Yeah, I hate codinghorror stories. How may karma points do you need to down-vote now, 100? I'm at 86 and once I get there, I plan on voting down most CH stories.
Yep. I'm wondering where most people who read this article place themselves. I would say I'm probably a mix between the Working Programmer, the Average Programmer, and the Amateur Programmer. Working because I would say I have a successful career so far; Average because I wouldn't say I'm a naturally talented programmer (although I question whether they exist at all); and Amateur because I love programming and messing around with new technologies.
Why wasn't Linus Torvalds added to his Successful Programmers list considering the first line of that category is - Programmers who are both well known and have created entire businesses -- perhaps even whole industries -- around their code.
Maybe he will get added once he dies, considering Linux will surely outlive him.
Another thing .. can Knuth and Dijkstra be said to be programmers ?! Just an open question for discussion !
He explains in the comments that he meant it predictively, in that their work would survive long beyond them. I don't think programming has been around on a large scale long enough for dead masters who've actually died, unless you'd consider Turing, Church, and Shannon to be programmers. Hell, even the inventor/discoverer of Lisp is still around.
edit: I added "Discovered" because that's the way many Lisp fans, including pg, refer to it.
It seems to totally overlook the successful open-source programming 'gods' so to speak, only mentioning open source in relation to amateur programmers. Where's Linus?
Where's Linus, RMS, K&R and Guido? They're not only successful, they're also "dead" (which is a stupid label to use). I'm sure people will be studying the Linux kernel and using GNU/Linux (or derivatives thereof) and hacking in Python and C long after those people are dead. Why does Gates get to be on that list and not the Woz?
I wonder where Jeff Atwood places himself on that list.
Seems the distinction between Average and Bad programmers is that, while both lack talent, the Average programmer understands that he lacks talent and the Bad programmer does not.
Neither, for that matter, is Knuth. I'm sure there are, however, piles of dead COBOL programmers whose code is still in active use. Perhaps Jeff should rethink the category names.
[+] [-] huhtenberg|17 years ago|reply
Knuth is apparently dead. And it sounds like he didn't go down quietly, he took Alan Kay with him.
[+] [-] 10ren|17 years ago|reply
http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/001250.html (since the article link is now dead).
[+] [-] jmatt|17 years ago|reply
Sarcasm strikes again! Kay is a living legend, since he's still alive. He's working at his own institute: http://www.vpri.org/html/people/founders.htm
[EDIT: Grammar]
[+] [-] rw|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] iamwil|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] euroclydon|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Hexstream|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Davertron|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] vinutheraj|17 years ago|reply
Maybe he will get added once he dies, considering Linux will surely outlive him.
Another thing .. can Knuth and Dijkstra be said to be programmers ?! Just an open question for discussion !
[+] [-] jleyank|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Hexstream|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] anthonyrubin|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] khafra|17 years ago|reply
edit: I added "Discovered" because that's the way many Lisp fans, including pg, refer to it.
[+] [-] nx|17 years ago|reply
No, that doesn't sound as cool as I expected.
[+] [-] jlees|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] donaq|17 years ago|reply
I wonder where Jeff Atwood places himself on that list.
[+] [-] jimbokun|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] biohacker42|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] arundelo|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jcl|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gills|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] swombat|17 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pj|17 years ago|reply