Does writing drivers for hardware in C++ cool/fun?

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Would you recommend me to try to get this job?

Yes.
2
15%
No.
2
15%
Sounds nice but I don't know..
6
46%
Bah, sounds like crap. I recommend you to try ANYthing else you can!
3
23%
 
Total votes: 13

MasterGod
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Does writing drivers for hardware in C++ cool/fun?

Post by MasterGod »

I might be taking a job of coding drivers for custom hardware that the unit I'll be at would create, of course in C/C++, that would give an OO API to the hardware.

Does someone have any experience with it and can tell me if that's a nice job or that I should avoid it at all costs?
I can't even realize what it would take, how does it works as I have 0 experience with such things in programming.

Thanks.

P.S
You're also welcome to post your interest and say (even if you don't have any experience at it) what that sounds like to you :wink: .
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Post by hybrid »

drivers are not OO. maybe you mean a programming API? Anyway, programming drivers is fun, but only if you like hardware hacking. Writing an API is also fun, but requires some skills and creativity :)
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Post by MasterGod »

hybrid wrote:drivers are not OO. maybe you mean a programming API? Anyway, programming drivers is fun, but only if you like hardware hacking. Writing an API is also fun, but requires some skills and creativity :)
Good news :) !

And yeah :wink: , that's what I meant.
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Post by JP »

I would say that if you've 0 experience in the area then it's not the best idea for something to go for and probably you wouldn't even get the job because of that?

But i don't know anything about drivers either so maybe it's not all that hard or different to general programming.

My brother writes drivers for pharmaceutical machines and he did computer aided chemistry at uni or something and had only a small amount of experience with C programming i think so maybe you'll be ok without know much about it.

I've never heard him complaining about his job or begging me for advice so i'm guessing it's not something to steer clear of at all costs.
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Post by jontan6 »

i suggest you think of your career plan... where you want to be 5 or 10 yrs from now. if you are still fresh graduate, then maybe you can still experiment.

but i dunno, im not from america. I live in south east asia. in my country, driver programming, and c++ programming in general is not very promising career. people usually go for .Net, J2ee, or SAP.

maybe im off topic, sorry :D
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Post by rogerborg »

What part of America is Israel in?
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Post by MasterGod »

JP wrote:I would say that if you've 0 experience in the area then it's not the best idea for something to go for and probably you wouldn't even get the job because of that?

But i don't know anything about drivers either so maybe it's not all that hard or different to general programming.

My brother writes drivers for pharmaceutical machines and he did computer aided chemistry at uni or something and had only a small amount of experience with C programming i think so maybe you'll be ok without know much about it.

I've never heard him complaining about his job or begging me for advice so i'm guessing it's not something to steer clear of at all costs.
Sorry for not being clear about it; I mean job as to what I'm gonna do at the beginning of my army service, because now two weeks before I'm finishing my army programming course I need to start deciding at which unit I wanna serve.
Two, I'm gonna get all the knowledge I need there, wherever I'm gonna serve; each unit has a different training time in the stuff they're working with so its merely a case of interest by me in what each unit has to offer as each unit would train me in what they do.
jontan6 wrote:i suggest you think of your career plan... where you want to be 5 or 10 yrs from now. if you are still fresh graduate, then maybe you can still experiment.
I'm gonna serve for 5-6 years from now..
jontan6 wrote:but i dunno, im not from america. I live in south east asia. in my country, driver programming, and c++ programming in general is not very promising career. people usually go for .Net, J2ee, or SAP.
The army offers me almost any technology I want (as to work with) so its ok :wink: .

P.S
//! OffTopic
I finished my last project in the course today!! Guess what it was? An army game of course hehe..
The tanks moved, shot each other and using simple math and physics to discover each other on different terrains and lots of stuff. Finally after two hard weeks me and my team finished it starting from scratch - Yay!
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Post by jontan6 »

wow... you're arrangement is very good. if you decided to try driver programming, can you shift in the middle if you didnt like it?
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Post by Virion »

jontan6 wrote:i suggest you think of your career plan... where you want to be 5 or 10 yrs from now. if you are still fresh graduate, then maybe you can still experiment.

but i dunno, im not from america. I live in south east asia. in my country, driver programming, and c++ programming in general is not very promising career. people usually go for .Net, J2ee, or SAP.

maybe im off topic, sorry :D
wait... I'm from south east asia too. just curious... which country are you in?
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Post by jontan6 »

philippines =)
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Post by MasterGod »

jontan6 wrote:wow... you're arrangement is very good. if you decided to try driver programming, can you shift in the middle if you didnt like it?
I can ask for another thing, yes, but it depends on so many things so I would probably won't get to change "jobs" so fast but it is possible and has been done many times.
Oh and thanks.
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Post by rogerborg »

Most employers will let you declare a Mulligan after your first job anyway. It doesn't have to define your career, and it will provide very valuable experience that will help to distinguish you from the crop of Java / C# script kiddies being churned out by the Sheboygan Conservatory of Progamatics.
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Post by MasterGod »

@rogerborg: I hope you're right.

Anyway, I've been informed that I might be able to get another job at that same unit which is the most awesome job I could ever get (IMHO as it is really interesting job for me) though I can't say what it is.. (Oh and there's like 0.111% chances to get it unless I'll really impress them)

So thanks for your replays, I'll think carefully on what to take.

Wish me luck!!

P.S
I'll know if I got it only in about 2 weeks so I have lots of time to think about it till then..
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