Why do you program?

I was recently asked this question by someone. I was at my desk, immersed in the code, and they just could not understand the appeal.

I attempted to explain the reasons below and the question has sat with me for a couple of days, leading to this post.

Photo by Arnold Francisca on Unsplash

1. The ability to code is a superpower. You can literally create something from nothing. (Note: in truth, we stand on the shoulders of giants. E.g., coding a project in Python is not building something from nothing. Many, many people have contributed to building the platform started by Guido van Rossum.)
2. It is very satisfying to fill a need. I have built several projects that addressed a market specific need. Seeing the solution / project used to meet a need is just…awesome.
3. The computer does exactly what you ask it to. If the program does not compile or there is an error in execution, 99.9999999% of the time it is a failure on the part of the programmer. It’s a failure of understanding, setup, syntax, execution, etc.

I am sure there are more reasons I will think of but this is my initial answer to the question.