Is it necessary to understand what's happening at the hardware level to be a good programmer?

Posted by bev on Programmers See other posts from Programmers or by bev
Published on 2011-10-17T22:23:47Z Indexed on 2012/11/18 5:18 UTC
Read the original article Hit count: 171

Filed under:

self-improvement

|

Hardware

I'm a self-taught programmer, just in case this question is answered in CS 101. I've learned and used lots of languages, mostly for my own personal use, but occasionally for professional stuff.

It seems that I'm always running into the same wall when I run into trouble programming. For example, I just asked a question on another forum about how to handle a pointer-to-array that was returned by a function. Initially I'm thinking that I simply don't know the proper technique that the designers of C++ set up to handle the situation. But from the answers and discussions that follow I see that I don't really get what happens when something is 'returned'.

How deep a level of understanding of the programming process must a good programmer achieve?

© Programmers or respective owner

Related posts about self-improvement

A toolset for self improvement and learning [closed]

as seen on Programmers - Search for 'Programmers'
Possible Duplicate: I’m having trouble learning I've been working as an IT consultant for 1½ years and I am very passionate about programming. Before that I studied MSc Software Engineering and had both a part time job as a developer for a big telecom company. During that time I also took… >>> More
Time management and self improvement

as seen on Programmers - Search for 'Programmers'
Hi, I hope I can open a discussion on this topic as this is not a specific problem. It's a topic I hope to get some ideas on how people in similar situation as mine manage their time. OK, I'm a single developer on a software project for the last 6-8 months. The project I'm working on uses several… >>> More
Time management and self improvement

as seen on Programmers - Search for 'Programmers'
I hope I can open a discussion on this topic as this is not a specific problem. It's a topic I hope to get some ideas on how people in similar situation as mine manage their time. OK, I'm a single developer on a software project for the last 6-8 months. The project I'm working on uses several technologies… >>> More
Software development books are useful, but when to find the time to read them?

as seen on Programmers - Search for 'Programmers'
I have 5 books in my "read-wish-list". When do I read them? I mean I could force myself to use 1 hour during working hours, but this will last for 2 days then someone will ask me to do more "high priority things". One option can be reading at night, but also this has limits, even because I prefer… >>> More
When returning from a period of not programming, do you find you've improved?

as seen on Programmers - Search for 'Programmers'
It seems as though whenever I take an extended break from programming—whether to pursue other interests or simply because I fall out of the habit for a while—I invariably find that when I return to a project and set to coding, I come with an abundance of new ideas, novel approaches, and… >>> More

Related posts about Hardware

Older SAS1 hardware Vs. newer SAS2 hardware

as seen on Oracle Blogs - Search for 'Oracle Blogs'
I got a question today from someone asking about the older SAS1 hardware from over a year ago that we had on the older 7x10 series. They didn't leave an email so I couldn't respond directly, but I said this blog would be blunt, frank, and open so I have no problem addressing it publicly. A quick… >>> More
Installer Reboots at "Detecting hardware" (disks and other hardware) on all recent Server Installs

as seen on Ask Ubuntu - Search for 'Ask Ubuntu'
I have a very frustrating problem with my PC. I cannot install any recent version of Ubuntu Server (or even Desktop) since 9.04 even using the text-based installer. I boot from a USB stick created by Unetbootin (I also tried other methods such as startup disk creator with no difference). On the Server… >>> More
Difference between "machine hardware" and "hardware platform"

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
My Linux machine reports "uname -a" outputs as below:- [root@tom i386]# uname -a Linux tom 2.6.9-89.ELsmp #1 SMP Mon Apr 20 10:34:33 EDT 2009 i686 i686 i386 GNU/Linux [root@tom i386]# As per man page of uname, the entries "i686 i686 i386" denotes:- machine hardware name (i686) processor type (i686) hardware… >>> More
Remove hardware from "safely remove hardware" list on Windows 7

as seen on Super User - Search for 'Super User'
Hi, I have a USB wifi card (D-Link DWA-125) on a Windows 7 x64 computer. The problem is that the card appears on the "safely remove hardware" list, but I don't ever want to unplug it, so I would like to remove it from the list. So far I have only found solutions that mess with the registry (and… >>> More
Windows 7 Not Recognizing Any Hardware, Linux Recognizing Hardware

as seen on Super User - Search for 'Super User'
I have a new desktop computer with two SSDs: one running Linux Mint 15 (SSD1), the other running Windows 7 (SSD2). My mint runs perfectly - USB wireless adapter is recognized, SSD2 (connected by SATA) is recognized and accessible through the filesystem, Ethernet works, etc. However, my Windows 7… >>> More