
A Developer's Guide to Surviving the Coronapocalypse - jdegoes
http://degoes.net/articles/coronapocalypse
======
scarface74
_Cloud infrastructure and costly web services can add up to hundreds of
thousands or millions, even for relatively small companies. There will be
increasing pressure to minimize these costs, and to replace high-priced
services with those that have low total cost of ownership._

I’m usually a cloud true believer and choose to emphasize letting someone else
do the “undifferentiated heavy lifting” so developers can concentrate on
building new features instead of spending extra hours babysitting
infrastructure. But, since most software engineers are salaried, this is the
time to trade time for money instead of the other way around if your company
is struggling.

I’m fortunate to work at a B2B company where our clients are large health
systems so for us it’s business as usual. We actually think we will grow.

~~~
cwbrandsma
I’m most likely wrong (I hope I am), but I’m worried about the long term
economic effect this virus will have on the hospitals. Not right away, but
over the next year. We have a large number of people needing hospital care for
extended time (1 to 2 weeks), and a large number of unemployed. This will
result in a lot of bankruptcies (even for people with health insurance). Will
the health insurance industry be able to pay out all these clamps as well?

Anyway, I’m half expecting to see another massive bailout for hospitals, or
the government just buy them outright in about a year.

~~~
strict9
Like you I also hope to see bailouts, but the biggest bailouts happen because
industries that receive them have an army of experienced lobbyists.

Hospitals for better or worse have negligible presence with lobbyists and
won't receive the windfalls that fossil fuel, airlines, airline manufacturers,
and cruise lines will.

~~~
scarface74
I am the last person who thinks the government will choose the people over the
lobbyists. But something as obvious as your local hospital closing can’t go
ignored by politicians.

You notice that now Trump is talking about expanding Medicare, increasing
unemployment benefits, and reopening ACA enrollment and you don’t hear a peep
from conservatives talking about socialism.

It’s true, the definition of socialism is when the government is helping
“them” - not you.

------
dangus
There is almost no actionable advice in this article. It all comes across as
something someone would sell as a seminar.

The end goal isn't to tell us any useful information, it's just a list of
vague best practices that could be packaged up into a motivational swindle -
in this case, piggybacking a global pandemic with content that isn't
particularly related.

And of course it’s targeted at the audience that has the least amount of
likelihood of having any significant trouble due to the pandemic.

Software developers:

In high demand (and not a healthcare worker?) Check!

Can work from home? Check!

High income? Check!

Making a guide for that kind of person’s “survival” is pretty much an insult
to the doctors and nurses who are fighting not only for their patients’
survival but their own.

------
SiempreViernes
Nice, a guide for how to survive an unique and ongoing crisis! It must be full
of battle tested advice I’m sure!

For example, they suggest moving to someplace with lower cost of living,
surely sage advice!

~~~
dessant
Similar articles just show how spoiled and priviledged the authors truly are.

I've seen some baffling things here on HN too, such as people _preferring_ to
only be informed using push notifications about the crisis, personalized for
their area, nothing else, because that's more _convenient_ than looking up
information, or the other day, deciding to block COVID-19 related news
entirely, instead of selecting a trusted news source and rationing their
exposure to the media.

~~~
capableweb
Is it so baffling that people are getting tired of reading about COVID-19
though? I mean, I've been in quarantine for at least 1 month now, and gonna be
at least 2 more weeks. I'd like to read about other things than COVID-19,
especially since I can't really take any other action than to stay at home,
especially because it would be illegal for me to not be at home.

So yeah, I'm one of the people who have started removing and blocking things
that are mentioning COVID-19, since I can't really do anything about it. Once
something actionable comes up, I'll hear it in the official press conferences
from my country's government.

I guess luckily, my HN blocker only blocks mentions of COVID-19 and "corona
virus", so the keyword "Coronapocalypse" managed to get through, and here I
am...

~~~
dessant
I think it again comes down to one's priviledge. If you have the possibility
to isolate yourself for months and you don't have to worry about anyone else,
you may be able to afford to block the news entirely.

Everyone else needs to read the news (5 minutes a day is enough), because it
may contain important information. Consider how you may miss a changed bus
schedule announced on a local news site with "due to coronavirus" in the
title. Same thing about the local supermarket, you may get home without food
while exposing yourself and your family to additional risk. You may also be
fined for failing to present specific papers when you leave your home for
groceries, for which the requirement may have been announced a day prior.

Reading the news is crucial for most of us during this period, we just have to
do it responsibly.

