320 karma · joined May 4, 2014
If you are unhappy it is usually obvious and your manager usually knows about it -- if they haven't done anything to rectify the situation, they likely can't or won't do anything about it.
Saying you are unhappy just creates a more tense situation.
In my experience, the only option you have in these situations is changing your role or group within your organization or leaving your organization for another job.
[Low|Med|Hi] + [Key] + [Initials] + [Number]
Low|Med|High = One of three keys based on how sensitive the site is. High: banking / work / email, Low: I don't trust the site, Med: other.
Key = Random string that only I know, with the most important accounts having a unique string
Initials = Initials of site name based on domain name + TLD, with the initials moved up x letters (for example, capitalone.com -> COC -> DPD)
Number = One of three random sets of numbers I use. Sometimes I forget which number I use for each site, but I can figure it out after a few incorrect attempts.
This means a unique password for every site generated by a system that only I know with no central storage except my brain.
What is wrong with this? What would be the advantage to using 1Password / LastPass over this?
No offense, but if you're non-technical, what are you basing this on? Literally every client I have worked with has said this and it's almost never been the case.
And as for your actual question: the most important attribute you should look for besides basic technical competency is someone who really believes in your idea and wants to see it through.
Looking for the lowest bidder on Elance will result in a lot of pain for you. They will see your baby as just another project to knock out. They won't have you or your business' best interest in mind and will cut corners. You will end up spending a lot of money for a low quality result, and other developers likely won't want to touch it.
Unless you have the money to pay a full time, market-rate salary, you will have to find someone who doesn't need a high salary (although they will expect a significant amount of equity, like 10-50%) and believes in your idea enough to deal with lots of iteration without cutting corners.
Maybe 40-50 years ago (if you were white). Maybe. Absolutely not today.
I found that the key was to find clients who value your work. Working with individuals or small businesses can be tough because they are usually highly constrained by budget and do not understand everything that goes in to what you do. They want freelancers because they can't afford full time people. They will compare you to the rates they can find on Craigslist or Elance and balk when you require market rates.
Instead, find startups with technical people doing the recruiting or large companies with established roles and processes for freelancers. They will at least understand market rates and what you actually do.
You also need to have the power to say no to clients. That usually means savings and the willingness to wait long periods between jobs in order to find the right one. For me, the hit rate of was 1 out of every 8-10 job opportunities.
https://www.google.com/search?q=site:usps.com+"zip+code" returns 120k results
https://www.google.com/search?q=site:usps.com+"postal+code" returns 372 results
I have found him to be contrarian and rude for the sake of being contrarian and rude.
To me, his behavior represents the worst of the archetypal 'rockstar' programmers I have worked with -- perhaps more skilled than the average, but full of himself, unreasonably mean and impossible to collaborate or work with. I have watched this kind of attitude destroy teams and companies and I prefer not to condone it.
There are plenty of people much more talented than him who are capable of providing feedback without seemingly delighting in being an asshole.
If you also use ST regularly and can afford it, I highly encourage you to support development and buy a license right now.
1. Play by the "rules": stockpile the degrees, certifications, awards, etc. that we all know are largely useless but are absolute requirements for signaling your way through a standard corporate job interview. If you are after a normal, boring, corporate American desk job (nothing wrong with this depending on your life situation) you must play the game by the rules. If you don't, you will delude yourself and lose opportunities to lesser talented candidates who are better at playing the game.
2. Leverage your connections: use your professional connections to bypass / skip many of the requirements set by the "rules" to get a job. This requires less of playing by the rules but means you must have a solid professional network of people that have good jobs at companies that are looking to hire and are impressed enough by your work to give you a recommendation. This is harder than it seems, even for those with good connections, but I personally have found the most success finding good jobs these way.
3. Set your own rules: start your own business. This is the toughest but allows you to completely skip the rules. It also requires the greatest amount of talent and offers the greatest amount of reward. Speaking from personal experience, however, unless you have stockpiled savings and have excellent work ethic, this is a massive risk that has the potential to destroy your savings, emotional state and family relationships.
If I were you, I'd focus on a combination of #1 and #2. Get the college degree even if you think it's useless -- I'm sure you're being rejected immediately because of a lack of college degree. If you really don't want to do that, start working your professional network for referrals or start working on a great side project that you can present at an interview that showcases your talents and makes up for your lack of degrees. #3 is the dream, of course, but I've found that there is enormous value in the stability of a regular paycheck and insurance, especially when you have dependents, despite the soul-crushing nature of corporate jobs.
Good luck.
Do you not see the issue with using a single data point about a person to judge them as closed-minded? Do you not see how that in itself is much more closed-minded?
I smoke pot every day. I've tried any natural hallucinogen I can find, multiple times. I'm a raging liberal. I'm a part-time cook that almost certainly could talk and cook circles around you when it comes to cuisine. I promise you I'm very adventurous.
But I often refuse alcohol during the week, and almost always in professional settings. Why?
1. Alcohol makes me excessively nauseous 2. Alcohol makes me excessively tired 3. Being nauseous and tired ruins my day 4. I don't like the implication that in order to be part of a professional setting I should be expected to drink alcohol
And that's it. None of the nonsense reasons you included above. Hopefully at your next conference you'll lose the entitled attitude, realize you know nothing about these people, and try to talk to them whether they drink or not. Or hopefully they'll just be able to avoid you and enjoy a conservation with someone who has a real understanding of people.
As developers, this problem isn't going away any time soon. Our options are basically to create our own thing and be our own boss so there is no management to frustrate us, or just give in, write the code, take the check, and enjoy our lives outside of work. It's that simple, but it's also quite liberating when you allow yourself to accept it.
I know that's ambiguous, and I'm not sure how it'd be implemented. But I often listen to podcasts when working from home and often wish for a way to consume Hacker News in the same way.