
Ask HN: Do you ever feel the urge to work on something tangible? - flyGuyOnTheSly
Besides your computer, that is!<p>I&#x27;ve been at this for about 15 years now. Writing code. Making websites. Making people&#x27;s computer problems disappear basically.<p>I have lived a life &quot;in tech&quot; almost exclusively.<p>I was talking to my neighbor the other day who is a plumber by trade.<p>He was explaining how he is working on a new apartment building right now installing all of the faucets and pipes and what not. Running up and down stairs because there is no elevator installed yet, etc. Basically getting his hands dirty.<p>I have never thought this before... but as he explained it to me I actually started getting envious of him.<p>Which is an idea that I never thought I could ever have in my entire life.<p>I want to do something real. With my hands. That other normal real people can see and appreciate.<p>Like a working tap faucet for example. That&#x27;s pretty awesome if you think about it! It&#x27;s a magical button that gives fresh water to real people whenever they want! They might not know it... but they LOVE that tap and really appreciate it!<p>Whenever I learn a new algorithm or a new CSS trick or whatever that I think is cool... my only outlet is online essentially. I know a few local people who can talk shop so to speak... but after 15 years I was hoping to have met more than a handful of my ilk.<p>Maybe I&#x27;m just depressed? Maybe I&#x27;m just bored by my own routine? I don&#x27;t know.<p>So I ask you HN, are there any older programmers out there who just got stir-crazy churning out the same old code year after year just to make a buck?<p>What did you do to overcome that hurdle?<p>Thanks for reading!
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rajeshmr
Hey!

You are not alone. I started getting this feeling around 2-3 years back and
the feeling still lingers in me. I want to get out of tech (its been around 9
years in tech for me), and build real stuff, stuff you could feel and touch
and adore.

I would quit tech, if i figured out what i wanted to build (for real). I would
augment my craft with tech, but i wouldn't want to be working in tech to make
a living.

And no, you are not depressed for gods sake! You are absolutely normal! The
problem with the tech industry as i see it, is that you never attain mastery
over your craft. It is a never ending game. You always have something new to
learn - the paradigms keep shifting and priorities keep changing. While that
may excite the majority, there are a bunch of us who would like to master our
craft to perfection - and this sense is hard to attain in tech (please feel
free to disagree, and if you are the lucky few please get in touch). I have
envied craftsmen too.

But if you talk to them, they would probably envy us - since we make more
money than them.

Best thing i figured is, use your privilege of making more money than majority
and secure your future so you could buy some time to explore the craft you
want to perfect. It should be on the side. And once you are clear you want to
do it for the rest of your life - quit your job and move on to work on your
craft.

Hope that helps!

~~~
flyGuyOnTheSly
>And no, you are not depressed for gods sake! You are absolutely normal! The
problem with the tech industry as i see it, is that you never attain mastery
over your craft. It is a never ending game. You always have something new to
learn - the paradigms keep shifting and priorities keep changing. While that
may excite the majority, there are a bunch of us who would like to master our
craft to perfection - and this sense is hard to attain in tech (please feel
free to disagree, and if you are the lucky few please get in touch). I have
envied craftsmen too.

That's a great point. It does seem like an onslaught at times. But I don't
think that's quite what I am upset with.

I LOVE learning new things!

It just seems like all of the things that I have been learning recently have
only benefited large faceless corporations or people that are otherwise doing
not-good-work in this world.

Like lining their pockets with the profits of whatever pointless game they
seem to be playing.

Eking out a few percentage points off of a website's bounce rate or cutting a
few milliseconds off of somebody's program runtime just seems so utterly
pointless to me now.

Maybe it's just the types of people I have been working for?

Maybe I should try to get some work doing what I do for a non-profit or an
organization that helps people... instead of a capitalistic one that drains
their wallet?

I don't know... I just feel like I am wasting my talents doing what I am
currently doing is all.

>But if you talk to them, they would probably envy us - since we make more
money than them.

I know that they do. I have plenty of buddies who work in factories and they
tell me all the time "You don't work! You just sit on a computer!"

The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence I suppose.

Thank you very much for that comment!

~~~
rajeshmr
> Eking out a few percentage points off of a website's bounce rate or cutting
> a few milliseconds off of somebody's program runtime just seems so utterly
> pointless to me now.

Exactly! It seems utterly pointless indeed.

> I don't know... I just feel like I am wasting my talents doing what I am
> currently doing is all.

