Somewhat true. I author software mostly in Unity these days using state machines and I am developing the deepest, most rich and robust applications of my 30+ year career in software development absolutely code free. If you are still churning out lines of application code I highly recommend learning about the excellent x-platform tools like Unity that are available today. If you are writing device drivers or native utilities in C or Assembly, then my hat is off to you for actually practicing programming. Scripting, no matter how sophisticated, is somewhat banal when you think about it. Applying endless standards and APIs to recreate what has already be done before. There just isn't enough risk in it for it to be actually innovative. I'm not pointing fingers, the game engine centric development I do these days is even higher abstraction from the machine, but there is a sense of freedom working in simulated space and time. It's not really programming, it's more like experience design. And for the grossly divisive posts below, imagine a world where people are not judged by the color of their skin or the country they came from. Isn't it a better place?

Is that like when the CEO creates an unrealistic deadline out of thin air and I spend the weekend coding a hack to make it look like a feature kinda sorta works? Surely this study isn't suggesting that people are spending their weekends writing programs in obscure languages just for fun?!?!?

I'm in my 40s and I'm working on innovative stuff every day. At my company the younger guys all look to me for help and mentoring. The company looks to me for technical leadership. I agree that there are a lot of really talented young technologists out there, but very few of them can do what I do or bring the type of value I bring to the organization. Give them 20 years experience and maybe they will do the job better than I can, but for now I think my "relevance" is very safe and secure.

I'm always amazed at how *intolerant* leftists can be. I live in a rural "redneck" community and we have very little crime, pollution, racism and unemployment here. Our schools are ranked some of the highest in the nation and just about everyone I know graduated college. Maybe we're not as dumb as the stereotype you submit to says we are.

...you wouldn't be asking this question.

Yes, consult with headhunting firms in your area (as long as you are in an area with tech jobs, SF/Bay, RTP, or major metro area). I predict you'll be working again as a programmer within 30 days. Of course half the money you earn will go to the headhunting firm and they won't give you many benefits or anything, but you'll have a job and make decent money.

Intelligent liberals are actually pretty rare. I know tons of educated, successful liberals, but they are all hacks and con artists. Much like our President.

When I was under 30, I thought everyone over 30 was a dinosaur and I was right from a certain point of view. Now that I'm well over 30 I think everyone under 30 is a punk ass and I'm usually right about that too. Fact is, good programmers come in all shapes, sizes, colors, and ages. I suppose the same can be said about bad programmers. Being a game developer I've been turned down for jobs because I'm "too old". I wonder if the "enlightened ones" who make those decisions realize they are discriminating on a level similar to discrimination of race or gender? Pretty low mentality for such "smart" people. Anyway, I figure as long a Metallica or Iron Maiden can still tour, I can still make games.

Once devs see a way to monetize their efforts they will adopt the platform. Heck, Apple created an army of Objective C developers once the appstore took off.

...and I make loads of money with it because it all works. You should focus your interview questions on the company's design and quality culture. I do appreciate clean, elegant, standards conforming codebases, but that's all academic exercise for the programmer. Users could care less as long as their software works the way the need/expect it to. Maintainability is important, but not as important as user experience. If the software does what users need it to do it will require *less* maintenance. Also, forget newer technologies because that just isn't important at all. Good projects use the *right* tool for the job despite current trends. Yeah, the stuff we have now is boatloads better than last decade's stuff, but you can still create useful software in FORTRAN or C. I stopped caring about code style when Sun first opened sourced Java. That codebase was barely readable but millions of people were happily using it. The fact is sausage tastes great, but the consumer *never* needs or wants to know how it's made. Ok, one step further here and some advice from a 25 year software trenches veteran: learn to appreciate and admire bad code. Learn to view it as a challenge presented to you so you have something to do to earn a living. Adversity is the avenue to opportunity.

...they dominate U.S. politics!

I wear a different outfit everyday and I still don't think about it.

Wrong. The space shuttle had a horrific safety record. 2 accidents costing human life in 135 flight cycles is much worse than any production airplane used for air transport. Actually, by an exponential margin. Nobody would get on a 747 if 2 out of 135 or even 2 out of 135,000 flights resulted in a fatality.