Hacker News Reader

Comment by albertgoeswoof | Hacker News Reader

The author makes a valid point, however the pushback against using OSS as an important hiring signal, is that most people are not privileged with enough spare time to work on OSS outside of their day job. Eg if you have a family, long commute etc.

And if they already are an excellent programmer and hitting all expectations, why should they do this? In fact, an employee who’s spending 5-6 hours/day on side projects might not be the best person for the company.

I don’t think recruiters look all that deeply either, I think you could game this by writing some docs or readme corrections to all of the top projects on github and get the PRs accepted.

View on HN

> The author makes a valid point, however the pushback against using OSS as an important hiring signal, is that most people are not privileged with enough spare time to work on OSS outside of their day job.

Like most people I know, I use open source software in my day-to-day job even though I work in a company who provides proprietary software and services.

That means that when I do encounter errors or bugs in those open source components and libraries I can make the choice to either write workarounds locally in my code, or I can choose to submit patches back upstream.

That’s not a matter of privilege. That’s a matter of choice.

I also think it’s reflective of a developer’s attitude: does he prefer things done “properly”, or will he just hack together something which works? Will he share his solutions or not?

That’s often not your choice, your employer needs to give you the time and in some cases permission to do it.

If your company allows you to use buggy components but doesn’t allow you to fix bugs...

Then that’s a company with some pretty serious problems, and it’s going to show in all of their products. If you as a developer decides to stay in that company then that will also reflect on you.

Oh right yes I’ll just quit my job and not pay my mortgage so I can work for a company that has great values.

I'm not telling you what to do, or saying you should quit your job and leave your life in ruins over company values.

I'm just telling you how perception by association works. Your choices are entirely your own.

>I'm just telling you how perception by association works. Your choices are your own.

For that to work, the people you go to interview with have to have some idea of what your previous company is like, which is very unlikely.

Also, "I had bills to pay" should erase 99% of your "perception by association" concerns. And guess what? You can't verify that. And if you do try to verify that, you're the problem.

Why are those two conditions mutually exclusive?

Don't worry this is part and parcel of HN posts. "If you don't do things the RIGHT way, you must be incompetent". With no regard for one's circumstances or context.

Where is pushback against using degrees as an important hiring signal, given many people are not privileged with enough money to go to the university? Where?

Literally this article, and all the other comments and posts about how useless a computer science degree is for hiring, and how we should all go to boot camps. I actually have a comp sci degree (and learned a tonne) but I know former classmates who skipped through without learning to program properly at all.

Still, I confidently bet someone without GitHub profile has easier time in hiring market than someone without a degree.

This is why scholarships exist and significant effort is being made at getting everyone a chance to attend university.

You’re making a false equivalence. GitHub can both be good for the privileged, and the underprivileged can use GitHub as an equalizer. The only way to guarantee they cannot use GitHub as an equalizer is for every hiring manager to ignore GitHub profiles.

Look at the candidate, whatever they choose to present as their experience and resume, and make a decision based on that. Don’t ignore anything they send you and don’t discount them because they didn’t send you something that someone else did.

> most people are not privileged with enough spare time to work on OSS outside of their day job

I keep hearing this. Do you have any data to back it up?

Count me as a data point. I have a family, children, relatives, friends and a house to keep in order. And some other things that takes time.

If your commute is on a straight enough road you could probably do it then using an ssh app on your phone. /s

Reply on news.ycombinator.com