What is the hardest thing about being a programmer? JavaRush graduates and students talk

A sedentary lifestyle, working with outdated code and finding bugs - developers, like people in other professions, face difficulties in their work. You can have a long discussion about what is the most difficult for a programmer, or you can simply ask the opinion of developers. We were curious to know what pisses off developers, so we did a survey and collected the results in this text. Our survey involved students and graduates of CodeGym - both those who are still taking the course and those who have already got a job. This is important to understand, because the opinion on the difficulties in the work for these categories is different. For example, these are the problems identified by students of CodeGym, who are still on the way to their first job:Working programmers think differently: gaining real experience, developers change their opinion about the difficulties in development. For example, for working programmers, the problem of the lack of specifications is in the first place, and for students, working with legacy code. For the background, we also add that among the working graduates of CodeGym, most of all those who got a job in a product company, in second place are developers in outsourcing, and only 3.8% of developers work in the freelance field. We will analyze the difficulties in the work in more detail - with the comments of the developers. And at the same time, we will find out what developers like most about their work and how their relationship with remote work has developed.

Lack of specifications

The lack of specifications, that is, descriptions of the behavior of the program that needs to be developed, is the first problem on the list of difficulties for working programmers (it was noted by 69.2% of developers). As we mentioned above, what is interesting is that students and job seekers have a slightly different idea of ​​which programming problem will be the main one. For this category, this is work with legacy code ( obsolete code - ed. ) - 45.5% of respondents voted for it. This difference in answers suggests that students do not fully understand the problems they will face in practice. Among students, the problem of lack of specifications is in second place (36.4% of people voted for it).

Here is what the programmers said about the lack of specifications: “I’ve been working recently, but I still don’t understand how the application works,” says Denis. “Without understanding the nuances of the product and without proper specification, it is hard to make changes or refactor old/specific code,” says Andrey. “It's hard to switch from task to task in the absence of documentation or specifications,” notes Roman. “Because of the inaccurate terms of reference [you have to] come up with a solution, which is then criticized and rework is required,” says Veronika. “Lack of clear terms of reference in 90% of cases,” says Denis. “There are no clear technical tasks, customers themselves do not know what they want. Already at the development stage, the task can change dramatically,” adds Andrey.

Estimating task deadlines and working with legacy code

Indistinct deadlines were in second place in the list of difficulties of the programmer's work. 42.3% of working IT people voted for them. At the same time, students put this problem only in fifth place (18.2% of votes). Most often, programmers complain that the employer incorrectly estimates the deadlines for completing tasks or that, having little experience, they themselves cannot calculate the correct deadlines. “Sometimes I am not sure about the timeframe for which I will complete the task and put a larger estimate (estimate - ed.), although I complete it faster. Sometimes it annoys customers,” says Igor. “The deadlines are set from the ceiling and by other people, often not related to the development,” says Denis. “Time for a task in which there is no experience is difficult to determine,” Nikolay adds. Working with obsolete code gained the same number of votes among working programmers as blurry deadlines - 42.3%. Recall that the students put her in first place (45.5% of the vote).

Too many rallies

Perhaps the problem with rallies in the field of IT development has worsened during the pandemic. There were many rallies. But because of the online format, it has become even more difficult to delve into the essence of conversations. 38.5% of working developers said that rallies complicate their work. At the same time, the students gave 18.2% of their votes for them, probably because they had not yet encountered this problem in reality. “A lot of time is spent on empty communication, and no one canceled deadlines,” says Peter.

Passive lifestyle

Sitting at a computer all the time ranked fifth among the difficulties in the work of programmers (34.6% of the voices of working developers). Students and job seekers ranked this difficulty in fourth place with 36.4% of the vote. Programmers noted that due to a sedentary lifestyle, they have health problems: cervical osteochondrosis, “sore back”, overweight.

Communicating with other people and finding bugs

The need to communicate with other people and look for errors scored the same number of votes - 23.1% each among working programmers and took fifth place in the difficulty rating. Interestingly, none of the students voted for the problem with communication. This is most likely due to the fact that newcomers have not yet had time to work in IT teams. At the same time, 36.4% of students and job seekers voted for finding bugs.

Office or remote: which is more difficult?

Although at the beginning of the quarantine, many were happy with remote work, according to our survey, there were quite a few dissatisfied with this format of work. Respondents note that it is difficult for them to concentrate at home, the boundaries between work and leisure are blurred, and it is difficult to maintain work-life balance. There are those who are dissatisfied with the office: they are mainly annoyed by the fact that they have to spend several hours to get to work and home. “The disadvantage of the office is travel time. The disadvantage of remote work is a lot of temptations that can distract the fact that the house is smoothly turning into an office, ”says Igor. “There is a lot of unnecessary communication in the office,” notes Denis. “The office is worse because I'm an introvert. It’s easier for me to communicate with people virtually,” Alexander adds. “Definitely [harder] remote work. Overcomplicated communications, lack of contact with the team. Remote communication tools do not allow solving tasks as productively as I do in the office,” says Denis. “Working in an office is more difficult if the office is far away because it takes a long time to get there. I don't want to waste time. But if the office is under my nose, then I will definitely choose the office. There is a working environment,” says Vladislav.

Bonuses of working as a programmer: high salary, creativity and career growth

For balance, we asked survey participants about the benefits of working as a programmer. Most often, developers noted high salaries, good working conditions, interest in work, career prospects and the possibility of relocation to other countries. “Constant logic puzzles, comfortable conditions and good salaries,” says Igor. “High salary in exchange for the opportunity to solve interesting problems. Very serious opportunities for growth,” says Denis. “Creative, calm, measured, and most importantly, interesting work,” Roman. “I feel the joy of creating something new or fixing something old. Programming is an eternal puzzle with a thousand solutions, the dopamine addict in me is happy. At the moment, this is probably the easiest of the creative activities after frying scrambled eggs, ”- Denis. “Interesting tasks,

“You can work 24 hours a day, or you can work with your head. The profession of a programmer is just about that. You yourself (depending on the task at hand) determine what you need to do, when and to what extent. All you need is a computer, a head and this very task, ”Arthur. What do you think is the hardest part of being a programmer? And what is the most pleasant thing? Looking forward to your opinion in the comments ;)