Research explodes myth that older programmers are obsolete

[Xamonas Chegwé]

Soylent green is coders!


I have my own viewpoint on matters. In the 70s, programming as a field was booming and there was lots of money to be had. So every cloven hooved idiot from the Ozarks decided that being a programmer was the way to get rich. So thereafter the field was inundated with a bunch of clueless gold diggers, dropping the average competence in the field like a rock. And now today we're reaping the results of that gold rush in the form of tech that doesn't work, programs that violate basic design principles and just basic shit in IT. Maybe it's not that older programmers can't learn so much as that the younger ones never could learn.

That's not programmers fault. Most programmers I know are still uber-geeks. The problem is with the business model being used these days.

Yep - her tits ain't big enough. And she doesn't pout. What kind of a model can't pout?

[Warren Dew]

The early 90's being the good old days? Nah, that's much too late for that. The "good old days" of programming were when at least 90% of programmers looked like this:

Those guys could actually code, though.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

I love Stack Overflow

Stack Overflow is teh awesomez.

I guess she was talking about your stack?

[Azathoth]

I love Stack Overflow

Stack Overflow is teh awesomez.

Got me out of the shit many times

[klr]

The early 90's being the good old days? Nah, that's much too late for that. The "good old days" of programming were when at least 90% of programmers looked like this:

Those guys could actually code, though.

[Cormac]

The other problem of course, with coders young and old, is that while they can produce remarkable technology - more often than not, it is incapable of resolving the initial problem. Customers don't know what they want, and the skill is in discovering the nature of the problem, and making sure that the solution resolves the problem.

In my experience, most coders jump to conclusions, and don't take the time to analyse the problem to really work out how best to address it.

(This failure in the diagnosis/design activity is why >70% of IT/Change projects fail to succeed. Successfully launching bug-free code is not a success, if it is not fit for purpose).

[klr]

The other problem of course, with coders young and old, is that while they can produce remarkable technology - more often than not, it is incapable of resolving the initial problem. Customers don't know what they want, and the skill is in discovering the nature of the problem, and making sure that the solution resolves the problem.

In my experience, most coders jump to conclusions, and don't take the time to analyse the problem to really work out how best to address it.

(This failure in the diagnosis/design activity is why >70% of IT/Change projects fail to succeed. Successfully launching bug-free code is not a success, if it is not fit for purpose).

Very true, but some of them also fail because many IT vendors are just out to make money by screwing their hapless customers. [/mini-rant]

[Mysturji]

I can remember spending a weekend fixing a mangled abortion of a fucked-up wankjob of an attempt at programming by the new young'un rising star fresh from 4GL School. His code was a fucking abomination. He apparently had the attention span of a goldfish. He would start a new function before he'd finished writing the previous one. Nested fucking functions for fuck's sake. If you could call that tangled mess of alphanumerics a "nest".
And this is at the same place where shortly after I joined, a senior (though younger in age than me) colleague and I had the following conversation:
{I had just come from a UNIC & C environment to a Fortran & VMS environment)
Me: How do you do a for loop in Fortran?
Colleague: What?
Me: What's the syntax for a for loop?
Colleague: What's a for loop?
Me: *pause* OK, any kind of loop... "do while"?
Colleague: *blank stare*
There followed an explanation of what a for / while loop was, followed by...
Colleague: That sounds like bad programming practice to me. I'd advise you to use a GOTO

[Pappa]

They introduced GOTO into PHP a while ago.

[Azathoth]

They introduced GOTO into PHP a while ago.

[Cormac]

The other problem of course, with coders young and old, is that while they can produce remarkable technology - more often than not, it is incapable of resolving the initial problem. Customers don't know what they want, and the skill is in discovering the nature of the problem, and making sure that the solution resolves the problem.

In my experience, most coders jump to conclusions, and don't take the time to analyse the problem to really work out how best to address it.

(This failure in the diagnosis/design activity is why >70% of IT/Change projects fail to succeed. Successfully launching bug-free code is not a success, if it is not fit for purpose).

Very true, but some of them also fail because many IT vendors are just out to make money by screwing their hapless customers. [/mini-rant]

Funny cos it's true.

I take great pleasure in hauling out the Statement of Work, and comparing to what was delivered, and then taking the razor to the invoice... I did it to a number of the large consultancies when I was in London. Heh. They didn't like it up 'em.