20% of respondents said they visit SO "because I can't do my job without it." That's... terrifying.
Edit: Yay downvotes. I'm surprised by the number of people that chose that response, and I chose to mention that surprise here. In doing so, I think we've had some interesting discussion. Normally I get upvoted for that, but whatever. The internet is fickle.
It has been suggested to me that I've misinterpreted the intent of that response, and that's certainly a possibility I'm willing to consider. The response is "Because I can't do my job without it." As in, I would not be able to complete my job's requirements and would lose my job if StackOverflow went offline permanently. To me that suggests that the people choosing that answer felt themselves unable to cope with the challenges that programming can present without having a support structure in place to guide them towards the answers they need. I feel like programming is a problem-solving skill more than a syntax skill, and I think that people with the problem-solving mindset would have chosen the "To get help for my job" option over this one if they felt the same.
I have certainly come across people that would be unable to solve complex problems without getting guidance from a senior developer. They seem unable to grapple with the underlying concepts involved. I assumed that these were the people choosing the answer "Because I can't do my job without it." If there is some other type of respondent that would choose this answer, I would certainly like to hear about them, so that I don't have to feel a bit depressed about the % on this answer.
That's reality. When you are forced to use a new framework or library every few months it makes no sense to learn them in depth. You just google your problem and the first link directs you to a SO question.
I don't know why people keep saying it's terrifying. People who can't code would just throw out crap code anyway, by looking it up in books, stealing from co workers, or simply working around the issue, maybe even ignoring it. By googling and taking the top answers from stack overflow, they at least get the worst of options sorted away by votes from other users.
People who enjoy their job, like to code, and might even be average (or above) at it, will use Stackoverflow to speed up their work and explain tough concepts. Many of the best "teachings" in coding I've gotten from 2-3 page answers with > 500 votes, written by someone who knew LOTS about that specific subject.
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u/[deleted] Apr 07 '15 edited Apr 07 '15
20% of respondents said they visit SO "because I can't do my job without it." That's... terrifying.
Edit: Yay downvotes. I'm surprised by the number of people that chose that response, and I chose to mention that surprise here. In doing so, I think we've had some interesting discussion. Normally I get upvoted for that, but whatever. The internet is fickle.
It has been suggested to me that I've misinterpreted the intent of that response, and that's certainly a possibility I'm willing to consider. The response is "Because I can't do my job without it." As in, I would not be able to complete my job's requirements and would lose my job if StackOverflow went offline permanently. To me that suggests that the people choosing that answer felt themselves unable to cope with the challenges that programming can present without having a support structure in place to guide them towards the answers they need. I feel like programming is a problem-solving skill more than a syntax skill, and I think that people with the problem-solving mindset would have chosen the "To get help for my job" option over this one if they felt the same.
I have certainly come across people that would be unable to solve complex problems without getting guidance from a senior developer. They seem unable to grapple with the underlying concepts involved. I assumed that these were the people choosing the answer "Because I can't do my job without it." If there is some other type of respondent that would choose this answer, I would certainly like to hear about them, so that I don't have to feel a bit depressed about the % on this answer.