caseymarquis (u/caseymarquis)

caseymarquis commented on Please stop the coding challenges blackentropy.bearblog.dev... · Posted by u/CrazyEmi

simonw · a year ago

> This is like asking a Ruby developer to debug PHP as a test of flexibility.

Sounds like an OK test to me. Great (senior) developers should be able to do that kind of thing. Categorizing yourself exclusively as "a Ruby developer" is a career trap.

caseymarquis · a year ago

That's either a fun or terrible exercise depending on who is administering and how. However, if you said it's a Ruby role and the candidate is good enough to be picky, you may scare them off when they think your description of the role was a lie.

caseymarquis commented on Even Microsoft Notepad is getting AI text editing now theverge.com/2024/11/6/24... · Posted by u/redbell

glouwbug · a year ago

I like how currently on LinkedIn there’s a feature to use AI writing assistance to help land your next job. Like if I can’t write how am I ever going to work a job

caseymarquis · a year ago

I recently used ChatGPT canvas to improve a friend's resume. I had managed him in the past, and he is great to work with. However, from his resume you would never know it. I did 3 hours worth of editing and improvement in 5 minutes. I gave rambling descriptions of what he had done when working for me and why it was impressive, and GPT translated this into resume speak almost instantly. I then gave some vague suggestions for improvement, made a couple minor edits to buff off the AI veneer, and viola, he had a professional resume that will help him do great work in his next position.

caseymarquis commented on Net 9.0 LINQ Performance Improvements blog.ndepend.com/net-9-0-... · Posted by u/olvy0

dingdingdang · a year ago

OK, so since I've never actually bothered to look at what LINQ actually is.. there may be others in the same boat: "LINQ allows you to query any enumerable collections such as List<T>, Array, or Dictionary<TKey,TValue>.". Got to admit I still find the LINQ to DB passtru rather opaque even after reading up on it: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/30716776/passing-a-query...

Basically allowing for a uniform way to query data which is reminiscent of a more modern version of SQL (in my optics anyway). Does anything library wise come close to this within the Golang ecosystem?

caseymarquis · a year ago

While LINQ does include a library of extension methods for functional programming with .NET collections (which is great), it also includes "Expression Classes". In a nutshell, this allows a user to pass a single expression lambda to a function, and the function implementor receives the abstract syntax tree for the lambda, not the lambda itself. You can then not only receive and analyze these trees, you can also manually build and compile them. This effectively allows a limited set of runtime macros within .NET.

caseymarquis commented on Founder Mode paulgraham.com/foundermod... · Posted by u/bifftastic

caseymarquis · a year ago

I've been occasionally mentioning this book on HN since I read it. Linked below. The book is about how companies evolve and how teams of people work together. It uses human growth as an analogy and fairly accurately describes how companies fail or thrive at different stages. It's older at this point, but it's about human behavior and group dynamics, which don't change rapidly.

The book doesn't use the phrase founder mode, but it discusses the transition from a founder oriented company to a culture oriented company in detail.

The human analog works well here. Advice for parenting a baby, toddler, child, or teenager is all different. People's needs change over time. At a certain point people become adults and need mentoring more than parenting.

Almost every article on how to run a company fails to qualify the stage of growth that the company is in. Once you start thinking about how companies evolve over time (somewhat predictably), it changes your perspective. PG is right in the correct context. Those advising AirBNB are also correct, in the right context. Following either piece of advice blindly is just living in a cargo cult.

https://www.amazon.com/Managing-Corporate-Lifecycles-Ichak-A...

(Like any business book, it's at least 20% BS, but the remaining 80% is quite good. If you do read the book, do not read the first few chapters and assume you've gotten the whole idea. The book has a very good paradigm on worker profiles and what is needed in different stages of growth in its later chapters.)

caseymarquis commented on The Wetware Crisis: The Dead Sea Effect (2008) brucefwebster.com/2008/04... · Posted by u/andromeduck

forgetfreeman · 2 years ago

It's thinkpieces like this that make me believe that IT professionals specifically and white collar workers generally would benefit greatly from a mandatory 24 month stint on a construction crew. One of the most important lessons any job foreman can learn is that every crew needs at least one lame duck.

A single talented carpenter with an energetic but otherwise totally unskilled helper can accomplish more in a shift than two talented carpenters together. If you don't have someone to run to the truck for nails, hold shit, move ladders, etc. productivity suffers because your talent is wasting time on menial tasks.

Same thing applies to IT departments. The folks the author is busy sneering at are at least as valuable as the engineers they're actively trying to retain because (among other things) they soak menial tasks that would otherwise cut into their rockstar's productivity.

caseymarquis · 2 years ago

I grew up working construction on the side with my father, became an appprentice lineman, moved to aftermarket electrical installations in CNC machines, then ended up writing software products for over a decade. I've worked on a wide variety of software: Embedded projects requiring 2000 line assembly ISRs for legacy RS232 protocols, reverse engineering binary network protocols, implementing network server protocols from specifications, writing my own actor and dependency injection frameworks in managed languages, web application backend work, frontend work with JavaScript/TypeScript and frameworks, and so on. I also do a lot of product management, support, customer management, and internal management. Much of my customer support involves teaching external developers from large corporations how to use HTTP and SDKs.

I'm usually one of the smarter people in the room when doing software development and spend a lot of time helping others. In construction, I'm the enthusiastic idiot as the skillset is different. Most tech workers underestimate how high skilled tradework and many other positions outside their experience are, especially management work.

