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A comment on Stop Telling Everyone What You Do for a Living. Parent comment

Re:Stop Telling Everyone What You Do for a Living by austin-cheney on Tuesday April 11, 2023 @06:23AM (#35523103)
I write software. The end. Its boring, even to other people that write software.

At previous employers I was more specific about what I do for a living: walk around a park, go to phone meetings, stare out a window. In those cases I generally only wrote software as a personal hobby.

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Re:Stop Telling Everyone What You Do for a Living by HeyLaughingBoy on Tuesday April 11, 2023 @03:11PM (#35529881)
A little more context can make it interesting to others though. I used to struggle to explain embedded software to non-technical people (and even to technical ones!), so instead I started saying "I write software that controls mailing machines" or "I write software for medical instruments." Having a real-world "anchor" that they can relate to helps others understand what you do and if they want to continue a conversation along those lines.
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