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07-27-2018 , 06:33 PM
He just told me to rewrite it “without awk or sed” and i was like lol k, 15 minutes later, done.

“Really?”

Hahaha this guy chewed me out two weeks ago so this is super satisfying
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07-27-2018 , 06:39 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by maxtower
It could be your salary requirements. There are a ton of companies out there looking for competent people that they think they can hire for $83,000. They made it work that one time back in 2013 so why not again?

You worked for a large company before and you're older. They probably think you want too much even if you didn't mention it. They probably can't afford to pay for real programmers.

You need to be more selective about which interviews to go on I think. With software it's all about scale. To a first approximation it takes the same amount of time to write software for 10 customers as it does 10,000. You need to get interviews from companies with some scale to get decent salaries. Unless a start up has real VC backing, smaller places simply can't compete because they have no scale.

The market for programmers is a lot different than some other jobs like dishwashers, lawyers, doctors and plumbers. Because of the ability for your work to serve an unlimited number of customers the jobs with the most scale can pay the most. Small shops in other fields have a more level playing field with the bigger players.
Full disclosure because who cares - I was making about $180k at mega-corp w/bonus, 401k matching, pension, etc. But I've been saying $150k + equity is in the ballpark. Most of the startups I've talked to are potentially willing to go that high. But they seem to want superman for that and I don't quite check all their boxes.

I do have a netflix tech screen phone interview next week. We'll see how that goes. I'm not expecting anything.
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07-27-2018 , 08:48 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by suzzer99
I think I just missed out on an offer because of giving my previous salary (+bonus, etc.) and what I'd expect (which for the record was $20-$30k lower). I'm not giving that out anymore.

The interview went great. It was basically how would you build a like widget - front and back end, right in my wheelhouse. But then right at the end I admitted Santa Monica was a bit far for me but I'd make it work (dumb probably) and he asked my salary so I told him what I was making at hyper-mega CO and what I might be willing to accept. At that point the 2nd person I was supposed to talk to became unavailable and he said "sorry for making you drive out this far for 1.5 hours". Not the best sign.

Either that or because I'm too old, which I'm starting to think is a factor in a lot of these. When I was even in my early 30s I walked in and got so many jobs I wasn't remotely qualified for. Now in my late 40s I'm nailing interviews and not getting it. But I understand if everyone is like 30 you're gonna worry how late 40s guy is gonna fit in (although I can pull off early 40s if you don't know my age). And of course I'll never know if that's the real reason - so I start chasing my tail trying to rectify all these made up reasons.

Another place said they were moving forward, to the point of getting references, then reversed course and said they realized they need someone with more DevOps experience. Which could be true - but it also could be their first choice finally said yes and was a lot younger.

It really sucks because my first onsite was the company that I think really liked me. And I was by far the shakiest. I should have scheduled it later. Argh.
I just received a rejection notice after stage 2 interview with a company (initial phone screen -> talk with hiring manager). This is for a UI Developer role. The hiring manager asked me about deployments and aws which imo fall way out of the purview of a UI developer role and something I haven't had to deal with yet.

Part of rejection email

Quote:
We have decided not to move forward to the next step for our open front end role. To share some feedback, we are looking for deeper understanding within the SDLC.
I'm pretty sure this is referring to the lack of exp in aws/deployments. I don't think some people understand what roles they are even hiring for sometimes.
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07-27-2018 , 08:56 PM
$180k and can't write find_first_repeat in O(n)? Jelly.
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07-27-2018 , 09:22 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by suzzer99
Full disclosure because who cares - I was making about $180k at mega-corp w/bonus, 401k matching, pension, etc. But I've been saying $150k + equity is in the ballpark. Most of the startups I've talked to are potentially willing to go that high. But they seem to want superman for that and I don't quite check all their boxes.

I do have a netflix tech screen phone interview next week. We'll see how that goes. I'm not expecting anything.
If you go too low on salary then potential companies will think you’d bolt at first opportunity to make more. Doesn’t seem like seem like developer shortage is that acute at the present time. Could be wrong though. Getting lots of inquires but so are a lot of developers.
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07-27-2018 , 09:28 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by :::grimReaper:::
$180k and can't write find_first_repeat in O(n)? Jelly.
is this something that front end react devs do often? is it something that requires anything other than googling the algorithm?
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07-27-2018 , 10:07 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by suzzer99
Full disclosure because who cares - I was making about $180k at mega-corp w/bonus, 401k matching, pension, etc. But I've been saying $150k + equity is in the ballpark. Most of the startups I've talked to are potentially willing to go that high. But they seem to want superman for that and I don't quite check all their boxes.

