts with him because they wanted him to make an internet toolbar (think Ask.com) and he politely informed them toolbars doesn't really exist anymore and it wouldn't work on things like modern browsers or mobile devices.

Being given a polite but honest opinion was obviously something the client wasn't used to and knowing the guy was a young and fairly inexperienced, they started throwing very personal insults and asking him exactly what he knows about things (a lot more than them).

So being the big, bold, handsome senior developer I am, I immediately phoned the client back and told them to either come speak to me face-to-face and apologise to him in person or we'd terminate there contract with immediate effect. They're coming down tomorrow...

So part my rant, part a rant on behalf of a young developer who did nothing wrong and was treated like shit, I think we've all been there.

We'll see how this goes! Who the hell wants a toolbar anyway?!

covid is making life hard again. I can't just stop in the middle of a research project because I can't access the robots anymore. *makes angry noises* I already canceled a human study because of covid, so this feels super unfair.

but you know what pisses me off even more? the govt complaining about numbers being high but not doing jackshit about active disinfection of air and public spaces (China did that, btw) or providing cheap disposable masks for people.

Also, I'm not as much afraid of getting covid as I am afraid of giving it to the head of the department who is a 70+ yrs old genius in his own right.
Fuck.
Fuck.
Fuck.

... This is shit.

Hahahahahahahahahha I'm not going to do anymore of your "quick" projects that result in shit pay and drain me out. I got actual fulfilling projects I enjoy working on hahahahah not again "friend". The audacity of this guy to ask me to handle a big project alone while he sits on his ass and gets a 50% cut. He should have paid attention in school if he wanted to be a programmer. All he does is lie to clients that he can code yet runs to me to do all the work. Hahahah let's see how he gets out of this one. Not gonna help you today "friend".

My anxiety is over the roof. I have keep 3 media players simultaneously playing Pink noise, Sounds of raindrops and lofi hiphop just to keep my brain grounded.