Is there life after code?

[)roi(];18552868 said:
You certainly would have some interesting stories to tell..
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What happens in (...) stays in (...) :D

Actually started out as an operator on ICL System 4 , with paper tapes and card readers . Got my first taste of coding when I was entrusted (having been promoted to senior operator :D) with encoding other peoples coding sheets onto punch cards...
 
biometrics said:
My dream has always been to own a software company that creates products. In the 90's it was a combo of that and what you describe. But since 2000 it has purely been products. It's really satisfying knowing your products are used in 20+ countries.
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Would love to know what kind of products? I also have my own product that I market and support. It's very larger but very niche so the market not that big
 
[)roi(];18552904 said:
Lol... it's amazing what simple stuff would entertain us; I remember being blown away by Atari Pong.

One of my fondest memories writing early code was produce wireframe spinning planetoids on the BBC Model B; I used sine & cosine formulas to draw adjacent elliptical arcs, so it was painfully slow to render, but it was still worth it in the end; the Acorn graphics routines supported the ability to flash replace colours; which if painted in a regular sequence would allow you to simulate wireframe motion i.e. spinning planetoids and flashing stars.
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Very nice. Graphics programming is always a big draw when you're starting out, since it's right in your face and you can see your progress straight away.

I'm just a few years behind you, so my graphics coding happened mainly on PC. I had a lot of fun implementing bits from demos I saw...but at least I had Turbo Pascal by that time. I also pretty quickly ran into speed issues, so I taught myself assembly for that.

I often read these cool blurbs about how game devs were using this magical language called c to make games, so I tried my best to find a compiler for it...but sadly I had no luck. It took me forever before I managed to track down a copy.
 
garp said:
I guess it depends on the kind of company. What a lot of guys call their "own company" is frequently little more than free-lancing or contracting. Seen a lot of guys start a full fledged business and burn themselves out in no time because they have have the fantasy of being full time coders while they're also trying to market, recruit, fund raise, do the books, etc etc. It severely limits growth. This is a very hard transition to make as it is not easy to let go.
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I get the feeling that most, or even the vast majority of "software companies" in SA are like this, or am I wrong? Very few actually create original products, they just wait for other businesses to come to them and say "I want X done" then they do it.

If this is the case why is it like this in SA?
 
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Knyro said:
I get the feeling that most, or even the vast majority of "software companies" in SA are like this, or am I wrong? Very few actually create original products, they just wait for other businesses to come to them and say "I want X done" then they do it.

If this is the case why is it like this in SA?
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It's like that everywhere - "I run a business" or "I'm a consultant" is more often than not code for "I couldn't get a job". When I see this on a resume, I always try to understand if this is the case or not, since of course there are plenty of legit enterprises too - it's important not to think that all "business owners" are one or the other - they're simply real businesses or not, and it's a global phenomenon.
 
Started coding in assembly young age (circa 1992), mostly part of the demo and virology scene.
 
cguy said:
It's like that everywhere - "I run a business" or "I'm a consultant" is more often than not code for "I couldn't get a job". When I see this on a resume, I always try to understand if this is the case or not, since of course there are plenty of legit enterprises too - it's important not to think that all "business owners" are one or the other - they're simply real businesses or not, and it's a global phenomenon.
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Seems to be disproportionately the case in SA. Honestly I'd have trouble naming even 10 original software products to come out of this country.
 
I find there is a funny contradiction that can sometimes occur with developers. Let say you succeed by creating a product or startup by coding it yourself. Money comes in through subscriptions or yearly maintenance from clients meaning you have to maintain the product or do data analysis or support or you get pushed into the business/management side of things because of your success.

However if developers software projects fail or not one of their projects is successful they would end up with more coding experience in trying different problems and technologies to try find a profitable product so they end up with much more varied experience in coding than someone who has succeeded, making their skills matrix on CV look much better and giving them an advantage in the job market

I see a lot of people write on their skills matrix all these varying programming languages but that doesn't necessary mean they have an active software being used, let alone used by thousands of users.
 
skimread said:
I see a lot of people write on their skills matrix all these varying programming languages but that doesn't necessary mean they have an active software being used, let alone used by thousands of users.
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What does active software have to do with programming languages?
 
etienne_marais said:
Anyway, you still have your code/binaries (demos) ? How about a YT upload ?
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I'll have to go look through some old CD's. Hopefully they're not scratched to ****.I wrote an Eliza bot in the mid 90's that i skinned to look like Hal 9000, which i found the other day. I cried, It was beautiful.
 
semaphore said:
What does active software have to do with programming languages?
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With active software I meant code that is running in production. It does reflect well on you if have code that is being used by 1000s of users. It also shows the developer considered performance when coding it.
 
cguy said:
It's like that everywhere - "I run a business" or "I'm a consultant" is more often than not code for "I couldn't get a job". When I see this on a resume, I always try to understand if this is the case or not, since of course there are plenty of legit enterprises too - it's important not to think that all "business owners" are one or the other - they're simply real businesses or not, and it's a global phenomenon.
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Quite true... yet I have had the pleasure to take on the role as consulting director twice in my career; stemming from expert experience gained from the successful completion of complex industry solutions:
  • POS EFT, Private Transaction Switching, Financial Transaction Acquisition, Settlement (including automatic Bank reconciliation)
  • Petrochemical Stock management, Replenishment and Routing/Scheduling, Supply Chain, JIT fuel sales, ...
In these case Industry demand was always the main driver... would have been silly to ignore a lucrative income stream (+ great opportunities for commission) & a finite timeline.
 
skimread said:
With active software I meant code that is running in production. It does reflect well on you if have code that is being used by 1000s of users. It also shows the developer considered performance when coding it.
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No it doesn't. I don't know what bull**** metric you're using there. I've seen code used by millions and it is not performance tuned at all. So essentially you're saying only code that is used by X number of people is the only good code? lol. okay.
 
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