Details
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AboutAn organism which doesn't sleep on time for someone's fucking commitments.
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SkillsSystem.out.println("Insufficient place to fill all my skills");
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Location127.0.0.1
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Website
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Github
Joined devRant on 4/16/2016
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-The oldest computer can be traced to Adam and Eve
-Yes, it was an apple
-But with an extremely limited memory
-Just one byte
-Then everything crashed5 -
As a developer, sometimes you hammer away on some useless solo side project for a few weeks. Maybe a small game, a web interface for your home-built storage server, or an app to turn your living room lights on an off.
I often see these posts and graphs here about motivation, about a desire to conceive perfection. You want to create a self-hosted Spotify clone "but better", or you set out to make the best todo app for iOS ever written.
These rants and memes often highlight how you start with this incredible drive, how your code is perfectly clean when you begin. Then it all oscillates between states of panic and surprise, sweat, tears and euphoria, an end in a disillusioned stare at the tangled mess you created, to gather dust forever in some private repository.
Writing a physics engine from scratch was harder than you expected. You needed a lot of ugly code to get your admin panel working in Safari. Some other shiny idea came along, and you decided to bite, even though you feel a burning guilt about the ever growing pile of unfinished failures.
All I want to say is:
No time was lost.
This is how senior developers are born. You strengthen your brain, the calluses on your mind provide you with perseverance to solve problems. Even if (no, *especially* if) you gave up on your project.
Eventually, giving up is good, it's a sign of wisdom an flexibility to focus on the broader domain again.
One of the things I love about failures is how varied they tend to be, how they force you to start seeing overarching patterns.
You don't notice the things you take back from your failures, they slip back sticking to you, undetected.
You get intuitions for strengths and weaknesses in patterns. Whenever you're matching two sparse ordered indexed lists, there's this corner of your brain lighting up on how to do it efficiently. You realize it's not the ORMs which suck, it's the fundamental object-relational impedance mismatch existing in all languages which causes problems, and you feel your fingers tingling whenever you encounter its effects in the future, ready to dive in ever so slightly deeper.
You notice you can suddenly solve completely abstract data problems using the pathfinding logic from your failed game. You realize you can use vector calculations from your physics engine to compare similarities in psychological behavior. You never understood trigonometry in high school, but while building a a deficient robotic Arduino abomination it suddenly started making sense.
You're building intuitions, continuously. These intuitions are grooves which become deeper each time you encounter fundamental patterns. The more variation in environments and topics you expose yourself to, the more permanent these associations become.
Failure is inconsequential, failure even deserves respect, failure builds intuition about patterns. Every single epiphany about similarity in patterns is an incredible victory.
Please, for the love of code...
Start and fail as many projects as you can.30 -
!rant. Sometimes, trolling your fam is a lot of fun.
Just today my sister asked me how to type the character ÷ on her keyboard. I told her to press : and the - key and then just move it like so.
: -
: -
: -
:-
÷
See? Ez pz. She actually tried it and just said 'i cant, it erases everything'. And then all of my other siblings kept ranting the same thing. I forgot we were in group chat. And now its full of : and - spams. And im just here laughing my ass out.11 -
Random guy : Well I'm not tracked on the internet, I use private tabs.
Me : Well, I'm not sleeping with your mom, I use condoms10 -
My conversation with my wife today, while I was at work:
Wife: The wifi isn't working.
Me: What's it doing?
W: Not working
Me: Try turning it off an on again.
.
.
.
Me: Is your phone on LTE? Or is it connected to wifi and the internet isn't working?
W: LTE. Aubrey (my wife's sister) said she turned it off and nothing happened.
Me: did she turn it back on?
W: Do you really want me to answer that?
Me: Just making sure. What lights are on on the router?
W: (Sends me a picture of the router with no lights on)
Me:...
W: Oh it isn't even plugged in
Me:...
W (after a couple minutes): Its working now!
YES I REALLY WANT YOU TO ANSWER IF YOU TURNED IT BACK ON!13 -
Long but worth it...
So I was cleaning out my Google Drive last night, and deleted some old (2 years and up) files. I also deleted my old work folder, it was for an ISP I worked for over 2 years ago. After deleting the files I had a little twinge of "Man I hope they're not still using those". But seriously, it'd be a pretty big security risk if I was still the owner of those files... right? Surely they copied them and deleted all the info from the originals. IP addresses, Cisco configs, username and passwords for various devices, pretty much everything but customer info.
Guess who I get a call from this morning... "Hi this is Debbie from 'ISP'. I was trying to access the IP Master List and I can't anymore. I was just told to call you and see if there's any way to get access to it again" (Not her real name...)
I had to put her on hold so I could almost die of laughter...
Me: "Sorry about that Debbie, I haven't worked for that company for over 2 years. Your telling me in all that time no one thought to save them locally? No one made a copy? I still had the original documents?!"
Long pause
D: "Uh... Apparently not..."
Another long pause
D: "So is there any way you can give me access to them again?"
