yacoder

I agree, but I don't think I am being romantic - I do realise jobs always have those boring, etc. elements, it's a matter of whether overall you are happy with it.

And I certainly don't accept the contention that there aren't jobs programmers can be really happy in (as some contend, not saying you are necessarily), I think that's lazy thinking...

In any case I certainly don't think it's something fundamental as it's not the work itself that bothers me so much, but rather the pain of working in a negative situation.

currently, mostly C#, SQL, F# and some scheme. Most of my experience (and entirely professionally) is on the MS stack, though I run linux at home.

I certainly believe that the kind of stuff you learn on a CS degree is incredibly important, esp. algorithms, hardware architecture, etc.

I agree with you that I think the academic approach wouldn't be as efficient as taking a more practical approach to what I need to know.

Thank you. The positive encouragement of HNers means a lot to me.

I think a consensus is emerging that putting the language project aside for a while to focus on OSS would be a good idea.

Ironically I sent you an email about this very subject asking for advice (though more on the Micro ISV side of things) earlier :-)

Yeah. I know. I am being an idiot. I guess it's just easy to be too afraid of being rejected, which I definitely am. I need to get over myself I think.

I'm ok for money, but not great (some debt) so can't really make that lovely lovely idea reality :) nice suggestion though!

Wow! I am definitely interested in discussing any possibilities (I have clearly been far too reticent on this front as is clear from discussion here), for obvious reasons I'd rather not post [all] those details here; have dropped you an email.

Roughly: based in London, mostly C# skillset (currently).

thank you very much! I think you are perhaps being somewhat overly kind! I care about and love programming, though I do tend to feel like I somewhat suck at it. I guess right now I just want to find a way of actually getting somewhere where I can improve my coding chops.

I mainly program in C#, though I code in scheme (what a lovely language), F# which is a .net ocaml near-enough, and I am learning ometa which, though not a language, allows you to experiment with languages quite nicely in other languages.

As far as stuff I've done, I've mainly played around with stuff; outside of work I've been on-and-off working on the language idea for a while, at work I've done a bunch of internal stuff much of which sucks :'-(. I try to do as good a job as I can, though it's difficult to stay motivated when in such a negative environment. Am rather depressed about it all at the moment to be honest!

I feel like I have a lot more to improve on. a lot more. In fact I have a terrible fear that if I was to apply for jobs now my suckiness would screw my chances at some of the cooler places blowing my chance to apply at them later. Argh.

I have definitely been reticent on the jobsearching front. I guess a combination of inertia/laziness and fear have got in the way; also I suppose I am worried that if I apply to jobs before I am 'ready' (well practised in the algo stuff typically asked at decent job interviews, etc.) I will end up blowing my chances at these places then later when I come to apply with more experience in this area they won't want to hear from me. Is that a stupid approach?

yes, I want to switch from internal to a software company. I definitely feel like open source is really critical; I don't feel like I'm working in an environment where code quality matters to anybody, the only way I'm going to get to work on a decent code base with people who care (and will improve me) before moving job is by working on open source.

Thanks for the advice; will definitely take it on board.

It's true that the language project itself is unlikely to be monetisable (especially since the chances of it ever being used let alone popular are close to 0), but I wondered whether I could develop something along a similar vein, say a code analysis tool or some such, which could find application of language-related techniques and keep me in an area I find especially interesting.

I guess I just want to be happy as a coder; whether that requires me to be independent or can be achieved working for someone else is something I'm not yet sure about. I agree I need to leave the negative situation, I guess part of what I'm asking is how best to improve myself such that I can get a job somewhere decent.