Work in IT, They Said | Hacker News Reader

Work in IT, They Said

6 pointsmartinplease8 comments

Work in IT, they said... But it's a lie. It's not a wonderful industry where you learn something new every day, where you overcome interesting challenges, where each day is a different adventure, where you bring some valuable work on the table for a cutting-edge project that makes sense... It's just little, tiny, shitty problems, tools tailored to specific scenarios that can't work beyond them, software that doesn't even install due to incompatibilities, it's all hack-it-up wiring from a rotten socket to another rotten socket using a rotten cable, fucking pesty bugs de la muerte all around, config that changes all the time... And the seniors are as clueless as we are, some even brag about it!.. I don't know what else to do.

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That's why you get paid to do it. If it was fun people would do it for free. Go work in another trade if you don't like IT. You're in a business that's usually regarded as one of the most comfortable. Have you tried a physically or mentally exhausting job? One with risk of bodily harm or death?

« If it was fun people would do it for free. » → I doubt it: not even youtubers do it for free, nowadays... To which you'll say (rightfully) that video making isn't so much fun either...

« You're in a business that's usually regarded as one of the most comfortable. » → I must admit I didn't give much thought to the poor little African kids who are starving before posting on my privileged pitfalls. Now I feel guilty about it: who am I to complain about what really boils down to my own inability to handle failure and absent taste for effort. Again, this feels inextricable too...

« Have you tried a physically or mentally exhausting job? » → After all this time wasted context-switching, waiting on somebody else to fulfill their depth-10 ticket to unclog the firewall, the borderline unlawful harassment necessary to make them do it, manually testing (my nemesis), compiling (so much that there are memes about this one), people who send "Hi, are you there?" by e-mail during toilet break, aaall the fucking broken docs out there, tHe NOdejS eCOsYstEm (ok, this one was below the belt... Still deserved), I think IT can be mentally exhausting too, in its own way.

What I mean is that from your description you're working a real job, so I assume you don't have the option of not working or pretending to work in a fake job that has been tailored for you. In that case, IT is probably as good as it gets.

IT doesn't have to be so mentally exhausting, if you remind yourself that in the end of the day the problems are not that important. Nobody's going to die because of a firewall. The same is true for many other jobs that people get stressed out from.

So IT is just like any other job. Who'd have thought? But I agree: the wonder and magic and all of that kind of thing that people are sold about IT ain't the truth.

I hate the interview process now. 20 years ago a phone call was enough to get an offer.

What exactly makes you hate the interview process? Could you develop on the reasons? How has it changed over time? Why do you think it has changed this way (I assume it can't be for the sake of professionalization)?

In the 90s you would post your resume on craigslist and get 40 phone calls the next day. Usually a call was enough to get an offer. Now you have to go through 4-5 rounds

In the immortal words of Mr. Bones, "THE RIDE NEVER ENDS"

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