Becoming a Polyglot Programmer Through the Eyes of a Freelance Musician

Before coming to the software world, I was a freelance musician for over 10+ years. I toured and played bass with bands and artists like Albert Lee, Ray Parker, Jr. of Ghostbusters fame, and even was featured on Entertainment Tonight. As a developer now, I look back on some of the concepts I learned to become a successful musician and how they apply to learning software. Truthfully, they are not that different.

Lets dive into how the world of music has attempted to overcome a lot of the challenges around learning a new coding language, and see if we can draw some parallels together.

Transcript

1. Becoming a Polyglot Programmer Through the Eyes of a Freelance Musician @kickinbahk Josiah Mory
2. I Came From the World of Music
3. Worked as a Sideman
4. Playing Bass for Artists and Bands for 10 years
6. Studied Music in College
7. A place to be exposed to things I wouldn’t otherwise study
9. Writing for choirs and orchestras
10. Different than a Performance-based School
11. - most the focus is how to better play your instrument
12. kinda like the difference between a Boot Camp or studying Computer Science
13. One is generally more practical
14. The other more theoretical
15. My college career had a lot of theory and I enjoyed it
16. No….Not Music Theory
17. Okay maybe that too
18. a little bit…
19. the theory of how music fits together
20. Can be Many Aspects
21. • Rhythms • Notes • Orchestra • Band
22. My Favorite Focus: Band
23. interaction between the Bass and Drums
25. known as GROOVE
26. Theory of Groove
27. Every Musician strives for Groove
28. The listener may not know what it is
29. They typically know when it ISN’T
30. Different Genres Define it in Other Ways Swing Clave Bubble Funky
31. All Reference different Types of Groove
32. “If you gotta ask you'll never know” - Louie Armstrong
33. To Understand the Groove You have to Listen
34. Immerse into the Thinking
35. the Feeling
36. “Experts in a particular field can often instantly know that something is right, but they can’t explain why.” - Malcolm Gladwell, Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking
37. Immersion allows reaction
38. Know what others are doing
39. Informs how my part Interacts with the rest of the band
40. just Like I immersed myself in a Style
41. by Listening to Records
42. Talking with other Musicians
43. Going to Live shows
44. I immerse Myself in a programming Language by:
45. • Podcasts • Meetups • Conferences/code Camps
46. great ways to learn
47. While Those are Important
48. YOU
49. HAVE
50. TO
51. PRACTICE
52. I wasn’t Born writing Ruby
53. Just Like I wasn’t Born Playing a Samba
54. They are Skills I had to Gain
56. Practice is solving some small known problem
57. Never on the Gig
58. Practicing in music happens at different Speeds
59. start Slow and get Faster (Developing finger Dexterity and Reaction)
60. start Fast and go Slower (Checking for good Technique)
61. What does this look like in coding?
62. Solve simple, known problems
63. to find New and Unique solutions
64. My Favorite Practice Tool: Exercism.io
65. Different ways to solve the Same Problem
66. It Always comes Back to the time I give
67. More Valuable than my Role
68. Understanding the Goal of the Drummer
69. How can I complement the rhythm?
70. Play with the Kick Drum
71. Play off the Kick Drum
72. I thought beyond my Role
73. To how the music was Best served
74. Know the Rules… then Break them
75. Start Idiomatic
77. I enjoyed this Process
78. taking Idioms from other Genres
79. Taking Idioms from other instruments
80. While they seemed unique and creative
81. Using Common Solutions for One Language
82. Solving problem Uniquely in a Different Language
83. Creativity starts in knowing the typical Solution
84. then Solving a different way
85. Polyglot - using or knowing multiple languages
86. Knowledge of Other Languages Allows Me to Approach Problems Differently
87. Allows me to be involved in the conversation
88. and How my part can complement the others
89. Allows for communication
90. Rather than a war over how to achieve a goal
91. More and More Projects are Polyglot
92. The better I Understand how my part fits
93. The better job I can do to serve the project
94. Could Be Simply Where Logic is Handled
95. • Front-End • Back-end • Component
96. OR What have I learned from “insert Language” that I can apply Here
97. Sometimes there was an opportunity to learn on the Job
98. More often, I had to put in the time to learn it on my own first
99. Before I was ready to use it on the gig
100. Advantage:
101. Learning on your own allows you to find languages which speak to you
102. As with any time you fall in love, it’s difficult to explain why. It (Ruby) just worked the way I work, and it had enough depth to keep me interested. Fast forward 15 years. All that time I’d been looking for something new that gave me the same feeling. - Dave Thomas (on Elixir)
103. I think that people should use whatever gets them excited. Pick something, anything, and just try it. If you don’t like it, try something else. Humans are all different, and there’s no single answer here. - Steve Klabnik (on learning languages)
104. The Languages we use are just tools
105. Not Religion
106. Or the way to Enlightenment
107. It’s not the tools that you have faith in - tools are just tools. They work or don’t work. -Steve Jobs
108. Ruby Jobs may not be Popular Forever
109. Am I the lucky one that works on a RoR project for 20 yrs?
110. Is that so lucky?
111. I never wanted to be part of a Cover Band
112. I wanted to make New and Interesting music
113. Just as it has changed before, the world will keep changing
114. At The End of the Day…
115. The value of a performance is judged on the way People feel
116. Our software is judged on the way People feel
117. The fact that I understand ‘groove’ did not matter to an audience
118. they just want to Dance
119. or experience some emotion
120. The people I work with did appreciate it
121. Software should move people in the same way
122. They don’t care that I use Ruby, C#, Rust, Elixir, Go, C++, Javascript…
123. Okay they may care about javascript
124. But my knowledge of Theory
125. Allows me to approach a problem in better ways
126. In more Creative Ways
127. Exploring Other Languages Recap:
128. More Valuable than my Role Find Creative Solutions (Break Rules)
129. Communicate with those I Work Opens up Opportunities
130. provide a better experience for users and those I work with
131. Thank You! Hire me :) kickinbahk.com @kickinbahk
132. Thanks to: Saron Yitbarek Judd Lillestrand
133. They typically know when it ISN’T
134. To Understand the Groove You have to Listen
135. then Solving a different way
136. Rather than a war over how to achieve a goal
137. Before I was ready to use it on the gig
138. provide a better experience for users and those I work with