It is no secret that any profession acquires a certain amount of myths that seem convincing to those who are far from the topic. In IT, the profession of a programmer has become one of the most mythologized. We have collected myths about programmers known to us and tested them for truthfulness. For this, we conducted a survey among technical specialists of our company (78% of whom are programmers) about what lifestyle they adhere to.

Dating myth

Programmers are easier to write a script that shoveled all dating sites and find him a suitable girl, than to look for her yourself. Favorite book on this topic: "How to meet a girl, JavaScript solution in 30 lines."

Among programmers, traditional offline dating is mostly popular. So, 48% of them met their companions through mutual friends. The work took the second place of popularity dating, here found a couple of 29% of programmers.

Relationship myth

The personal life of a programmer is based on one unpleasant feature of refrigerators - after some time the food ends in them. And in order to solve this problem, some programmers have to find a girlfriend and perform the love-romantic rituals necessary for this girl to stay in the apartment and regularly replenish the refrigerator.

Most programmers (83%) do their own shopping. And whatever the housewives born with the cookbook in their hands may be, programmers not only know how to buy food, but they are also able to make something more complicated than scrambled eggs, pasta and frozen dumplings.

Concentration myth

A stripper dancing next to a programmer who is passionate about writing a program can leave her profession and go work as a milkmaid. All attempts to distract him will be unsuccessful.

The vast majority of programmers (61%) are distracted by the rest while writing a program. However, a little over a quarter of the programmers surveyed (26%) said that they could get distracted only on the most urgent issues. Only 1% of programmers answered that they were never distracted while writing a program. If we talk specifically about strippers, then programmers are no different from other professions.

The myth of free time and spending it outside the Internet

Offline - a zone of discomfort for any programmer. “It's time to relax!” Said the programmer and switched to another screen ...


Perhaps, once, when the trees were large, and computers were exotic from computer centers, programmers were completely introverts with rudimentary skills of communication with the outside world. We are glad to announce that today it is not. Offline is not a discomfort zone for programmers, despite the fact that 85% of them think that they spend a lot of time on the Internet. In their free time, they do household chores (65%), chat with friends (61%), read books (59%) and play sports (49%). It is interesting to note that among programmers, programming in their spare time is in seventh place in popularity, and computer games - in sixth place.

If we are not talking about the lesson, but about people with whom programmers most often spend their free time, then the statistics are: with the “second half” (52%), with friends (51%) and with family (50%):

Myth of communication

It is easier to communicate with a programmer online, even if you are sitting in the same room.


Indeed, programmers usually communicate with friends and family using the Internet, with instant messaging services being used most often (84%). But this is only due to the fear of personal communication, and the convenience of technology and their ubiquitous prevalence. By the way, how many of the “non-programmers” reject Skype / ICQ / VKontakte / classmates and other electronic communication tools? That's the same thing. But you see, sitting in the office you don’t get too much involved in personal meetings with all your friends, relatives and acquaintances. On the second most popular place for programmers were telephone calls (67%). Personal meetings took the third place in popularity (64% of responses).

Cleaning myth

In no case do not restore order on the table of the programmer. They call this mess "controlled chaos" (although it is clear to the hedgehog that if managed, it was two months ago).


Most programmers try to clean the workplace at least once a month. One third of the surveyed programmers do not often work on the desktop, only once a month or less. In general, cleaning on the table, according to our observations, is not related to the profession. Take a closer look at your colleagues' jobs. Surely you will discover a lot of interesting things about how inclined to clean up the order on the table, for example, designers, salespeople, marketers, add the necessary things yourself.

The myth of simplicity and appearance of judgments

For a happy life, there is enough computer with internet access, a comfortable chair, a bed and a fridge with food.

Long hair and carelessness in clothes is not a desire to be like a hippie, but just a reluctance to spend precious time on hairdressing and shopping. “For 40 minutes I have to sit quietly and stupidly to look at my reflection in the mirror while they cut me! It is unbearable! And these fitting rooms ... "


Once upon a time indifference to their appearance was a kind of sign of caste IT-professionals. In part, this was due to the fact that programming was done mainly by people of a certain mindset. But for system administrators, for example, this was a consequence of the need to climb all sorts of dusty back streets of offices in order to maintain the efficiency of local area networks and the computer fleet of organizations. But this trend is also in the past. Today, programmers strive for comfort. Most of them try to get everything they want, they monitor their appearance and try to keep a healthy lifestyle. Buying new things is fun and they like to equip their home. As for long hair and carelessness in clothes, now it is a sign of belonging to very different social groups. If you do not believe, ask the hipsters.

As you can see, we were not able to debunk all the myths. Can you refute them? Or maybe you have in mind there is something else that is considered a characteristic sign or a feature of programmers?