[HN Gopher] Ask HN: How do you find peers in your field who care...
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Ask HN: How do you find peers in your field who care about their
craft?
I am asking specifically from the Software Engineering /
Development field fo work, but it can likely be applied to a great
many other fields. I would like to know how others go about
finding peers to discuss the more abstract or theoretical aspects
of their craft/trade/field to a degree that a "9-to-5er" would
typically just not care about. In my work life I find it difficult
to engage others in discussions about computer science theories, or
even obtain advice about perceived best practices. Those who have
the knowledge and experience seem too burnt out with the industry
to care, and those without are usually in the industry for the
status & pay. So how / where do you find people who care?
Author : natpalmer1776
Score : 21 points
Date : 2022-03-30 18:27 UTC (4 hours ago)
| giantg2 wrote:
| Find independent projects. I work a 9-5 job and stopped giving a
| crap about it. I still have an interest for my personal projects
| though. Not that I have much time to devote to it, nor am I great
| at it. But I do care about it.
| eatonphil wrote:
| I run a Discord for this [0] and I started a virtual software
| internals meetup as well [1]. Next event is tomorrow at 8pm ET
| with Simon of Napkin Math and Philip O'Toole, author of rqlite.
|
| Basically looking for people interested in hacking on databases,
| compilers, emulators, browsers, operating systems, distributed
| systems, etc. Anything cool software internals? Come hang out.
| Introduce yourself in #hacking-introductions.
|
| But also, you're in the right place. Hacker News and Lobsters are
| great communities for this. Plus good quality Reddits like
| /r/programminglanguages, /r/compilers, /r/emudev,
| /r/databasedevelopment, /r/networkdevelopment, etc.
|
| The /r/emudev sub has an awesome Discord server and I hear the
| /r/programminglanguages sub has an awesome Discord too.
|
| [0] discord.multiprocess.io
|
| [1] meetup.com/hackernights
| 46756e wrote:
| If you are looking for in-person, I think it's a numbers game. I
| would like to meet more people like this myself, but I have found
| a few just by meeting friends or friends that are engineers.
| bitxbitxbitcoin wrote:
| Listen to podcasts in your specific field, follow the podcasters
| and their guests, attend events where they will be speaking at,
| or reach out via email. Good luck!
| Dig1t wrote:
| I'd also love to know the answer to this question. I have a few
| good friends that are really passionate about computer science
| and programming and we talk all the time about it. However,
| finding more has been pretty hit or miss. There seem to be a much
| larger proportion of people like that working at Google,
| Facebook, etc that I have met, but working at those places
| obviously isn't a guarantee that they're like that.
|
| I guess the only advice I could generalize from this would be to
| seek out the people working at the top end of whatever industry
| you're interested in, as the people who are truly passionate
| about a subject are likely to be talented and probably working at
| whatever place is considered the "best".
| version_five wrote:
| > as the people who are truly passionate about a subject are
| likely to be talented and probably working at whatever place is
| considered the "best"
|
| I'd be cautious with this assumption. Not that it's always
| wrong. Places that are _considered_ the best attract type-A 's
| that crave external recognition and don't really care about
| their trade. In another era they would have been in finance.
|
| Not that I think software is saturated with these people, but
| your assumption could break down. For example, you end up
| getting people organizing a meetup or code+coffee or whatever
| because they want to be seen as organizing it and not because
| they actually care about it.
| giraffe_lady wrote:
| I am also just generally skeptical of reputations because of
| how they can outlast the behaviors that earned them. Years
| ago I worked for a great company, truly wonderful group of
| people with a really careful, respectful approach to work.
|
| Then there were a bunch of big leadership changes and it
| turned to shit and I left. I kept on hearing about that
| amazing "culture" for 2-3 years after that, they actively
| used that reputation in recruiting even. I still knew people
| there and it was even worse than when I left. Once companies
| know they are known for something good they will milk it
| whether or not it's real.
| romanhn wrote:
| TBH, you might be looking in the wrong place. Computer science !=
| software engineering and you'd probably have more luck engaging
| with folks in academia circles. Look into the Papers We Love
| community as well.
|
| I would, however, caution away from the mindset that your
| colleagues don't care about their craft. They probably do, but
| that doesn't mean that their interests necessarily overlap with
| yours. Calling them "9-to-5ers" seems needlessly adversarial as
| well, even if they do prefer more work-life balance in their
| life.
| giraffe_lady wrote:
| Yeah I might well be one of these people. I do care a lot about
| _my craft_ which is writing software for people to use to solve
| business problems.
|
| If my craft was more abstract or theoretical I'd care a lot
| more about those factors, be better versed on them. But my
| actual daily work is actually very grounded, applying known
| solutions to well understood problems. The craft is in the
| execution and refinement of it, not the theory here.
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