Having said all that, I feel uniquely qualified to offer a rebuttal. The article is describing a clear pattern that I see at large companies that are not focused on software development or lack solid engineering leadership. Ironically, the problem gets worse the more a company tries to outsource IT as they face all the same challenges with less control. It is an organizational health issue however, not some universal truth. If tech workers lack anything, it's experience with organizational growth, change, and group dynamics, not construction experience. Organizations are like people, they grow, change, figure out who they are, have identity crises and need different things in different phases. Ask the highest level/most competent manager you have access to for book recommendations if you're interested in this.

Anyway, back on topic, software "gruntwork" typically implies a department lacks the agency to automate away said gruntwork or lacks the skills to do so. As an example, I work with many organizations using the JVM, but none of them use Scala, Kotlin, Clojure, or any other "nice" JVM language. They use Java. In some cases Java 8. If you're writing Java, there is absolutely stupid gruntwork. I've written example applications for some of these organizations and I had to create code generation tools to stay sane in this environment. In software, you eliminate stupid gruntwork with tools, not people.

We do need average enthusiasts in software development, but it's not the same as construction. In construction the less talented person fetches things and does setup work. In software development, the less talented workers spend most of their time using libraries, plugins, frameworks, compilers, interpreters, databases, and languages while the more talented workers write them.

My experience isn't universal, and I'd be interested in hearing some dissenting opinions on this.

caseymarquis commented on Infants understand language via rhythm and tone rather than individual sounds theguardian.com/science/2... · Posted by u/im_dario

CSMastermind · 2 years ago

> Might as well be raising a dog and a dolphin.

That made me chuckle.

But it's possible for siblings not to share any genetic material right?

A brother and a sister would obviously get different genes from their father and presumably there would be a 50/50 chance of them getting different genes from their mother.

There's four unique prototypes of children any two people can produce together.

caseymarquis · 2 years ago

I thought it was more like 2^23 unique prototypes?

caseymarquis commented on Show HN: Interactive AI Resume/LinkedIn for better networking/job hunting protoconstruct.com/chat/6... · Posted by u/anyeung

vunderba · 2 years ago

It's very similar to how the entertainment industry works. A director can specify a broad range of qualifications and search an actor database for potential matching candidates.

The biggest issues I see are:

- getting candidates to put their data in, you can't really rely on scraping because a résumé doesn't provide enough information, and your hallucination quantity will go up

- getting critical mass of users, so that recruiters and potential employers would find the database valuable

- candidates embellishing their accomplishments, though admittedly this is also a problem with basic resumes

caseymarquis · 2 years ago

I think OP has solved some of those issues with this approach. Initially, this is a fun tool that provides value to individuals. The result at scale becomes extremely valuable. The biggest missing piece is verification of skillset. I'm not sure how to solve that. Current employers? Motivated to keep their top performers and little incentive to engage early on. Peers are easy to game and are susceptible to generative AI for automation. You would almost need to integrate some kind of in person meeting for verification. Establish known experts and have them review and verify, then feed that into employer feedback after hiring for a sort of credit system. Employers using the rating system would themselves need to be monitored and policed.

caseymarquis commented on Show HN: Interactive AI Resume/LinkedIn for better networking/job hunting protoconstruct.com/chat/6... · Posted by u/anyeung

caseymarquis · 2 years ago

This is a very interesting idea. Given access to long form descriptions of what has been worked on, ideally with some kind of trusted verification, this approach seems like it would operate at scale quite well and could transform the way we network and hire. A technical expert could explain what is needed for a role, and with AI assistance candidates could be sorted through extremely effectively and matched to companies that are a good fit for their experience. Given, this doesn't account for junior developers who have yet to build up their skillset, but for experienced developers this could result in a much more efficient hiring process.

caseymarquis commented on Why Men Get So Few Matches on Dating Apps [video] youtube.com/watch?v=x3lyp... · Posted by u/Tozen

caseymarquis · 2 years ago

Men are applying and women are hiring. Half the candidates are lying on their resumes. Many candidates are spamming their resumes indiscriminately. If you've ever had to hire someone for a position that attracts hundreds of candidates (i.e. software engineer with decent pay), you'll encounter the same dynamic. I hate being in that role. I have to reject 199 people and accept 1. Often, there are dozens of qualified candidates. You interview half a dozen, and then you tell 5 out of 6 perfectly qualified people you interviewed they didn't get the job. You feel like a horrible person the whole time. I've discussed this with my wife (we met on Bumble) and she confirmed the scenarios are very similar.

It's often better to be in the hiring position than in the applying position. But it's awful for everyone involved.

The way to avoid this mess when applying for jobs is to build up a network and lean on it for new positions. I wonder if dating may have a similar alternative approach.

caseymarquis commented on Is ORM still an anti-pattern? github.com/getlago/lago/w... · Posted by u/AnhTho_FR

caseymarquis · 2 years ago

Comparing a JavaScript ORM to a C# ORM like Entity Framework feels like comparing C macros to Lisp macros.

You can't really have a reasonable conversation about ORMs without defining the feature set your ORM has. If an ORM doesn't apply type safety to SQL queries and translate typed code expressions to equivalent SQL expressions, it's not performing two of the key functions I associate with ORMs. If I didn't take these features for granted, I would probably question how useful ORMs are too!

I think the reason it's so hard to have a conversation about ORMs in general is that we're often lumping radically different systems together and then making a blanket judgement. Again, it's like working with C macros, getting annoyed with them, and then judging all macro systems to be bad.