Quote: Original post by Eelco
Id say programmers should be able to get better with age up until the point where they start going senile, and I suppose thats not your problem at 40.

I dunno, articles like these seem to suggest it starts "after 40," which could conceivably mean 40 and a day. The latter one implies that mostly one's typing speed would be affected. Of course, programmer's are divided about the impact that would have.

I'm over 40. I've been contracting recently because the money was so much better. However, the client I was working with asked me if I wanted to come on full time because they needed someone with deeper experience. They're paying me significantly more than I've ever made before.

I'm a .NET/C# programmer. I have experience with ASP.NET, WPF, WCF, Windows Workflow, Silverlight, XNA. Nobody has accused me of being obsolete ;)

Quote: Original post by shuma-gorath
I dunno, articles like these seem to suggest it starts "after 40," which could conceivably mean 40 and a day. The latter one implies that mostly one's typing speed would be affected. Of course, programmer's are divided about the impact that would have.

well how much of your day is actually spent programming? Or more to the point, how much of your time is actually spent typing? It's actually quite small when you consider how the job relies almost completely on the ability to type code.

And let's not forget the typing aides in IDEs. Last time I used Visual Studio, it was rather good at filling in blanks and I got very used to typing a few glyphs and hitting enter. Autocomplete rules. There's also a lot of gizmos for auto-generating code.

Programming is about getting the computer to do work for you. So of course, a programmers get the computer to do work for them, too. Hence the programming languages themselves, compilers, shared libraries & toolkits, open-source, engine kits, object orientation, name-spaces, autocomplete, GUI designers...

My current boss is over 40 and there is no way you could call him obsolete, not-up-to-date, etc. If you think about it, most good programmers start 'playing round' as kids / early teens. That said, this guy has been 'doing this' for longer then I live now (I'm 25). Sure, I am good for my age / experience and stuff, but there are areas in which he simply kicks ass.

Hope that when I hit 40, a lot of the problems I'll have to solve as a programmer will be of a philosophical nature - 'to buy a fifth Lambo or not to buy?' ;)

Quote: Original post by Eelco
Do you want to become a programmer at 40? That sounds like an uphill battle. Good programming is like being good at playing the violin; you are never going to be the best if you didnt start at age 4, and if you started after you were 25 you are always going to be an amateur. Programming is a mindset, a way of thinking, a form of language.

The prerequisite to being a good programmer is having good problem-solving skills. Copying code listings from magazines at age 6 is neither required nor enough. In addition, programming is in no way "like playing the violin". It is a purely mental activity, whereas the violin also involves motor skills. IMO comments like these discourage people for no reason. I would even argue you can become "the best" if you start at 25 or 30, simply because I believe most of the needed skills can be acquired through non-programming careers too.

Quote: Original post by VerMan
Well, as you abeylin, i'm 33... i know 7 years from now seems a bit far. But I'm just thinking since i see job postings ("from 2x to 35", "over 40 need not to apply", etc)
So maybe i'm just wondering what would happen in case i need to switch jobs for whatever reason when i get there... but as you, i prefer the technical side than the management side of the profession.

Quote: but there's nothing really that says you have to stop writing code when you start going gray

LOL

You've actually seen job postings where they state that people 40+ shouldn't apply? Seems a bit odd since in many places it's considered unethical, if not illegal to do such a thing.

That being said, as long as you say up-to-date with technology as it evolves, I don't see why someone can't be a programmer well past 40. Some people have no interest in pushing paper when they can write code.

Quote: Original post by D_Tr

Quote: Original post by Eelco
Do you want to become a programmer at 40? That sounds like an uphill battle. Good programming is like being good at playing the violin; you are never going to be the best if you didnt start at age 4, and if you started after you were 25 you are always going to be an amateur. Programming is a mindset, a way of thinking, a form of language.

The prerequisite to being a good programmer is having good problem-solving skills. Copying code listings from magazines at age 6 is neither required nor enough. In addition, programming is in no way "like playing the violin". It is a purely mental activity, whereas the violin also involves motor skills. IMO comments like these discourage people for no reason. I would even argue you can become "the best" if you start at 25 or 30, simply because I believe most of the needed skills can be acquired through non-programming careers too.

Just like how people have no problem picking up fluency in a foreign language when they are older... oh wait they do.

I have quite often tried to teach 20+ people how to program, and its not easy for them. Computer languages are really quite different from human languages, and many people I know have a really hard time adapting the to sheer level of autism a computer demands from you. It doesnt read between the lines. Besides, learning to program well requires time; lots of it; the kind of time grownups hardly ever have.

Ive seen many people get burnt out on programming just because of problems like getting their array indices lined up correctly. they just dont seem to see where to put the -1. The reason it seems 'obvious' to me is because somehow I found tinkering with that for days on end interesting as a kid. This doesnt have anything to do with problem solving skills; its just a stupid convention, just like the gender of nouns in many languages. Kids learn it without thinking about it. But after a certain ago, your mind just doesnt seem to care anymore about picking up on all that tedious information.

Do you actually know of any outstanding programmers that started after 25, or is that belief of yours based in faith?

I taught my wife of 26 to program. She just plain got it, and managed to write some useful programs for use at work. Her education? Masters in literature. Did dramatically better than others I've tried to teach at much younger ages, including some who spend all their time tinkering with computers. One 18 year old friend of mine, in the end, threw his hands up and said "screw it, I'm joining the army instead." He did. I also have another friend who started in college and seems to be a pretty badass machine learning specialist now. I taught an artist friend some Java (not &#106avascript) and he just got it, though he decided it wasn't what he wanted to commit himself to.<br><br>Some folks just get it, some seem to be pathologically unable to, and I haven't spotted a pattern in age, gender or intellectual background.

Quote: Original post by Eelco
I have quite often tried to teach 20+ people how to program, and its not easy for them. Computer languages are really quite different from human languages, and many people I know have a really hard time adapting the to sheer level of autism a computer demands from you. It doesnt read between the lines. Besides, learning to program well requires time; lots of it; the kind of time grownups hardly ever have.
?

My theory is that most people who would have taken an interest at that point (people who would enjoy programming) already have. The rest are being forced into it by a job requirement or class they must take. The further out in age groups you go, the more likely that those have an interest have already checked it out (especially during teenage years), and the more likely the people you have to teach aren't the programmer type.