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Be Nice to Nerds

Bill Gates is commonly attributed to have said, “Be nice to nerds. Chances are you’ll end up working for one.” Assumptions are that Mr. Gates was assigning nerd status to himself and perhaps forever linking nerds to the profession of developing software. Recent accounts of Mark Zuckerberg and his portrayal in “The Social Network” as a coding, nerdish Midas may have furthered the notion that if you can code like Bill and Mark, you can name your tune to billions. Stardom status seen mostly as the exclusive territory of Hollywood stars and millionaire athletes can now shine on wunderkind who can turn grand concepts into functioning products/services via PHP or C++.

But what is the norm for IT professionals who code for a living? Are the chances for stardom real? Perhaps we could conjecture that they are just about as real on a probability scale of an actor becoming the next Harrison Ford or the next Little Leaguer becoming Albert Pujols. It could happen, but the odds are long. Still, just like those who dream of grease-paint or pine-tar glory, many are reaching for software’s version of the brass ring.

For evidence, consider that just as there are acting schools in Los Angeles, New York and elsewhere, and baseball camps and academies for aspirants, there is a growing trend for the establishment of commercial software development schools. This recent NY Times article shows that venture capital is being eagerly put to use in their creation. Furthermore, Digipen University, a dedicated college for video game developers, takes in 24,000 applications each year from which it admits only 200 first-year students.

Even the Federal Government is helping to fuel interest in becoming a software developer. It listed three different software development disciplines among the 30-fastest growing jobs in America.

I must be catching the fever, too. I recently downloaded Scratch, a programming language developed at MIT, to help train my nine-year old son on how to cut some cool code. The key feature of Scratch is that it allows you to create functionality without mind-numbing adherence to arcane syntax. The result? More code, in less time, with less headaches. My son has created some rudimentary video games which have served to reduce his spending at GameStop. Maybe he has a shot at getting into Digipen.

But seriously, functionality free of syntactical-tyranny is one of the driving principles behind AutoMate™. It is the essence behind “No Code, No Limits.” You can create working automation (code) in less time, at less cost, with a wider population of business analysts and IT professionals. Data and trends clearly show that the need for software functionality will continue to rise. But coding automation in traditional script-based languages is an exacting craft steeped in strict syntactical discipline. The world’s need of software craftspeople seems insatiable because the need for automation deployed on IT resources continues to accelerate as dictated by competition and economics. More developers can be only part of the answer; they need to be armed with the right tools and technologies. So what is the right tool for general purpose, IT and business process automation?

We invite you to consider AutoMate, which is syntax-free and geared toward today’s most popular IT and business technologies like SQL databases, Azure, AWS, SharePoint, WMI, SNMP, Exchange, Excel and many more.

Be nice to your company’s nerds. Enable them to be automation stars. Download AutoMate for a free trial today.