I do have a netflix tech screen phone interview next week. We'll see how that goes. I'm not expecting anything.
I wasn't trying to say you should ask for less money. I was trying to say that you should only interview at places with enough scale (or VC) that they won't bat an eye at 10-20k difference. Unless of course you really don't want to work for large corp.
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07-27-2018 , 10:14 PM
Get salary expectations communicated before you go in..
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07-27-2018 , 10:16 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Victor
is this something that front end react devs do often? is it something that requires anything other than googling the algorithm?
No. Speaking of which does anyone use the memoize-one npm library/have seen significant good preformance results from using it? Longshot I know but somehow server side pagination in my app is in bad shape i.e. "hey I want to get this thing, oh here's your 30k rows UI, gl with that".
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07-27-2018 , 10:35 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Victor
is this something that front end react devs do often? is it something that requires anything other than googling the algorithm?
I'm not a front-end dev, but are you suggesting that front-devs never write algorithms or write anything nontrivial?
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07-27-2018 , 10:35 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by :::grimReaper:::
$180k and can't write find_first_repeat in O(n)? Jelly.
a) Can’t write it in a few minutes the next day after a 7 month road trip where your brain is 100% dedicated to learning Spanish.

b) Believe it or not it’s possible to add many multiples of your salary in value to your company w/o even knowing what O(n) means.

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07-27-2018 , 10:35 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Grue
"hey I want to get this thing, oh here's your 30k rows UI, gl with that".
We have some endpoints on our site that perform searches and enumerate the results, a page at a time. I personally set the max page size pretty high, my theory is, if someone wants 100k results, they're going to get them, either through a ton of small requests or a smaller number of bigger requests.

Anyway, didn't really think about it until someone decided they were going to search something that returned every result, and then go through every page.

There are roughly a billion rows in the database. I added a max page parameter.

(Does your backend really return 30k rows, or is it just that you want to get them all a page at a time?)
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07-27-2018 , 10:45 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by maxtower
I wasn't trying to say you should ask for less money. I was trying to say that you should only interview at places with enough scale (or VC) that they won't bat an eye at 10-20k difference. Unless of course you really don't want to work for large corp.
I really don’t want to work for large Corp. I don’t want to take 6 months+ to get plugged in. I want to wear more hats and not be pegged as just “the node guy”. I want to build something from the ground up. I want to work for a company that might put up with me building something for a few years, then working part time from South America for 6 months (I don’t tell them that part).
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07-27-2018 , 11:06 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by RustyBrooks
(Does your backend really return 30k rows, or is it just that you want to get them all a page at a time?)
our back end is um.. challenging, in that yes UI can make a request to get all widgets and if all widgets is in the B range (and at this company it is), it will really attempt to do that. Problem is its hard to say what is in that range and when its fine to get all widgets (<1000) and when its not.

Quote:
Originally Posted by suzzer99
I really don’t want to work for large Corp. I don’t want to take 6 months+ to get plugged in. I want to wear more hats and not be pegged as just “the node guy”. I want to build something from the ground up. I want to work for a company that might put up with me building something for a few years, then working part time from South America for 6 months (I don’t tell them that part).
Welp market is good but not that good imo. It took a few months but I more or less figured out I was hired into this job with humblebrag a really good total comp because the product I'm delivering will result in 8 figure savings yearly for my company after it replaces various 3rd party products with our internal tool. If you can deliver that kind of value awesome but def have to communicate that.
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07-27-2018 , 11:18 PM
FWIW - I should know a lot of the CS stuff I’m getting dinged for. I’m realizing it is a definitely leak in my game. But it’s also easily possible to be really productive w/o it.
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07-28-2018 , 12:14 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Grue
Welp market is good but not that good imo. It took a few months but I more or less figured out I was hired into this job with humblebrag a really good total comp because the product I'm delivering will result in 8 figure savings yearly for my company after it replaces various 3rd party products with our internal tool. If you can deliver that kind of value awesome but def have to communicate that.
I seriously doubt most companies have any idea how much a developer is actually worth to them. They just know boondoggles cost a lot and good devs are expensive.

I also think great devs are generally worth many multiples of what they're actually paid. So it's not like the market has anything to do with actual value added. It's all just the least you have to pay for a dev who keeps your stuff from blowing up - like every job.

