What jobs would allow you to program your own projects almost full time?
I was wondering, there must be jobs that allow you to be paid for full time work, and spend most of your time coding.
The only job I could up with though is maybe car park attendant where you sit in the booth. If you found a quite carpark you might get to spend most of your time coding?
Any other jobs like this?
You're basically asking "who's going to give me money for nothing?" Forgetting for a while the fact that it's THE holy grail of most of working population (and hence can be rather difficult to obtain), government jobs are your best bet, as it has the most inefficiencies. For example, the lady who sells tickets in a local museum in my city seems bored out of her mind, as there are basically no visitors there.
I was an overnight library technician at a university (11:30 PM to 7:30 AM).
That job had a lot of downtime, consistent internet/computer/resource access, and no censorship or blocking (since anything could be needed to answer an honest query).
There were a few weeks a year where I did more than 10 real hours of work. Mostly finals weeks.
You could try house sitting.
Instead of seeking a job, why not create an environment that allows you to code? You could become a Youtube or Twitch streamer or you could seek angle investors that pay for your projects.
Einstein thought that being a patent clerk was a good way to go. He did ok. More seriously, you have to pick a job that allows you to live but isn’t so physically draining or mentally deadening that you can’t think. Lash yourself to the wheel for 10-20 years, make a pile and you’re home free. Might have to choose where you live but the nets everywhere.
SWE for a big, old non-tech company. My last job I was at a 140yo retailer in the UK and I basically did about 6 hours work a week
I interviewed for a concierge position at a fancy building years ago. The guy made it very clear that most of the time was spent idle at the desk, and all the other concierges would bring laptops and do other work online.
Get really good at excel, and quite a few jobs can be automated out of effort, freeing up your time. Just remember, never tell anyone you're good at excel.
Posting this for the umpteenth time :-)
Someone I knew was an engineer at a water treatment facility. His job consisted of sitting around waiting for alarms to go off. He coded an entire (if basic) SCADA application while he worked there and sold it to the company I worked for.
So, you do need to be an engineer first if you're going to do this :-)
There are a lot of clerical jobs out there where the bulk of the work could be pretty easily automated by someone with moderate programming skills, thus potentially leaving you with many hours per week where you are expected to be working on a computer but don't have any urgent work tasks to accomplish.
Starting your own company can be pretty much this, but you'll have to build something other people want.
Edward Snowden described one of his jobs, in his books, as something he could mostly automate, and he was then mainly just waiting, on call. Perhaps you can find some sort of overnight government contractor sysadmin type of job?
Being a junior developer. You'll get paid pretty well and only have a few meetings a week. Most of your time will be coding your own work.
being a night shift security guard might work
Night shift unarmed security guard, the holy trinity of getting paid to do nothing.
Being professionally unemployed.
Fire fighter.
Doorman, night shift.
Senior management.