Having a Job As A Programmer

[davidthefat]

I have thought about this, even if I am in a highschool robotics club, I have to sacrifice alot to get the job done. Imagine a full time job as a programmer, you have even less time for your family and sometimes you might have to work through the night if you have to make the deadline. Since programming anything isn't predictable, bugs may pop out of nowhere and stuff, you may find your self debugging the program a lot. I want to know how much real programmers actually work on a daily basis. Is it more demanding as a game programmer or lets say a programmer for NASA?

[agnl666]

I would assume NASA. Though if your working as a programmer, I'd think you have more time to program though you have nearly regular work hours. I guess the key would be enjoying it. I think programming is predictable. Bugs aren't random, you put them there so you just have to get good and don't or find them and fix them.

[whitey6993]

I read somewhere that most programmers work around 60 hours a week because of deadlines, unexpected technical errors, ect... I imagine that after a while you would eliminate most common bugs and become skilled at finding more elusive ones. Still things like intermittent bugs, even if they can be identified, pose problems. Really, the only way to have a career in programming is exactly as agnl666 said, you have to enjoy it.

[davidthefat]

I enjoy it, especially when it runs perfectly without bugs... but I want to be a good dad when I grow up, spend lots of time with my kids and wife...

[lor]

Yeah I think being a programmer, even though I'm not one yet, would take lots of dedication and you'd really need to love and be interested in what you did. I don't really think that all programmers work tons and tons of hours like you guys are stating above, yeah a lot of them probably do but I'm sure that if you'd want to pursue being a programmer and being a good father you might be able to find jobs where you can work from home/online or jobs that don't make you stay up till like 11pm finishing work.
Jobs that involve contracts might be the ones you'd have to avoid.. I think those would be the ones that require you to stay up all night & day trying to meet the deadline for a certain product.. that is, if you fall behind..

I'm just speaking in general and from my non-professional standpoint so.. w/e.

[Feral]

Working as a freelance programmer does require a lot of dedication I spent about a year working as and employed programmer working for a small company. I was only one of 6 total programmers working for this company and would generally put in between 50 - 80 hours a week.

I enjoyed the work being done and the job itself but spending that much time working in an office can become very tedious but I was used to working long hours so it didn't bother me much. the only real concern that ever came up was the amount of time I was spending away from my family.

In the end I made the decision to leave that job and work as a freelancer, I still work as many hours actually probably more as I usually sit at my computer for about 18 hours a day. But the up side is I am home with my family and can take as long of breaks as I want to spend with them.

So if you plan on becoming a full time programmer make sure that you understand that you will be spending more time at the office then a lawyer would.

As for game programming vs. NASA I would definitely say a game programmer is more demanding. While projects in both industries take years to complete, in NASA it is generally measured in decades so you have a lot more time and a whole lot long of a deadline.

[Sphexa]

If you enjoy it.. go for it! Programming is fun especially when you accomplish something.

[wim DC]

@school they also teach use 'object oriented analysis & design' .. which i find pretty boring. (Making use-cases, (system) sequence diagrams, domain models, design class diagrams, communication diagrams, anything you can think of)
Do you have to do this aswell as programmer, or is this task given to other people...?

[WingedPanther]

It depends a little bit on your environment, and the type of coder you are. If you want to be a peon, then no. Someone else will hand you all that paperwork and you will have to write your code to their spec. No creativity on your part at all.

On the other hand, if you want to lead a group of programmers in a large shop, that may be 90% of what you do!

There are all sorts of shades of in between. What you'll find, over time, is that you often save a LOT of time with that boring stuff. If you ever have to pick up a project somebody else was "almost done with" and there's no documentation for anything, you'll suddenly wish they had done the boring stuff. Instead, you'll have to do it to understand what's happening.

For myself, I don't use UML a whole lot, but there are times when I sit down and very carefully document the behavior. It's the non-trivial code where it suddenly becomes important.