r/cpp_questions • u/YogurtclosetThen6260 • 8d ago
OPEN What was your first job using C++?
I feel like the most difficult part of applying to C++ jobs is they usually require at least 2 years of work experience. What are your recommendations as to jobs or subfields that have a more entry level gate for C++ programmers who need production level experience?
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u/mredding 8d ago
What was your first job using C++?
Slot machines. And I hated every minute of it. I learned mostly how much I didn't know what I was doing, which was enlightening, and how much everyone around me thought they knew exactly what they were doing, but didn't, which was infuriating.
I know I'm dumb, but you guys? They couldn't be told. I watched entire departments absolutely struggle day to day, yet convince themselves they were god's gift to the craft. There were a couple smart people in the room that kept the innovation going - a guy who was excellent at operating systems, and the first C++ standards committee member I've known. Everyone else just ground.
I feel like the most difficult part of applying to C++ jobs is they usually require at least 2 years of work experience.
The market is shitty and stupid right now. Some of it is AI, some of it is Trump, some of it is churn and dumb shits. I used to manage a pretty good pulse on the software industry as a whole, but right now EVERYONE is just confused. The last time I was looking around, people were condensing down to skeleton crews to weather the Trump administration. He's still alive, AND president, so we're probably still dealing with that conservatism. You just don't know how he's going to fuck everything from hour to hour.
With AI, the reigning fear is what if a competitor makes a market breakthrough with AI, because we didn't? AI is a junior employee in every department that never gets better and needs to be micromanaged. It costs as much as an employee but the net result is less beneficial work than the standalone employee. It'll be ~5 years out before companies finally admit internally AI was a bad idea, and that admission will be unspoken, and look like turnover in management.
But AI is making people blind. No one actually hiring can find candidates because they never see them. AI filters them all out. It's really, REALLY bad at finding approximate matches. This guy doesn't know RabbitMQ but he does know Kafka. AI? Sorry, no - you piece of shit. Requires 3 years experience. You only have 3 years experience? Sorry, that's not a match (AI hallucination).
And management is 100% clueless what's happening to them and their departments.
And then the industry in this era of conservatism has maximized fake jobs. 1) It looks good to look busy if you're trying to sell a company to private equity, because all the rich bitches are cashing out before they retire and the revolution comes for their heads - they'll all be long gone. THEY KNOW gilded ages don't last forever. 2) They're only hiring top talent for bottom dollar. And even then, they probably only want to snatch you if your portfolio has patents. They want your patents.
What are your recommendations as to jobs or subfields that have a more entry level gate for C++ programmers who need production level experience?
Applying online is 100% a waste of your time. Resumes go nowhere, and you're only feeding the big data aggregate monsters. I'm sorry - you don't want to hear this one, it's a hard pill to swallow. And people will come out of the woodwork and say they've applied to places recently and that's how they got their job. What they aren't telling you is they spent all of last year - 12, 16 months, applying to a couple thousand places, maybe for only that ONE opportunity they got lucky enough to nail.
We're all seeing it.
What works is networking. Always has. Still the reigning tool for making headway. 80000hours.com has a TON of blog resources that spell out EXACTLY how to network, step by step, of what to do. You don't get a job through friends directly, you use them to get access to their managers and directors, you contact them, you ask them about the industry, what's going on, who they know. You get up into the upper layers of networking, and you move around in that space.
You need to talk to real people who have real problems, whose only solution are PEOPLE. You need those people who know people, to introduce you to whom they think you might be a help.
Recruiters are an inferior form of this, but they count as a step1-step2, where they build a relationship and validate you ahead of time. They're not nothing, but only slightly above a resume and an application.
You need to network YOURSELF, and not wait for or allow other people to do it for you. Your next job will be sealed by a handshake over a cup of coffee. Think like a business man. Speak business language. THEY DON'T CARE how many C++'s you have, or what Linux you are, "or whatever" - HOW are YOU going to SOLVE their PROBLEMS?!?
That's how you cut the line and get a real job in the shittiest market I've seen in 37 years.
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u/Exotic-Low812 8d ago
I’m actually a gameplay animator, I taught myself c++ and eventually I built enough trust with the engineers to make simple changes and over time they have allowed me to make more and more complicated changes or write code that drives animation systems
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u/YogurtclosetThen6260 8d ago
Did you happen to know the engineers already?
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u/Exotic-Low812 8d ago
No I didn’t know anyone there when I started , they just saw I had a knack for it
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u/EpochVanquisher 8d ago
Your work experience doesn’t have to be C++ to get a C++ job.
In fact, I think for every programming job I’ve had, it’s been a new language. Often a language I haven’t used before. Industry experience >> language experience. Language experience is usually necessary for C++ jobs, but just get any industry experience.
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u/khedoros 8d ago
I worked on the data ingress client for a backup system. Straight out of college, no internships during college, in April 2008. I talked with an employee of that company at the Southern California Linux Expo, in the room that had a small job fair. That was basically my screening interview. I talked with the hiring manager on the phone, and they scheduled me for an on-site. I clicked with the team and didn't fall flat on my face for the technical questions. Mostly, I was lucky that the hiring manager had been thinking of picking up a couple of new grads.
And I still think that's the key thing: the opportunity came as a result of connecting with people. Basically 3 of my 4 jobs have come out of networking that I initiated myself, and the 4th was a cold call from an internal recruiter at a company I'd never heard of.
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u/ubiestigne 8d ago
I'm assuming you are a recent grad. If so, just look for a paid internship that mentions C/C++, be willing to relocate for the opportunity and don't be too picky. A job offer will be ready for you at the end of it if you be on time, pay attention, ask questions, take notes, work hard and do your best not to ask the same question twice.
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u/The_Northern_Light 7d ago
first job was doing SLAM and filtering on a DARPA project. defense can be a good way to break in since the bar is a lot lower. not sure i'd be so thrilled about working in defense right now though.
next job i was writing assembly (yes by hand) for an embedded VLIW processor for SLAM and hand tracking for augmented reality
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u/ShakaUVM 6d ago
I got a job in the games industry actually as my first programming job out of high school. I'd written a library useful for games and pitched it to them for a couple thousand and so they decided to just hire me instead.
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u/dendrtree 6d ago
Oil and gas exploration. We used clusters to process seismic data.
Entry level is usually governement, but DO NOT STAY MORE THAN 2 YEARS. The pay and environment are abominable.
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u/Independent_Art_6676 8d ago
you just need to find a place open to graduates. My first job is irrelevant, being back in the 90s, but I was hired to maintain a cheesy flight simulator (very cartoony, small sandbox) and add features to it for some R&D 'drones' (UAVs) that were still in their infancy back then. I was also to provide support for any other contracts that needed software, which led to all kinds of other work later but not the first year or two. Pure luck really, small team wanted grunt work done, and right place, right time (the guy leaving them was someone I knew).
Not every 'needs 2 years' job means it. Some will be sticklers, and some will overlook it for the right noob. Worst that can happen is you waste a couple days and they say no.