Easy - an actress. My drama queen skills are out of this world, and I am a master emotional manipulator.
I was accepted to acting school but my mom put a veto on it, and said first I need to get a real profession and then I can make stupid choices.
But after my engineering degree and army service I was too old for sucking cock in LA.
So here I am doing my robotics PhD. Feel sorry for my lab mates having to take my melodramatic shit on the daily.

TROPHY WIFE!!!

Say all you want, the job requires tolerance and ability to stroke some ego. Really demanding hours and maintenance too. I just didn't fit the bill.

Alternative job if I weren‘t a dev?

Politician creating new dev jobs by passing annoying new data privacy laws each year.

Don’t even. It was more like 72 hours. Done a whole weekend sleepover in the office to get a deadline sorted, left at 6am Monday morning. Got home at 9am and get a phone call asking me why I’m not joining the meeting 🤷🏼‍♀️

When you chop down a tree it does not magically levitate because you misconfigured the chainsaw.

Lumberjack or carpenter would be a good life for me. Just being able to do something with physical consequences.

Drug dealer

I would draw furries.

Don't get me wrong, I would not enjoy it. But at this point I'm dependant on the cashflow, and that's the only other thing I know that pays well...

Unemployed socially inept hermit.

Already have it.
CNC operator.
I wanted to be cnc programmer but for now I'll have to work with the machines.
And I love it...
Making steel pieces with a 0.01mm precision...
Preparing the tools...
Operating the machine...
That's why I'm doing my own... For over 3 years (no money to finish yet hehe).
Also, got unemployed so I made a 3D drawing formation.
Now I can design, program and machine a full mold.
To bad company owners in my country (Portugal) like slave work... And I'm not accepting jobs for the minimum wage or I would be employed already.

Teacher

I love teaching but I hated school so the thought of going back...

Still teach people stuff when I get the chance. Taught my brother to drive, teaching a friend to drive, bridge knowledge gaps with colleagues, volunteer with the children's programs at my church

Probably a firefighter or a medic / surgeon

Probably a music composer starving on the streets.

A deer

If I wasn't a dev, I'd probably still be in sales somewhere.
Can't say I miss that life, customers are a pain in the ass you can't punch in the face. at-least with IT, if I smash my keyboard, it's not going to complain 😇

Kindergarden teacher... have 3 kids myself, love to teach them stuff and do activities with them. Kids between 2 and 6 are great. They can already tell you what they need but are not yet under the pressure to perform in a competitive school system. They're the most authentic human beings imho.

Other than that, maybe something in academia. Holding lectures can be huge fun if you got at least a few motivated students.

Probably a mathematician. I would be a very different person though, because a key element to my current lifestyle is that I never have to use my mathematical insight to the fullest and therefore I can work despite hangovers from nearly any substances. If I had to be sober to get anything done I'd need a level of self control which is very far from me at the moment.

So this one is interesting.

As I have mentioned on my site, I'd be one of the below:

1. Anthropologist
2. Archaeologists
3. Sound engineer
4. Musician or Artist of some kind
5. Travel guide
6. Museum curator
7. Or maybe own & run a Burger joint with Rock n' Roll playing all day

After spending much time in front of screen, I felt like would on field job be better for me, in terms of physical and mental well being?

I would probably open 2 locations.
A small seaside cafe that would bring exotic types of coffee, roast them in house, package them and sell them. Also have a small breakfast menu for the coffee lovers to enjoy before their walks on the beach.

The second would be in the middle of a busy city a concept of bar/hostclub with a twist. I would hire mostly women and men that have minors/degrees in psychology, teach them how to bartend, and have like a bar/therapy place where the people that work horrible jobs can come drink chill and feel a bit better and not get blackout drunk / fall into alcoholism

Woodworking.
Making furniture or flooring.
Making music instruments with wood. Wood is life. I’ll probably switch to wood next decade so I don’t have to debug stupid bugs but kill them while renovating furniture.

Considering I had a 10 year career as a restaurant chef before I decided to switch lanes and go to college at age 30, I guess I'll always have that as a fallback.

10 years ago when I started this path I was undecided between computer science and helicopter pilot. I made the right decision!

Animation/VFX/3D modeling and rendering.

I did this for a year and had a lot of fun, but felt engineering was a better fit professionally.

A home designer ( a.k.a Interior Designer )

Ever since I got my home renovated 5 years ago, I love finding ways to make the houses look and feel better.

