I think with time you may find such drudgery is present in every field. Ninety percent of any kind of work we do is gluing together components and solving boring business needs. It's part of the reason I think we engineers love side projects so much -- they're easy to start up, and you can try out academically interesting things (obscure programming languages, cool algorithms, etc.) without caring about the bottom line.
Side projects are good for your brain and in the long-term good for your career (lest you stagnate with old technologies). I recommend having this outlet. On the plus side, having a somewhat interesting job + really interesting side projects gives you both good money and intellectual freedom.
If you want to solely focus on interesting technical problems, I'd recommend working in a research lab or going to academia. On the downside, you may lose that nice paycheck, but your curiosity will remain forever piqued!
> If you want to solely focus on interesting technical problems, I'd recommend working in a research lab or going to academia. On the downside, you may lose that nice paycheck, but your curiosity will remain forever piqued!
If you join an industrial lab, rather than a lab in a university, you can keep the pay but still do the same thing as the academics.
Side projects are good for your brain and in the long-term good for your career (lest you stagnate with old technologies). I recommend having this outlet. On the plus side, having a somewhat interesting job + really interesting side projects gives you both good money and intellectual freedom.
If you want to solely focus on interesting technical problems, I'd recommend working in a research lab or going to academia. On the downside, you may lose that nice paycheck, but your curiosity will remain forever piqued!