Last edited by suzzer99; 07-28-2018 at 12:21 AM.
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07-28-2018 , 12:19 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by adios
If you go too low on salary then potential companies will think you’d bolt at first opportunity to make more. Doesn’t seem like seem like developer shortage is that acute at the present time. Could be wrong though. Getting lots of inquires but so are a lot of developers.
If you mean after a couple years - sure everyone looks around after a couple years. But my track record is pretty good about staying with companies for a while. I have no idea why they think I'd take an offer then keep looking for something better.

Why don't companies have any problem hiring devs with long commutes? Shouldn't it be the same principle?

If so though all I literally had to do was a) not complain about the commute and b) not give them a number and I probably earn an offer. Argh I SUCK at this. There is nothing else in the interview that went badly. Unless I'm too old.

I don't mean to come off entitled in all this btw. This has been a really humbling experience and I realized I should have been doing a TON more to keep my skills up to date with the latest and greatest, and be more curious about learning more in my areas of expertise as well.

I won't slip into that rut of just doing enough to satisfy my job requirements again.
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07-28-2018 , 03:07 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by suzzer99
b) Believe it or not it’s possible to add many multiples of your salary in value to your company w/o even knowing what O(n) means.
But why not hire someone who can write code well? I probably spend 30% of my time refactoring garbage, convoluted, inefficient code written by senior devs. These senior devs (age 40+) get away with high flying salaries writing mediocre code (I'm 28). Funny how you alluded to age discrimination.
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07-28-2018 , 07:09 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by suzzer99
If you mean after a couple years - sure everyone looks around after a couple years. But my track record is pretty good about staying with companies for a while. I have no idea why they think I'd take an offer then keep looking for something better.

Why don't companies have any problem hiring devs with long commutes? Shouldn't it be the same principle?

If so though all I literally had to do was a) not complain about the commute and b) not give them a number and I probably earn an offer. Argh I SUCK at this. There is nothing else in the interview that went badly. Unless I'm too old.

I don't mean to come off entitled in all this btw. This has been a really humbling experience and I realized I should have been doing a TON more to keep my skills up to date with the latest and greatest, and be more curious about learning more in my areas of expertise as well.

I won't slip into that rut of just doing enough to satisfy my job requirements again
.
+1

Seems like you have the financial resources to take some time to rectify this though.
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07-28-2018 , 07:21 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by :::grimReaper:::
But why not hire someone who can write code well? I probably spend 30% of my time refactoring garbage, convoluted, inefficient code written by senior devs. These senior devs (age 40+) get away with high flying salaries writing mediocre code (I'm 28). Funny how you alluded to age discrimination.
Putting on my cynic hat. From a company's point of view, if they have their choice between a candidate who wants $75K that will probably write crappy code and a candidate that wants $150K that will probably write code that is somewhat less crappy but still crappy then guess who they are going to hire.
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07-28-2018 , 09:42 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by :::grimReaper:::
I'm not a front-end dev, but are you suggesting that front-devs never write algorithms or write anything nontrivial?
I am saying front end devs can right perfectly fine code without ever knowing O(n) and if they do need it for something, it is easily implemented by googling.
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07-28-2018 , 09:57 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Grue
our back end is um.. challenging, in that yes UI can make a request to get all widgets and if all widgets is in the B range (and at this company it is), it will really attempt to do that. Problem is its hard to say what is in that range and when its fine to get all widgets (<1000) and when its not.
Man, I just build paging into everything. If the consumer says he doesn't want it I build it in anyway and make it optional.
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07-28-2018 , 11:28 AM
My largest project is going into testing. It gets the right answers, runs quickly, and has reasonable functionality. I'm hoping there's not much left to test.
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07-28-2018 , 01:08 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by :::grimReaper:::
But why not hire someone who can write code well? I probably spend 30% of my time refactoring garbage, convoluted, inefficient code written by senior devs. These senior devs (age 40+) get away with high flying salaries writing mediocre code (I'm 28). Funny how you alluded to age discrimination.
Tell me if you think any of this isn't written well. https://github.com/jackspaniel/guar

Sorry about your experience with senior devs. But I take exception that not knowing O(n) inside and out is correlated with writing garbage code.

Last edited by suzzer99; 07-28-2018 at 01:13 PM.
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07-28-2018 , 01:09 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by river_tilt
My largest project is going into testing. It gets the right answers, runs quickly, and has reasonable functionality. I'm hoping there's not much left to test.
What does "going into testing" mean exactly?
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