Majority Income - Day / Night Job ?

ArtLeeApps · July 2013

Hi all,

Just curious to know, what people do for Daytime work... but then some work contracting, or nights. And what is your plans or goals.

Eg.
I work 9-5 daytime as an Analyst/Programmer/Developer for Transport Software (most of the time in a language called Progress).
I would like to spend more time, developing games (as most of us would.)
Im at work right now, keeping an eye on the Forum

and posting myself notes via OneNote of stuff to do when i get home.

Long term, id like to be living in Tasmania(that land thingy under Australia)... watching my Google Account grow as my games go viral

jmrmbz · July 2013

I'm in IT in a help desk role. I work the late shift (6p-3a). I spend every spare moment working on our next app. Working at night is slower than during the day so I get to spend a good portion of my time coding.

OZApps · July 2013

Been in the Enterprise, managed National Dealerships for Dealers of BMW, Nissan in Asia and Middle East (AS/400, RPG, SQL, even as far as FoxPro/dBase and then quite a bit with Visual Basic and VBA mainly Outlook based integration [before there was SharePoint]) then it was Teaching at the University in Austalia and a corporate role at the University. While teaching kept me going, the Corporate (even at a university, killed me) so now this is my 9am-2am apart making apps for games, Enterprise like apps and training, etc.

While many clients would want multi-platform iOS, Android, Windows (so as not to facilitate the employees with a BYO (Bring Your Own device)) Currently there is no framework that fits the bill as a true cross-platform and feature rich for a non gaming app scenario.

There are a couple of gaming and other projects that are on the backburner which I would like to complete personally (for some the core stuff is already done, need to make the menus, add social and GC type features and it is ready for publishing) just too pre-occupied.

Long term, I guess I am already in QLD (queensland) which is quite sunny and warm and has beaches and rainforest nearby, where the skies are blue and sunny nearly 365 days of the year.

Scouser · July 2013

Varies from project to project, coding in C/C++/C#/Assembler, writing tools (including disassemblers for new CPU/Microcontrollers),

Reverse engineering (both software & hardware at transistor level).

Coding firmwares for a variety of CPU/Microcontrollers to be used in many of our products.

Also now anything @techdojo used to do, including making my coffee

(

zoolax · July 2013

I use to had a cooperate job at EA,the pay was good(concept and 3d artist),the job was very boring + lots of office politics,few great people and some really mad people;)
I left and started freelancing as a matte painter and concept artist as source of income,I actually made more freelancing than my last job.saved up some money ,and during that time I learned lua ,csharp, a bit of java and cpp(I have to say I am very comfortable in lua and c# now,of course there is always room for improvement).
Then I started full time creating my game using my saving (it has been 6 months now),hopefully in couple of month my game comes out ,and we will see how it would do.I love to move to Vancouver as I am living in Edmonton Canada,and it is very cold most of the year.

techdojo · July 2013

I used to do pretty much the same as @Scouser (except the reverse engineering stuff - I made coffee whilst he did that - clever bas****

)

Now I'm one of the software development managers / team leader / scrummaster for an enterprise management information system for the steel fabrication industry - and if anyone thinks lua is hard to get their head round - wait till you try SQL!

Mobile dev and gideros is still just a spare time hobby for me

OZApps · July 2013

wait till you try SQL!

It is interesting in its own way, Inner and outer joins, nested SQL statements, yes for those that find Lua difficult to get their head around...

Do you use Toad, SQL Developer or is it MS SQL?

plamen · July 2013

I am 3d generalist/motion graphics freelancer for broadcast industry for the past 10 years, i've been in TV channels before it. I use all my free time on my own gamedev projects deluding my self this could give me financial independence and/or security some day meanwhile killing my savings as @zoolax

paul_k_clark · July 2013

I'm a contract Java developer just finishing up on a Judicial application. In my spare time I have a casual job website (hasn't really worked), a fantastic race party organiser app (only about 120 sales), a basic game (FacePlant) that I'm (mainly me) working on with my 12 year old daughter and I also develop Atlassian plugins for Jira, Confluence etc.

I enjoy my day job but like @plamen (and 99% of app developers) would like to do the others full time

SinisterSoft · July 2013

In the late 80's, early 90's I used to write games for a living. Nowadays I have a reports program on the PC that Primary teachers use to write reports. I do the game stuff in spare time (if I have any).

albert988 · July 2013

In the daytime, I developed Android app for enterprise. It's quite an easy job but the pay is bad. So I spend my spare time developing my game. Gideros is my first developing engine and I think it's really great. The income of the my game now is not satisfying but I enjoy the developing game fun. That matter a lot.

Long term, I'd like to become a freelancer with good income. And I'd like to live in Australia on the beach too.

OZApps · July 2013

@Albert988, if you move to Australia (Sydney) you could still make Android apps for Enterprise and have a good pay and... nearly live on the beach

hgvyas123 · July 2013

in day time job i am basically web developer however i am also game developer in my day time job and completed one game for client in day job of course with Gideros but can't announce the name over here as it is top secret project in the spare time i am making games for my own and currently i am earning more from my games than my day time job may be soon i will quit my day job and work as full time indie game developer however i don't know when

albert988 · July 2013

@OZApps, in fact, I don't like working in the Enterprise. That's why I want to be a freelancer and that's why I started developing game. Australia, is the dream place where I want to live. I want to retired in Australia.

