Hi guys. What's life like as a technically competent programmer in your country?

Over here, programmer is the lowest life form. Everyone despises the programmer, from the sales to the users. The consultants are people who normally are poor in actual programming, but good at talking and sales, and they rose up to be a consultant.

Here, a programmer works from 8:30am to 9pm everyday rushing projects. Pay increments are low, and can expected to be laid off by 35 yrs old, once u are considered technologically backward.

How's life of a programmer in your country?

wow thats pretty bad. where are you from? over here if your very experienced and specialize in a number of good areas theres demand for you. THey always want senor developers with 4+ years commercial experience but offer you pretty good pay 50k-100k a year maybe depending on your experience.

one of my friends graduated and got a job doing sales/support and configs for an It company I think and is getting 52k a year starting. I'm like *BLEEP* I dont know I dont think I can do those types of jobs I just like making things so i never went for it. Shes telling me I should apply but I dont think i have customer service skills lol to deal with people.

This post has been edited by sonesay: Jan 18 2008, 04:30 AM

It really depends on what level of programmer you are, and which part of the industry you're working in. While I don't have direct working knowledge (I'm currently still a student studying programming), the average starting salary for graduates in my degree program is around $60,000. That's with close to 100% placement as well. As far as programming in the Game Industry goes the more experience someone has, the more likely they are to be hired. However, there is a large degree of burnout. The industry is very demanding, and has long work weeks, so many people work as game programmers for a few years and then move on to something less demanding of their time.

As far as respect goes, it is entirely dependent on who you talk to, and what you're programming. From my experience it is generally a well respected career, but also considered boring and unimaginative in some circles.

Hmmn... programming here is subject to a lot of interpretations.

For one, people outside the IT industry often confuse programming with computer literacy. A few of the common fallacies are:

Programmers are no more than good typists. I don't know about you but, when I was a student, I was besieged by my mom into typing some documents for her: contracts, inventory lists, sales reports etc. She'd draft the stuff on paper then ask me, the almighty Computer Science student to type and print it out for her. This fallacy is often seized upon by member of the older generation who could see nothing beyond equating computers with typewriters.

Programmers make l33t kewl WEBSITES!!! LIk teh HAXorz. Ugh, please. Some people who know nothing else but their Friendster, Myspace, Multiply or Facebook account often fawn when they find out I'm a programmer.
Ppl: "Do you have a website?"
Me: "Why, yes, I do."
Ppl: "Whoa! That's so kewl! So, what's your Facebook account?"
Me: "Uh... I don't have any."
Ppl: "Aheheh... I see... Uhm... okies, nice meeting you (noob)"

Programmers WILL leave the country. This is something we share with nurses. Really, allow me to add another thing, programmers ALWAYS earn big bucks. (Well, maybe we do, but let's not exaggerate. I'm not made of f*c<!ng dollars!)

Programmers make corny jokes. Maybe we do, maybe we don't. We share this fate with mathematicians, scholars, physicists, chemists, nerds and geeks.

Programmers can and will repair their friends' PC's Uh... no. Only if I really love you. A lot. A whole lot. And no, I generally don't make websites for free either. No, I won't help you with your MySpace.

Overall, though, programmers in our country are generally a respected lot. Of course, as techie and technical people, non-IT people usually run to us, if not blame us, if something goes wrong. The solution, then, is a combination of tact, skill, politics, diplomacy, agility, dexterity and, not to forget, programming skills. All too often, some programmers do tend to turn out troublesome code then wonder why, fifteen years later, they're still working in the same hellhole.

Not that I'm implying or insinuating anything on anyone, though, especially myself. Au contraire, I do turn up with troublesome code from time to time

Funny thing my mom made me do that stuff too cause, well, i'm the only one in the house who knows how to do that stuff! except my mom would make me do that with spread sheets and microsoft exel hahah. and she didn't know what she was doing when she was infront of the computer. so when she got confused she would make me do all of HER work from her job. That and during the holidays i hear "Dianne make christmas cards on the computer" or "Dianne i bought cards can you use the computer to put a message on the card then do the envelopes" i would complain but having a philippino mom who has a belt in hand is kinda scary



And this is so true but those that have myspace,friendster,facebook and what not usually have a basic knowledge of the computer. that or they just take layouts from other websites that make the layouts for other people. and they think they know more about website designing. it makes me laugh because they don't know what it takes to set up a website.



Lol if you are qualified and get paid for this uhm they will have to pay lol. and don't worry about people with myspace they could just go to sites like myspacelayouts.com or something or some gay site called pimpmysite lmao even though making layouts are easy but people are too lazy to actually go and try.