Programmer by love, Software Engineer by profession
Tags: programming, career
Published: 2023-04-10 01:12:06

I love to write code, I started doing it when I was fifteen and saw an article on the internet teaching how to create a calculator in VB6 (Visual Basic 6). For some reason the fiften years old me found that particularly interesting and decided to try it. So I installed VB6 on my Windows XP and when I realized I was spending nights and nights programming and doing all the things that went over my head.

And I loved every second doing that, it was pure joy for me, trying to create new things, discovering the best way to put elements on the screen, cracking the obscure logic behind the magic that computers had. And when the Microsoft killed VB6 I chose to try a _"real"_ programming language, and that language was C++. At first it was a shock, I went from a language that was virtually low-code to one of the most code intensive, it was **hard** but it was rewarding, just like a puzzle. And I could keep writing here my whole story as programmer but I think that this beginning is a great picture of why I love to write code.


![Visual Basic 6](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/1ic96fh1fa862ruog80z.png)
<center><sup>Visual Basic 6 running on Windows XP</sup></center>

<br />And now we go the the present, I'm a Software Engineer and I love my job but I'm not doing it just because I love it. I'm doing it because I'm an adult and I need to work to pay my bills. Right now my job has a lot of code writing involved which for sure makes my life more happy, but this can change anytime, we live in a world that changes everyweek, we work in a field that changes everyday. 

Maybe tomorrow I need to work in a management position, maybe next year we have AIs that can write all the code that we demand, maybe low-code takes over the market. If I had to take a bet, I would bet that the programming activity will be gone someday, and then I will not be able to do what I love in my everyday job, but I know for sure that the Software Engineer position will always exists, maybe we have to prompt command to an AI write for us, maybe we have to use a low-code platform, maybe we don't even need to give inputs to the AI, just review the code that it wrote.

And with that I have a mindset that programming and Software Engineering are two different things. In my **personal definition**, programming is the mere act of writing code and Software Engineering is to give practical solutions to concrete problems. Again, this can be done with or without writing code. People solve problems with computers for a long time already, the Software Engineering already used punched cards, patch cables, punched paper tapes, switches and now we have what we call modern programming languages, but this is just a another tool, we will get over it.

Programming will always be in my heart and I will always do it in my free time, just for fun. I think that this relates with people that do carpentry work on their free time just for fun. They don't do it because they need a new table, they make tables because it is fun and rewarding for then. Everyone has, or should have, one thing that feels that way. For me this thing is programming and I can see me in the future doing this antique thing called writing code with your own hands.

And basically that's it. This whole text is just for me to say that I love programming and I'll be doing it even when our jobs don't require us to do it anymore. It started as a hobby and if needed it will goes back to hobby.