I’d probably be a florist or a baker:
Florist is a job where you work with nice and fulfilling things, while baker is well paid and I like to make bread!

Lawyer then transit to politics.
Still not sure is I dodged a bullet or not

None. I think, I have no other skill I could utilize professionaly.

A musician.

In Germany we call it a Mechatroniker. This was my career choice before I found out that I like writing web/desktop apps.

Uum..uuuuumm...
No idea? Probably sysadmin or sth..
If it had to be out of IT sector, no clue..I am bad with people..and I don't have the skill/education to be a medical examiner for autopsies..

To understand recursion, just click these links:

Screw it, I want to be a power ranger! Was facing a tough boss in resident evil 8 and a friend played the power ranger theme and damn that felt great! especially since I was fighting a frog like creature who sounded like one of the monsters from an earlier season who was also frog like and ate the power rangers whole. Yes I used to wear power rangers pjs when I was 10. Lol

I'd live in a ditch

Just sit on the side of the road, see people walking and waiting someone toss a coin

Probably a cook or a chef, I like the kitchen and cooking in general.

Maybe owning a small barbacue joint somewhere not so remote, like a route stop near some touristic place.

I wanted to go into Academia but wasnt smart enough

Programming was my backup plan if I didn’t make it as a guitarist in a death metal band lmao.

If I wasn’t a developer, I’d probably try CAD or maybe land surveying.

Probably a locksmith

Musician maybe.
Maybe I can still be one.
Might be too late

I would love to build apartment buildings and sell them.

but ofcourse id need a lot of money to start such a thing. hey what if i work as a dev for a while so i could afford that.

years and years later... var_dump($bug)

Well I got a degree as a chemist 🙄. Not something I would do for 40 years but for a while it's okay

Electrician.
I went to a technical highschool and was gonna be an electrical engineer.
In fact, I'm starting Electrical Engineering next year.
But I'm not gonna be an electrician anymore.
I'm more powerful now.

I would give myself so much shit for this.

Sales cloud architect, if I needed the money.

I give sales so much shit, like you've got no idea how much shit. I almost lost my job because I called the sales team at my job "soulless husks of meat and sin".

It's not an easy job but damn I was really fucking good at it.

If money was no problem, I would probably become a restoration artist.

I love to restore old homes, furniture, tvs, radios, etc.

Either a math/physics related job(teacher, scientist or something like that) since I love tgem and have a knack for it, or a military career which I wanted but they didn't let me stay :C
So dev it is

Sex worker, perfumer, scientist, circuit engineer, musician (regular or session), makeup artist, soap maker, graphic or ui designer, voice actor, track bike racer, runner, swimming coach (or running coach or bike coach), dietitian, paramedic, repairman, cook, veterinarian, animal shelter worker, teacher, electrician

If I weren't a dev I'd be doing IT support.

Back in 2018 when I was doing level 1 support as part of an internal IT call center, I applied for two jobs elsewhere in the same company, one doing level 2 support and the other in a different department doing cloud infrastructure engineering or whatever they're calling it now. I almost took the support job because the cloud job was really dragging their feet with my final interview with my boss-to-be.

I probably should have taken that as a sign of things to come, since it ended up being such a pain to work for him until our team got moved under a new manager.

The support team starts pressuring me for an answer and I eventually fire off an email to the cloud guys saying, "I already have a job offer and I can't delay any longer. If I can't be interviewed soon then I will have to withdraw my application."

Got my interview the next day, and he made the offer the same day. Turned out to be a very good choice in the long run, but man were the first couple years full of massive frustrations.

If I wasn't rejected for being mentally unfit, I'd have joined the Navy probably.
But I got rejected so I focussed more on dev.

Alternatively, I'd probably try to become a pro gamer buuut I gave up my shot for doing so to become a dev instead (and yes, I *actually* had a shot at becoming a pro gamer during my teens if I pushed through)

Electronic engineer.......yeap

I'd probably try to become a professional tabletop game master and also focus on getting better at arts to do commissions for some extra cash.
If that would not work out as well, I'd probably try to get into mentoring or teaching.

Alternate job if I weren’t a dev:

Painter (but won’t excel as much)
Bartender (would still like to try my hand on it)

Probably a photographer.

