Can Older Software Developers Still Learn New Tricks?

An anonymous reader writes "There's a persistent bias against older programmers in the software development industry, but do the claims against older developers' hold up? A new paper looks at reputation on StackOverflow, and finds that reputation grows as developers get older. Older developers know about a wider variety of technologies. All ages seem to be equally knowledgeable about most recent programming technologies. Two exceptions: older developers have the edge when it comes to iOS and Windows Phone."

Comments

One of two things.

[Anonymous Coward]

Older developers are always one of two things. They are invaluable wizards who have tons of experience, adaptability and know all the new technologies, or they are completely burnt out and useless. There is almost no middle ground. There is also a strong correlation between interest and hobbies - if they are doing techie things for fun, they will usually be in the wizard category. If they have just been doing the same old job for decades, and do few tech projects for fun, they will be burnt out.

Re:One of two things.

[pspahn]

There is also a strong correlation between interest and hobbies - if they are doing techie things for fun, they will usually be in the wizard category.

I can't really disagree here, but I wouldn't say that the correlation be restricted to what is considered a 'tech hobby'.

I have known a number of men in their upper years that I would classify in the 'wizard' category, yet their hobbies included things like fly fishing, baseball statistics, flying small planes, etc. I would really consider any of these a 'tech hobby', but I would consider them hobbies that require a great deal of technical aptitude to also be a wizard in.

Keeping the mind sharp is the key. If you do that by observing local caddis fly species, tying your own imitations, nailing the presentation to the fish (including time of day, weather conditions, season, physical stealth), and ultimately landing a 22 inch trout on 7x tippet, I imagine that keeps you just as sharp in the day job than simply doing more day job like things in your free time.

Hobbies are meant to be hobbies for a reason. If you are an aspiring musician gigging at the local clubs to make your cash and you then spend your free time doing more of the same, but "just for fun", your musical career is probably not going to take you where you'd like it to.

Completely detaching from concepts related to your occupation/career during your "me time" is absolutely essential to having a long enough career to ever become one of those "wizards". If you're a programmer, and you spend your free time programming for fun, you'll certainly become a solid developer, but there are very few people who love code enough to be able to sustain that for 20 or more years.

TL;DR - going fishing is better than having a 'tech hobby'.

Re:One of two things.

[geezer nerd]

I took on my last tech job at age 61. I was titled a manager, but as ever before, I could not (would not) keep my hands away from coding. I was in a start-up company involved in a completely different line of work than I had done before. I had learned a lot about XML in my previous job, and in the last one I learned VXML and Perl. And developed my first Eclipse plug-in. My coding experience went back to the old days when every computer architecture was different, there were no "platforms", and all code was developed from scratch. Memory dumps were our friends in the old days.

I did sense that programming technologies were changing rapidly, and I managed to keep my hand in with all the 20-something coworkers by working very hard to study and learn and apply new things. It can be done.

Too often, I see folks debating the merits of various languages. During my career I learned a zillion of them. Not a big deal. The big deal is learning the concepts. Sometimes a particular language will embody a concept (such as objects) more clearly or more usefully than another. But once you grasp the concept, the rest is syntax. Once I was searching for a new job and an HR type rejected me because my CV did not show Visual Basic. When I did get a job a few weeks later, one of my first activities was helping a junior programmer develop some Visual Basic code. Although I had never seen Visual Basic code before, I became the "expert" because I could see the ideas and concepts beyond the syntax.

33, 40 is not "old". I am 70 now, and still get a kick out of reading /.

Yes

[cunniff]

Now get off my lawn

Old Dogs and New Tricks

[the eric conspiracy]

If your old dog can't learn any new tricks, the chances are he couldn't learn any tricks when he was young as well.

Older workers cost more.

[Anonymous Coward]

They can command higher incomes based on their experience. They are harder to exploit, again because of their experience. Their health insurance costs more (more a product of poorly managed health care policies that are often beyond the employers control).

Any other excuse for not hiring them is a smokescreen, or worse, an attempt to stigmatize them to drive down the price that their experience can command.

Trygve would like a word with you...

[Anonymous Coward]

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trygve_Reenskaug developed MVC when he was 49, and DCI when he was 78.

As a 38 year old software developer

[composer777]

I can say... wait, what was the question?

Re:As a 38 year old software developer

[oodaloop]

We were discussing whether or not you approve of my presence on your lawn.

Re:Of course not

[Emperor Shaddam IV]

Yeah, this old fart knows Cobol, Assembly, C, C++, Java, a little C# and several other languages. I enjoy when you younger guys come to me for help because you can't read a log file, resolve a memory leak, write a test plan up, or optimize your SQL. :)

Re:old people have higher Health Care and don't 80

[Tough Love]

old people have higher Health Care and don't like pulling 80+ weeks.

Or even 40+ weeks. And don't need to because they tend to do their work more efficiently as opposed to galloping odf enthusiastically in all directions. Ultimately producing stronger, more maintainable code. By way of substantiation, note that the typical European worker at ~37 hours/week is typically as productive as an American or Asian worker supposedly putting in way more hours. The equalizer is, Europeans tend to plan better and waste less time.

BTW, note that being an older programmer does not obviate the possibility of having a young lover. Far from it. In work or love it's about keeping your stamina up: take care of your eyes and your body. Treasure your enthusiasm for life. Keep your mind active and never stop learning. The rest just falls into place.