Me: "They're gone Debbie. I deleted them all last night."
D: Very worried voice "Can... Can you check?"
This kids is why you never assume you'll always have access to a cloud stored file, make local copies!!
A little bit of background on this company, the owner's wife fired me on trumped up "time card discrepancy" issues so she could hire her freshly graduated business major son. The environment over there was pretty toxic anyway...
I feel bad for "Debbie" and the other staff there, it's going to be a very bad week for them. I also hope it doesn't impact any customers. But... It is funny as hell, especially since I warned the owner as I was clearing out my desk to save copies, and plan on them being gone soon. Apparently he never listened.
This is why you should have a plan in place... And not just wing it...
PS. First Post!25 -
Client: Can I speak to the developer responsible for my website?
Developer: Speaking...
Client: You have a deep voice for a 5 year old.12 -
Me: GET /sleep
Baby: 307 Temporary Redirect
Baby: 204 No Content
Me: 200 OK
Me: GET /sleep
Baby: 307 Temporary Redirect
Baby: 413 Payload Too Large
Me: 102 Processing
Me: 200 OK
Me: GET /sleep
Baby: 307 Temporary Redirect
Baby: 444 Connection Closed Without Response
Me: 200 OK
Me: GET /sleep
Baby: 307 Temporary Redirect
Baby: 444 Connection Closed Without Response
Me: 429 Too Many Requests
Me: GET /sleep
Baby: 307 Temporary Redirect
Me: 101 Switching Protocols
Me: 408 Request Timeout
GF: 102 Processing
Me: GET /sleep
Sleep: 404 Not Found
Me: 406 Not Acceptable
(Morning)
Me: 501 Not Implemented19 -
The first time I realized I wasn't as good as I thought I was when I met the smartest dev I've ever known (to this day).
I was hired to manage his team but was just immediately floored by the sheer knowledge and skills this guy displayed.
I started to wonder why they hired outside of the team instead of promoting him when I found that he just didn't mesh well with others.
He was very blunt about everything he says. Especially when it comes to code reviews. Man, he did /not/ mince words. And, of course, everyone took this as him just being an asshole.
But being an expert asshole myself, I could tell he wasn't really trying to be one and he was just quirky. He was really good and I really liked hanging out with him. I learned A LOT of things.
Can you imagine coming into a lead position, with years of experience in the role backing your confidence and then be told that your code is bad and then, systematically, very precisely, and very clearly be told why? That shit is humbling.
But it was the good kind of humbling, you know? I really liked that I had someone who could actually teach me new things.
So we hung out a lot and later on I got to meet his daughter and wife who told me that he had slight autism which is why he talked the way he did. He simply doesn't know how to talk any other way.
I explained it to the rest of the team (after getting permission) and once they understood that they started to take his criticism more seriously. He also started to learn to be less harsh with his words.
We developed some really nice friendships and our team was becoming a little family.
Year and a half later I had to leave the company for personal reasons. But before I did I convinced our boss to get him to replace me. The team was behind him now and he easily handled it like a pro.
That was 5 years ago. I moved out of the city, moved back, and got a job at another company.
Four months ago, he called me up and said he had three reasons for us to meet up.
1. He was making me god father of his new baby boy
2. That they created a new position for him at the company; VP of Engineering
and
3. He wanted to hang out
So we did and turns out he had a 4th reason; He had a nice job offer for me.
I'm telling this story now because I wanted to remind everyone of the lesson that every mainstream anime tells us:
Never underestimate the power of friendship.21 -
It saved me from suicide.
You have to understand first that things in India work differently. Academics are not personal, but a social business. Academic competition in India is very high and not in a good way, or for the good reasons.
As a teenager was sent off from my home to the other side of the country. I didn't like it. My studies suffered, and I failed my exams. Came back home and faced months of emotional abuse (guilt trips, scornful comments, plain insults) from my parents, neighbours and relatives. Indian society is just built that way. They didn't know they were damaging my psyche, or they were too angry to care. Lots of other shit (lost friends, lost love) happened at roughly the same time period and everything started to fall like dominos.
I fell into severe depression. Lost appetite, lost sleep. Nothing mattered anymore. There were mornings when I would wake up and not get up from my bed for hours, and not even move a finger. Self-hate became the motto of the day. I became violent and anti-social. I would either be angry or trying not to break down and give up all the time. Many a night, I considered suicide. I would end up googling for easy ways out to take.
But what gave me a way out of the pains of my reality was programming. It helped my keep my head, figuratively and literally. It kept my mind distracted and gave me a sense of purpose. I would shut myself in, plug in my headphones, shut the world out and just experiment.
I am not saying that I am the best at what I do, but those sleepless and troubled nights, and many other similar nights over the years have given me a definite edge over my colleagues.
Even today, when everything is falling to pieces, I know I have something to fall back on. I still get episodes of depression every now and then, but I know I can always pick up a new project and distract myself. It probably isn't healthy, but eh...
I am alive. I code. I kick ass. My colleagues respect and value my opinion. I love my job.
