I went a similar path (doing physics but not really excelling at it) and ended up a programmer. I’m pretty happy with programming overall. Note that in real-world applications, most of the effort goes into the engineering-like side of making sure your code is clean and maintainable, rather than the comp-sci-like side of having clever data structures and algorithms. It certainly doesn’t feel “too easy” most days, though it can sometimes be frustrating when you end up spending time struggling with tools rather than what you’re really trying to do.
Perhaps I should’ve said, hard in the wrong ways. The long term goal for a good professional programmer seems to be understanding what the client wants. Some math is needed to understand the tools, so you can give some context for options. But I spend most of my creative energy making sure my programs do what I want them to do, and that is really hard when each language has it’s own prejudice motivating its design.
I seriously considered looking into real time high risk software applications. But I just decided that instead of learning new languages until I ran out of youth, it’d be more fun learning general relativity, or even measure theory. The ideas in those subjects will probably hold out a lot longer then python.
I went a similar path (doing physics but not really excelling at it) and ended up a programmer. I’m pretty happy with programming overall. Note that in real-world applications, most of the effort goes into the engineering-like side of making sure your code is clean and maintainable, rather than the comp-sci-like side of having clever data structures and algorithms. It certainly doesn’t feel “too easy” most days, though it can sometimes be frustrating when you end up spending time struggling with tools rather than what you’re really trying to do.
Perhaps I should’ve said, hard in the wrong ways. The long term goal for a good professional programmer seems to be understanding what the client wants. Some math is needed to understand the tools, so you can give some context for options. But I spend most of my creative energy making sure my programs do what I want them to do, and that is really hard when each language has it’s own prejudice motivating its design.
I seriously considered looking into real time high risk software applications. But I just decided that instead of learning new languages until I ran out of youth, it’d be more fun learning general relativity, or even measure theory. The ideas in those subjects will probably hold out a lot longer then python.