OZApps · July 2013

@Albert988, I can imagine, I left the corporate/Enterprise type of jobs/lifestyle to do what I do. I live in a smalled town than a larger city, each of these decision have it's own pros and cons.

Would look forward to seeing more games from you, if you could PM me your email ID and a list of the apps that you have made.

Will look forward to seeing you as my neighbour soon someday

techdojo · July 2013

@OZApps - It's MS-SQL using SQL Management

OZApps · July 2013

@techdojo, integrated with dotNet ?

Platypus · July 2013

Hi, friends.

My day job has nothing to do with computer programming. What's more, I ****ing HATE my day job, but any move towards independence would involve a huge pay cut. I would much rather work for a rich, successful mobile gaming company (

Guava7 ?).

phongtt · July 2013

@Platypus

"rich", "successful"? Well, not yet, honestly!

Been full time (day and night, passionately) for my own-setup studio Guava7 since Jan 2012, but so far I still haven't reached the point where my self-published games have profit yet.

But I think we could have some kind of collaboration if you're interested. I'll talk with you later

Platypus · July 2013

@PhongTT,
Yes, please. I would love that.
Thank you very much.

loucsam · July 2013

A bit short of 30 years in a government IT job, two thirds of which was in sysadmin roles, while gradually moving to a programming role, but most has been in old sequential style languages such as Fortran. I use game programming mostly as a way of learning new computer languages and keeping me off the streets at night.

Currently needing to learn java for our latest application, as well as coming to grips with working in a team using agile, rather than mostly lone programming. OOP concepts still have me stumped!

I enjoy playing games so much it keeps me away from finishing a game.

With retirement in the next 5 or so years I'd like to get to a point where I could be doing game development as a full time hobby, and potentially earn a little extra income to pay for my retirement home costs lol.

ArtLeeApps · July 2013

Hi @loucsam, wasnt Fortran used for operating things like machinery? or am i thinking FORTH. i recall seeing that way back when robotic programming started out..

thanhquan1512 · July 2013

in day time job i am basically web developer however i am also game developer in my day time job and completed one game for client in day job of course with Gideros but can't announce the name over here as it is top secret project in the spare time i am making games for my own and currently i am earning more from my games than my day time job may be soon i will quit my day job and work as full time indie game developer however i don't know when

The same to me, I am a web application developer in day time job.

However my game revenue still not as much as my salary, so I must try more and more to beat my salary. Then I could quit my job and work endlessly through night without the fear "how to wake up early next morning to go to work"

plamen · July 2013

@Platypus welcome to "Killing The Savings Club" :-) What's wrong with neuroscience?

loucsam · July 2013

@ArtLeeApps I'm not aware that Fortran was used for operating machinery. It's a high level language, mostly used in the scientific community.

Platypus · July 2013

@Plamen,
Yeah, thanks, man. I wouldn't last long!
Neuroscience is fab!
My current job is something completely unrelated to neuroscience (to my great regret).

P.S. Alvin is great!

plamen · July 2013

@ Platypus Thanks, When i saw that you are into neuroscience I was thinking to ask about collaboration on making magneto-electro-software version of those very popular Netherlands mushrooms you've probably heard about :-) What, just thinking of way to make some money.

phongtt · July 2013

@Platypus this looks interesting

=> http://www.30isthenew20.com/music/focusatwill-vs-coffitivity/

riaano · July 2013

@OZApps,
My-my, I didn't expect to find someone from the AS400 / RPG world on here. I started my programming career in RPG and now, 9 years down the line, am still working in it.
Knowing RPG and the AS400/iSeries platform so well, it's a bit frustrating sometimes to get stuck with really simple coding errors in Gideros ... but, it's part of the learning curve - the penny will eventually drop and there will be sunshine and rainbows and laughter and butterflies etc, etc... It was the same when I had to learn to code in Cobol and RPG.

All in all I am enjoying Gideros and can't wait to really start knowing what I'm doing and getting my first game out! I don't get to spend as much time working on it as I would like to - work is busy busy busy, so I only get time in the evenings at home, where the woman and tv are noisy and the cat wants to help me code and the dogs and cooking vegetables and stuff. But I'm committed and will get there....

By the by, watch out for the Bulls giving the Brumbies a hiding at Loftus in the semis tomorrow!!

Platypus · July 2013

@PhongTT,
Thanks, mate. Very interesting.

@Plamen,

) .

OZApps · July 2013

@riaano,
cleaning up I found a whole lot of books that I am going to chuck out as they are no longer useful, thought you might recognize a page and @scouser, @sinistersoft, and other guys that worked with Spectrum might recognize the others. And just some more of the old stuff that is no longer useful (but is a trove of information)

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Majority Income - Day / Night Job ?

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