By - Guido Sohne -
April 21, 2003

Accra, Ghana - Working as a software developer in Web Africa can be a trying experience. I remember the days when, less than two months into starting a new company, we had to endure the infamous "load-shedding" -- a practice of cutting off electricity to whole sections of the city in order to conserve power. Never mind that you need electricity to work and you need to work to eat. Nowadays things are much better -- they just cut off electricity without any warning whatsoever or the power fluctuates crazily and the electricity corporation thinks that is entirely normal. We just have to make saving every five minutes a habit as well as run journalled EXT3 filesystems that won't corrupt data even if the power browns out 5 times an hour...

I can't believe the Californians complained about rolling blackouts!!

Some people have it good! There are so many things that are taken for granted in more developed countries that it is hard to imagine the environment that exists in Web Africa. Let's take labor supply for instance, if you are going to run a software company you basically have three choices:

1. Hunt around for really good programmers. Sell your mother to keep them because that is what you will have to do if you want these prima-donnas to stay. Good luck!!! These guys are all fantasizing about being Bill Gates and if you don't look like Bill and have a pocket like Bill... Good luck!!! I'll be seeing you on the other side, where the grass is greener.
   
2. Process literally tons of resumes. Each month a horde of new programmers, freshly trained out of NIIT come with impressive looking syllabuses, certificates etc. claiming skills in Java, C++, COM, Oracle, SQL, HTML and MS Office. The problem is that, though the syllabus looks good and would be a good starting point for being a software developer in apprenticeship, the teachers spend hardly any time with the students. They just churn students through the institution and probably can't keep up with the demand for certificates.
   
   Bottom line: These guys are less than half-baked and cannot do productive work. Not when you don't want to lose the client. And the government wants some Indian company to invest into this sort of thing to the tune of over $1,000,000? God help us all.
   
   
3. The last choice is probably the most ludicrous. You have to teach them how to code. I mean you find smart people, hire them off the street and teach them how to write programs. What's wrong with this? I mean, we are trying to make a profit developing software but we find ourselves running a school where we pay our students... Good joke!! But seriously, this is what you have to do if you want to make your business work. Ask if you don't believe me. One approach has been to divide the problem into a library that does the hard part, and code donkeys who do the tedious part. It works, no doubt about it. But it results in poor applications. Very inefficient designs. No innovation. The same way of doing things every time.
   
   There's no substitute for a good programmer. And what choice do you have when you can't find many good programmers? This is not a vicious cycle. Far from it. It's a malicious environment. Survival of the fittest, survival being the operative word.
   
   

Ahh, the life in Web Africa ... we better head over to the beach before we explode in frustration or die from a stress-induced heart attack.


Well, you made it!!! You became a Web African programmer!!

Congratulations!!! Let's break out the champagne. You are now one of the few genuine programmers around. You know what you can do; you know you love computers; you know you love the life of a techie. Your only problem is that you really have to hunt for other techies. They are always behind their computers, or working somewhere obscure, happy being bathed in the cold glow of a CRT display.

So you hit upon a bright idea ... Let's find a job!! I mean, I have so why not work for someone who can bring in all the interesting problems and just focus on.

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Source: NewsForge