Pushing for More

The end of the weekend

• I worked through the weekend, doing Haskell and some other work. I also had two interviews. During the week, I had to take a break and write some C++, also, for class. It’s always surprising when I realize I remembered how to write some C++, because I haven’t written a lot of it since the beginning of Summer. The sad part is that in class we use C++ and Java, and I certainly don’t remember how to write Java, so C++ it is.

• My friend and I continued studying during lunch times, and in fact, this past week we studied for three straight lunch-times (Tues/Wed/Thurs) and on Friday during lunch time we also hung out. We also managed to rope in two senior devs, which is really fun! One of them was already gushing about me, because we had met before and he was fascinated by what I was interested in. But he’s been out of the office and returns this coming week, so I haven’t really spoke to him since.

• One of the things my study-buddy spoke about was the rift between testers and devs. It’s really true. It’s bizarre to me because I very much consider myself a dev. I remember when I first started doing the internship, I met a guy who was a dev and asked him if he was ever a tester, and told him that I was doing this (just as a third internship for the experience; I was also doing two other dev internships) and he blandly said “that sucks” and ignored me. I also got yelled at one time because one of the testers said I was “behaving like a dev” because “they always do this”. Yikes.

• And yes, testers take a lot of pride in their work, but apparently they also hate devs. On teams, fortunately, they can get along, and support each other, but it seems like if you put a room between all of them and separate them, all they do is talk $h!T about each other. It’s quite sad. It’s a bit bizarro, too, because I’m sort of feeling like a black dude at a KKK meeting. Sort of like an imposter, because I hear them talk crap and I think “wow, is this what they’ll think of me, too?”

• It’s so unlike my life outside of that reality. Just because someone has a label doesn’t mean that’s who they are. A lot of the testers there have been scooped up by pretty big companies (but as testers). The devs..not so much lol. But to each his own, I guess. So we were talking about how we just don’t get what the deal is about the hate between testers and devs. It’s real, though. And other testers will straight up turn against you and stop talking to you if you make the switch. Yep, it can be that petty. Anyways, for now it’s nice to have that momentum and I really enjoy working with my study-buddy during lunch, and just getting better.

• Interestingly, my C++ code is a lot cleaner than it was before summer. I’ve also found myself writing tests. It’s nice to see the improvement. My friend laughed and told me that if a tester crosses into dev at the company, the testing head gives a $50 card to any tester who finds a bug in the dev’s code LOL. That’s pretty funny. I told her when she transitioned if I found it, I’d take her out to drinks or dinner with the card. :)

• I also made a bit of progress on the parser I’m working on via pair-programming today. So that was really great. I just want to continue and get better. In between, I’ve been watching the British tv series “Rich House, Poor House”. It’s quite good. I try to take breaks between working (usually timed) so I won’t burn out, and it allows me to rest my eyes and not suffer from computer strain later on.

I got into SPLASH

• But I don’t think I can go. It’s in Boston, which I’ve always wanted to visit, and one of the Haskell sessions is even in MIT, but I’d have to go through PAC Funding and miss a week of my internship, and I end up losing money because I wasn’t able to get my hotel covered. That’s my biggest cost, so maybe some other time. It would have been nice, though, because Nikos from Rust is going to be there, and the captain of the volunteering team (for which I was chosen) worked on the V8 engine. So it would have been nice to talk to her about the internals of a browser, considering that I’d like to build one. But I guess the timing didn’t work out.

My trip is confirmed for ICFP

• I’m definitely going to that. My hotel and flight is all booked, and I spoke to my roommate via email. My mentor from GSoC will also be there, along with a bunch of other people I know. It’s going to be a lot of fun, but I’m sure it will also be tiring because it’s going to be a lot of people between Strange Loop and ICFP. But I feel energized knowing I’ll be around FP-ers again. There’s even a Haskell Slack Channel (I also joined the Rust and Racket ones!) and people there are working Haskell jobs. That gives me a lot of hope. The more time I spend on this, the more I realize I just want to work in Haskell right now. I just spend my time on that. And I’d like to get better.

Things I’d like to do

• Hopefully by October I can start back making pull requests in Rust. I’m also almost done with Hbook.

Grad school

• I’m sitting exams this week and writing up an SOP (again lol) but for feedback this time. I’ve had four professors already give me the OK for recommendations, so that’s all good. So who knows, I guess. We’ll see how it goes. I’d love to, if given the opportunity. It would be a great experience and opportunity for me and I’d grow so much.

Anyways, I think that’s about it