Alternate Career Paths: If You Weren’t A Coder or Developer, What Would You Be Instead?

I think most of these comments are spoilt brat comments that come from a point of view of a comfortable couch and the benefits that come with it.

I find it more than very insolent and disparaging. Especially for people that "admire" the low paying jobs just for the jobs presumed quirkiness or exotic-ness, for their novelty or Just because they look fun. A job is a job. And for those people having to do it. It is hard and probably low paying and makes them feel insignificant. And probably its repetitiveness and redundancy is annoying. And the feeling of being undervalued can be overwhelming and not obvious to the admiring passerby.

If you ask them to swap place with you they would do it in a blink and you wouldn't like the place that they are in. you would want to swap back real quick. They would fight you tooth and nail.

You have the best job in the world you are a coder. Why would you wanna go into a job that is a living hell for many people who will look at you and admire you for your success especially financially.

You can probably do a lot of things for your family that other people dream about. Holidays and Christmas are probably magical for you and the kids and here you are wishing you were a magician.
You have the best coffee from expensive coffee machines and here you are wanting to work in a coffee house ?
As for job security ? Health care security ? Savings ? Retirement ?
Most of you probably have your cars and houses paid off and have more than one house etc and fewer worries .
You wouldn't be able to afford such luxuries with most of the jobs that you guys admire.

I think when you start feeling that you could do another job then stand up take a walk and be thankful for your blessings and count them. And look around. You are probably just tired. take a break. listen to music. Do a 100 push ups. Listen to music.
every Job has its pros and cons ala
the deadlines; the long hours; the pressure. BUT...

Anyways I really think that some of you guys can afford to take a years break and in between do your "dream jobs". And or do them on the side as a hobby. Because that is why you admire those jobs. BUT YOU ARE NOT DOING THEM.

So please do not make the jobs that you all have in coding come across and seem like a curse in hell or something bad.

You are a coder. Millions of men would like to be like you. its hard for many. And many cannot do the job. And they drop off and drop out.
You are kind of elite. You are in there.
You are doing it...You are a rock and roll star.
KEEP ROCKING!!!!

For me, besides Technical writing and Backend development, I like drumming and music production.

So Music production is something I will do, working on it. 😎

I'd be a writer or a painter.

Park ranger! I try to get out hiking every weekend, and camp sometimes too. When I see problems like branches across the trail, or especially trash, I clean it up if I can, and sometimes I think: wouldn't it be nice if this were my job? Just out there building trails, teaching survival workshops, stuff like that.

I love building software but the more I do it the more I dream about really disconnecting and getting away from screens and keyboards, at least for a while.

Sometimes I imagine it would be nice to be a truck driver, but I don't trust myself behind the wheel of one of those things.

But probably by most secret and lurid dream is to become a DJ and produce trance music and performs at clubs, that sure looks fun!

Drummer in a huge band

I would have likely been a teacher, but ultimately think I would have the most fun being a baker!

Really interested in cyber security lately. For now I'm just listening to all kind of podcasts (DarkNet Diaries is a good one, that got me hooked on the whole infosec space...) and marvel at all the clever ways people hack into networks and the astonishing stories of cyber-heists, scams and nation-state-actors.

I don't see myself reverse-engineering malware from byte-code (would leave that to smarter and more patient folks), but I could imagine myself doing pentesting, social engineering, open source intelligence collection or even testing physical security (ie.: breaking into places and tricking security guards). Of course all it strictly on the White Hat side :D

I also think this is one of the few things worth doing in IT. Protecting a companies assets from criminals or even a countries infrastructure is creating much bigger value then working to create the n-th VC founded ponzi-scheme or marketing landing page.

When I was in high school (way back in the 90’s) I wanted to be an aeronautical engineer but I was always way too lazy to actually apply myself and would never have made it through an engineering degree. I fell into software and it’s worked out okay. If I could do it again with hindsight I think I’d like to be a machinist.

Full time stock trader lol

Dude. Powerful question. I would be a noob. 😂😂😂

I'd probably own a bike shop -- which is my retirement plan, anyway.

I would have liked to be a medical doctor. 😊✌🏻

maybe a modern (heavily use of tech) primary basic needs kind of job like Farmer or Cook.
or maybe an athlete because as a coder I can't keep up constantly with daily workout.

Probably Math, Physics, or English Teacher. Probably ...

probably been a full time forex trader