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Ask HN: What's a surprisingly useful tech skill that's underrated today?

30 points Userrr | 1 comments | 12 Apr 25 08:13 UTC | HN request time: 0.223s | source

We often talk about mastering popular languages, frameworks, and AI tools. But what about the less-hyped skills that quietly make you 10x more effective?

For example:

Knowing how to write a custom shell script that replaces a SaaS tool

Building internal tools with no-code + cron + GitHub Actions

Understanding how to optimize a slow SQL query line-by-line

Crafting a bash one-liner that saves you hours every week

Using the command line like a superpower

I'm curious: What are the most underrated but highly valuable tech skills you've learned that more people should know about?

Would love to hear stories, examples, or even niche tools you swear by. Bonus points if it’s something you only discovered by accident or necessity, not through a tutorial.

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austin-cheney ◴[12 Apr 25 19:48 UTC] No.43667414[source]▶
* Clarity by which you communicate in writing, such as emails. If you cannot do this you will never be put in charge in any kind of supervisory capacity.

* Task management, which is the ability to efficiently accomplish multiple small tasks without notes, reminders, or JIRA. It’s the notion of getting a bunch of shit done.

* Perceiving things in terms of facts. That means not guessing at measurements and not making assumptions. Most developers cannot do this. The inability to do this on any level is the most identifiable trait of Asperger’s.

* An ability to question the assumptions of others or even the modes of existing common practice. Most people generally cannot do this and it is this, not programming mastery, that makes for 10x developers.

* As for more technical things the ability to dive deeper and lower without leaving the current language or platform is what typically separates the masters from the commoners. These are the people who can solve problems others cannot, because the non masters are always more restricted by current conventions.

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andrei_says_ ◴[13 Apr 25 18:29 UTC] No.43674800[source]▶
Could you please clarify this one with examples:

> Perceiving things in terms of facts.

What is an example of a developer being unable to perceive a thing in terms of facts? Inability to accept the specs of a library’s api?

replies(2): >>43676519 #>>43679995 #
1. austin-cheney ◴[13 Apr 25 23:08 UTC] No.43676519[source]▶
More like a willingness to invent data about a thing as opposed to referencing data that is either immediately available or easily found. This often done out of convenience. That is probably fine in casual conversation, but many developers will just guess at performance, requirements, estimations, costs, dependency overhead, and so much more.