Computer does what I tell it to do (mostly :p) and I feel good. Because for that small moment, I am in control of everything. For that infinitesimally small moment of my average, boring, and somewhat painful life, I am God.50 -
At my study's final exams, I coded a system with login and everything included.
Showed it at the final delivery:
Fake client: awesome! So how do I logout?
Me: 😐
Me: 😶
Me: 😁
Me: 😓
Me: 😭
Yeah, you couldn't logout.30 -
Under settings, we made a checkbox labeled “Run Program Faster”. The state was saved but it didn’t do anything.
We turned it “on” when people said things were slow. Usually they were happy and no one complained the “run faster” option wasn’t working.25 -
*Mom shows me laptop ad of 3000 bucks with the most overkill specs ever*
Mom: "Son, will this laptop run Google?"
Me: "Do you want to surf Google or actually run Google's server?"
Mom: *looks confused*
"I also want to use Fesabook on it"
Me: *brings her a 5 year old laptop with a new ssd in it*
*has an old i3, 8gb ram and no gpu*
Mom: "This laptop is super fast! Thanks son!"
*One hour later*
*Mom calls*
"Son, I think the laptop broke"
Me: "What? What happened?"
Mom: "I pressed a button and now all the keys are lighting red" (backlit keyboard)
Me: "You can choose the color of your keyboard mom"
Mom: "Ooh! How do I make it pink?"
Me: "You can only choose between red and blue..."
Mom: "What a ripoff"
*Hangs up the phone*35 -
If Gordon Ramsay made code reviews, I would watch that show. Especially the insults he would use for handling clients.
"This code has so much spaghetti, it decided to open it's own restaurant"23 -
* Selects text to copy *
* Ctrl + C to copy *
* Selects text to be replaced with copied text *
* Ctrl + C again instead of Ctrl + V *
Instant rage.36 -
Me: *Watching a movie*
Main Character: "Oh no, we have to hack the CIA to figure out how this machine works! Hacker girl, do the stuff"
Hacker Girl: "Consider it done!"
Hacker Girl: *Opens Linux bash*
Hacker Girl: *types 'mkdir Hack_CIA'
Hacker Girl: "They have two-factor authentication in place, this is going to be a hard one."
Hacker Girl: *Types 'cd Hack_CIA'*
Hacker Girl: "I'm in!"
Me: "..."
Friend: "Wow, so well done, so realistic!"
Me: *Dies*82 -
*client calls in*
Me: good morning, how can I help you?
Client: my ip is blocked, could you unblock it for me?
Me: certainly! What's your ip address? Then I'll have a look.
Client: I'm not giving you my ip?! That's too privacy sensitive.
Me: 😶
Me: 😶
Me: 😶
Me: sir, I'm very keen on my privacy myself but without that information I can't do much for you 😬
Client: ah so you're refusing to help me?
Me: not like that, it's just very hard to lift an ip block for me when I don't know the ip address.
Client: you just don't want to help, fine.
*click*
😶32 -
Wow, some guys here have the means to travel to the future!! Cool!! I too want some of that action!
8 -
Some empty-headed helpdesk girl skipped into our office yesterday afternoon, despite the big scary warning signs glued to the door.
"Hey, when I log in on my phone, the menu is looking weird"
"Uh... look at my beard"
"What"
"Just look at this beard!"
"Uh.... OK"
"Does this look like a perfectly groomed beard"
"Uh... it's pretty nice I guess"
"You don't have to lie"
She looks puzzled: "OK... maybe it could use a little trimming. Uh... a lot of trimming". "I still like it though" she adds, trying hard to be polite.
"I understand you just started working here. But the beard... the beard should make it clear. See the office opposite to this one?"
"Yeah"
"Perfectly groomed ginger beards. It's all stylish shawls and smiles and spinach smoothies. Those people are known as frontend developers, they care about pixels and menus. Now look at my beard. It is dark and wild, it has some gray stress hairs, and if you take a deep breath it smells like dust and cognac mixed with the tears caused by failed deploys. Nothing personal, but I don't give a fuck what a menu looks like on your phone."
She looked around, and noticed the other 2 tired looking guys with unshaven hobo chins. To her credit, she pointed at the woman in the corner: "What about her, she doesn't seem to have a beard"
Yulia, 1.9m long muscled database admin from Ukraine, lets out a heavy sigh. "I do not know you well enough yet to show you where I grow my unkempt graying hairs... . Now get lost divchyna."
Helpdesk girl leaves the scene.
Joanna, machine learning dev, walks in: "I saw a confused blonde lost in the hallway, did you give her the beard speech?"
"Yeah" -- couldn't hold back a giggle -- "haha now she'll come to you"
Joanna: "No I already took care of it"
"How?"
"She started about some stupid menu, so I just told her to smell my cup". Joanna, functional alcoholic, is holding her 4pm Irish coffee. "I think this living up to our stereotype tactic is working, because the girl laughed and nodded like she understood, and ran off to the design department"
Me: "I do miss shaving though"67