Here's also a great explanation for why reading the news could make a
difference for you:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22783044](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22783044)

> Plus I learned by the news that losing sense of smell and taste was a likely
> indicator of Covid-19. I got tested and discovered I was positive.

~~~
soneca
I would never know about bus and local supermarket hours and changes through
the news in any of the two cities that I lived in my life (Sao Paulo and Los
Angeles). I would (and I did) find the supermarket and the bus company
websites. That's not "news".

Cutting all news is a good strategy for some people for improving mental
health. Just like anyone can have a cabinet full of chocolate and just control
themselves to each a small piece twice a week, but it's much more efficient to
just not have chocolate at all at home.

Also, the general tone of people that don't want to read news anymore is that
they personally don't want it for themselves only. So, that's unrelated to
people that consider it crucial and want to do it responsibly.

Lastly, I've seen this desire of consuming less or no news in a lot of people
that are not the "HN crowd" or privileged people in terms of money.

~~~
dessant
> I would never know about bus and local supermarket hours and changes through
> the news in any of the two cities that I lived in my life (Sao Paulo and Los
> Angeles). I would (and I did) find the supermarket and the bus company
> websites. That's not "news".

That was your experience before this crisis. I've got hold of such information
from a local news site a week ago, while official sites remained unchanged for
a couple more days. I'm sure there are places where everything is well oiled,
but for most of us things don't just snap into place and we need to be aware
of our surroundings as much as it's tolerable for our mental health.

~~~
keiferski
Checking the news once a day for 15 minutes is more than sufficient. Keep in
mind that the overwhelming majority of people aren’t on Twitter, don’t know
what push notifications are, and really don’t need to do anything other than
stay at home, wear a mask, and avoid others. Constantly refreshing media sites
really isn’t productive or helpful.

~~~
dessant
I agree and that's what I'm advocating too, checking a trusted news source
once a day.

------
jeffrallen
And of you happen to still have a secure income: spend, spend, spend. Keep
your income moving so it can be income to others.

~~~
Havoc
Very altruistic. Possibly to ones own detriment

~~~
jeffrallen
That's not how economies work. They are not zero sum games, they are networks
of cash flows which create more flows.

------
z3t4
Finding a remote job as a developer has been next to impossible. Hopefully
that will change after this. I also hope that we will see less centralization
in general.

~~~
blackrock
The strongest companies that will emerge from this crisis, will be those tech
companies that focus first on remote collaboration.

Your workforce doesn’t get killed. But most tech engineers are young anyways,
so they should survive this virus.

And your workforce is decentralized, so you can have business continuity in a
disaster scenario.

------
Swizec
A bird doesn’t trust the branch, she trusts her wings.

1\. Build skills

2\. Have cash

3\. Network

~~~
PedroCandeias
That's very true. I'm also a software professional looking for work, and so
far my network has been a good source of promising leads.

On the cash front, in addition to the importance of having reserves, I'd
suggest that the importance of having multiple revenue streams has never been
clearer.

~~~
scarface74
Having multiple revenue streams doesn’t help when the entire economy is
screwed.

During the last recession, I was a full time software engineer, a part time
fitness instructor/personal trainer and had real estate holdings.

Guess how my alternate income streams worked out when no one was spending
money? I sold off all of my rental real estate (in an area that still hasn’t
recovered), I stopped trying to get personal fitness classes and scaled back
teaching to just a “working hobby” and doubled down in software engineering,
building skills and a network.

When the company I worked for finally did collapse in late 2010, I was able to
get a couple of contracts until I found a full time gig.

~~~
reaperducer
_Having multiple revenue streams doesn’t help when the entire economy is
screwed._

This is true. A couple on my block are an architect, and a yoga instructor.
Two very diverse income streams.

Now both are unemployed.

A guy I sold a web site to was one of those people who was big on diversity of
income.

His portfolio covered everything from hotel services to restaurants to
antiques restoration to a couple of small factories. All are closed. His
diverse income is gone.

~~~
tiborsaas
At least his chances were bigger than the average Joe's. Probably he made a
solid runway to last till his streams can recover.

~~~
scarface74
While I understand the “average Joe” is not in the position that software
engineers are in, I’m just going to address software engineering since we are
on a technical site.

In software engineering, you don’t need “multiple income streams” to stay
solvent. You just need a set of skills that are in sync with the market, good
interviewing techniques, a strong network, and cash to tide you over and keep
your expenses reasonable. This time is not a recession. It’s a true worldwide
epidemic. But during “normal” recessions, if you have what I outlined above,
someone somewhere will hire you at least as a contractor at some rate.

Of course if you overly specialized it might be harder.

The dot com bust wasn’t that bad if you were just a regular old enterprise
developer working at a profitable company that wasn’t directly or indirectly
dependent on VC money. Even in 2008, there were companies hiring hired gun
contractors at lower rates.

~~~
mywittyname
I wholeheartedly agree with this sentiment. We have the privilege of working
in an industry in which we can gain experience in nearly any sub-field using
online resources. If you were laid off from your $oldTech job, there are
dozens of $newTech that can be learned in your newly-found free time for next
to no cost.