Take any software corporation today, and see what kind of work they do - talk
to insiders! You will inevitably notice a pattern. Its all about these kinds
of things - shaving a few seconds off here, optimizing there. We are like a
cog in a machine. Maybe the engineers who got to work on iphone would have had
that feeling of accomplishment of having contributed to something big - but
the subsequent iterations would have been incremental at best! Now take the
example of a carpenter , the instructions are the same for him, but every
project is new though the underlying skillset is the same! And he can take
what he learns from his previous project and apply it to his next project and
improve his craft.

Like someone in the comments said, what you did 10 years ago is pointless now.

And if you are interested, check this out :

[https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/pakxby/silicon-
va...](https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/pakxby/silicon-valley-is-
inserting-its-biases-into-nearly-every-technology-we-use)

The tech industry may be doing more harm than good.

I too love learning new stuff, they are just different for me these days from
tech. How about learning art or music ? they will be new, and they will keep
you engaged.

What i was referring to was that, for example - if you play music your
feedback loop is almost immediate to work with. Your senses are engaged and
its easier to get into a flow!

Now imagine the way software construction is structured in big corporations -
your feedback loop is way into the future, with no way to assess your
contributions' impact. And even if you did have an impact, for whom ? As you
said, for some capitalist wanting to fill their pockets with profits who in
turn want to uphold shareholder supremacy!

I think i got verbose there ;) but i do understand what you are going through,
and i hope you come up with something that adds value to people and make you a
happy person! My good wishes!

------
ericob
What one learned 30 years ago in wood carving, painting (or plumbing) is
probably still widely applicable. The intricacies of a particular programming
language or environment you learned 30 years ago is likely meaningless. I
remember being an expert an version 1.0 of a graphics program. That expertise
is now useless: the program evolved, met its end of life and the company that
distributed disappeared in an acquisition. Telling people today that I was an
expert in 'FabulousDraw' gets me blank stares, the same as mention of the
company that distributed it.

Activity in the physical realms is not unchanging of course. But it is more
durable than software products. Installing the plumbing in a large building
might not leave much of a mark on history, but it will leave more of a mark
than doing the "plumbing" work on a corporate web site.

At least if you're a plumber or (was a) typewriter repair person, you can
physically show ordinary people an example of what you do and they are likely
to at least grasp the general concept.

~~~
flyGuyOnTheSly
Bingo.

>At least if you're a plumber or (was a) typewriter repair person, you can
physically show ordinary people an example of what you do and they are likely
to at least grasp the general concept.

If real people do not care about what you are working on, then what's the
point?

Am I working towards a thicker wallet or a few more zeros on my bank account?
And if so, why?

>Telling people today that I was an expert in 'FabulousDraw' gets me blank
stares, the same as mention of the company that distributed it.

LOL! I couldn't even find a reference to it on Google. Was that the software's
actual name?

P.S. ... I noticed that you have been on HN for almost 3 years now and have
only left a handful of comments. I encourage you to write more, as this
comment in particular was profound imho.

Thank you very much for it.

------
dennis_jeeves
Besides the "urge to work on something tangible" another good reason is that
you will find the dwindling opportunities in software due to ageism.

Btw - I'd personally love to team up with someone rather than go solo to
reduce the risks, work and responsibility.

(snid comment: you took 15 years to realize this!, well, better late than
never )

------
bjourne
Then quit your job and become a plumber...

------
qbrass
Start with a hobby.

~~~
flyGuyOnTheSly
Like what for example?

Model trains?

That isn't quite the "real" feeling I am after. A hobby that only benefits
myself because I am bored doesn't seem like the kind of thing that will
fulfill my lack of tangible real problems to work on.

The fact that my model train stopped working because the motor got wet or
whatever doesn't really seem like an important problem to solve that would
benefit anybody in particular.

~~~
ericob
Something different... The following isn't going to pay, but it is FAR from a
hobby. It it real, physically grounded, complex work that directly,
observably, benefits real people. Bridges to Prosperity
<[https://www.bridgestoprosperity.org/>](https://www.bridgestoprosperity.org/>)

~~~
flyGuyOnTheSly
That's a really interesting idea!

But it looks like they are only after money? [0]

They only ask for donations, fundraisers, or to join their newsletter. Is
there any actual work to be done?

[0] [https://www.bridgestoprosperity.org/what-you-can-
do](https://www.bridgestoprosperity.org/what-you-can-do)