I would've been way under at this point in time if photography was my main gig. Before the pandemic hit, concerts were my favourite thing to shoot, but even then it was mostly for my own enjoyment rather than something I could rely on financially. If I had to do it for a living, I would've probably had to resort to weddings/graduations/portraiture, and it would've been terrible since I suck at directing people to pose (part of the reason why I enjoy shooting concerts - because I shoot what's happening without the need for my intervention). Selling prints would kind of make sense if I had the market, but where I am, people are rather cheap (so selling locally wouldn't really work), and I'm rather reluctant to delegate things to an online service.

Alternate job?
Assuming I didn't go to the university, probably some office job where I mostly had to organize data, I enjoy making and maintaining spreadsheets, even if at a basic level.

Definitely electrician. I’ve always been obsessed with figuring out how stuff works and I’ve always liked electricity too

probably end up as Physics or math teacher

A mentor

A cook or a chef, pretty honorable field of work... but the job is hard, stressful, long hours and the pay can often be terrible, so you definitely need passion.

To be honest, all my chefs friends work harder than anyone else I know.

I'm not sure. Was considering becoming a pharmacist when I was in high school. Also was considering becoming a graphic designer. If I had enough money to just quit being a programmer today and couldn't go back to programming, maybe teaching computer science or being an artist.

I had a good time delivering pizzas in uni. The work is simple but there's just enough variety in destinations so it's not boring. The pay is shit though.

Prob a singer or a percussionist

Probably acting. I loved to go to the acting course at school. Played a bigger role in a theatre play in that same school. I was more of a quiet guy, but had no problem turning into (most) roles and playing scenes.
Had a good friend who was part of a theatre club and passionate too, so working with him was even more fun.
My role-play seemed to be so impressive/surprising, that it was praised in the final year book by several anonymous comments inside my profile page.
Today I'm a CS grad and acting is still interesting, although it's unlikely that I will pursue this path.

Politician or Actor. I acted in plays since my childhood, even though only minor roles, and my interest in politics is still high to this day. And if none of these had worked out I would've become a soldier. Leo goes wroooooom.

Alternative job(s) if I weren't a dev?

Something in the audio field, either car audio, or somewhere in the audio/visual realm. In my youth, I attended car audio shows and fascinated by the science behind what it takes to have great sound. Everything from materials used, using the various sound-measuring gadgets, to solving complex acoustical problems.

Witcher!!

Toss a coin gents

Client: We don’t have the budget for that

Me: ...fml, I thought this was the silicone valley of plenty??

Probably one of these:
- electrician (middle or low voltage)
- unfit for employment in germany, which is the worst.

I'll be in the VFX industry. Modeling, lighting stuff.
Probably wanting to kill myself due to the potato sack worth of a salary i get

if(i != 'dev') alternativeJob = currentJob;

I'd probably open an office supplies and stationery shop.

I could also go full time singer, although then I'd be the only full time member of my band.

Real Estate agent. I'm good with people and I'm detail oriented - that combination has made me a very successful developer & consultant. I'd probably have built out my own real estate sales support tech (e.g. my own web site, apps, whatever) on my own just to have kept up my technology interest. I like the idea of making 3% commission on $400k home sales for basically doing jack shit but schmoozing clients and keeping up with state laws that can be covered in a 40 hour course and taking a licensing exam.

I could totally be a swimming coach, just not with kids, please...trying teaching them something it's simply umbereable.

Astronaut was always my first choice. But I suck at math, so logically I chose programming. ;)

Librarian sounds like a nice job. Sometimes I wouldn’t mind being a truck driver. Would get to see lots of places and the pay is really good right now with shortages of drivers who aren’t high on drugs every day.

Definitely an airline or cargo pilot. Always have loved everything about aviation.

Alt career ? Professional Chef, fancy restaurant.

Possibly an accountant or architect.

I wouldn't be doing THAT alternative job,

but i guess doing archvis would be an idea. Or doing other 3D visualisation stuff such as creating furniture or stuff like that. Seems to pay well.

It just has to be something, where you can be creative, while also not being held like a slave.

i dunno man

CEO of the company

Probably play things on the internet, start my only fans.
Probably music things, which is compatible with streaming and only fans too

Imagine you're on fire continuously running past a pit of scorpions. Being pressured kind of feels like this anyway.

I would have loved to be a composer or producer, but I never was good at getting musical ideas from my head onto paper.

Most of the jobs I dream of are really just jobs I romantisize. Like being a journalist travelling the world with an audio recorder. Or being a barista. I’ve already done the barista thing though, and I’m happy I took the step into software engineering. But maybe one day I’ll go back and start my own little café.