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Transitioning From Windows to Linux Development?
truthsearch asks: "I've been a professional Visual Basic developer for 6 years, working on two and three tier systems and also web applications. Two years ago I tried Linux and went from being a fan of Windows to an aspiring developer of Linux (or at least Unix) applications. My company has just announced their complete acceptance of moving everyone to .NET and so I want to leave ASAP. I'm even willing to take a pay cut to leave Microsoft software development. So if I were to not contribute to OSS or take time off to get my masters (in CS of course), what's the best way to transition from professional Microsoft platform development to Linux? Are many companies hiring Microsoft developers with little Linux experience to assist in corporate migration? With online postings requiring 3-5 years Linux/C++/Java experience how's a Windows developer supposed to transition? Is my only solution to stick it out here while I contribute to OSS for the experience?"
Questions:
#1. Do you want to work on OSS systems and with OSS toolkits (writing a web application in PHP running on Redhat 8.0 and Apache 2.0) or do you want to write OSS code (writing a web application licensed under [BSD | GPL]).
If your goal is to write software licensed under an open-source license, you will have a large uphill battle to find work.
#2. Are you sure your newfound passion is worth giving up your job over in this economy? Better to write windows code during the day, so you can afford to write linux code at night.
Slowly ebbing into linux is a good way to go, it will let you built up an understanding and ensure you are set on this decision.
Recommendations:
If you really want to break into the OSS software development market, you need to bear in mind a few things.
#1. It is like any other market, your network of personal relationships you have developed over the past six years will be your basis, where you start looking. As always the buddy-network is the best possible way to find a job you might actually enjoy.
#2. OSS is often as much about community as software, get involved. The best place to probably get involved is your local LUG. At you LUG you have a chance to meet like minded individuals.
#3. Write some code that has your name on it, so that when asked to produce demos/examples of your work you can show them your (GPL | BSD) licensed code. If you write software that happens to help your local LUG you get a bonus point.
#4. Remember that you might be able to create a new job, rather than fill an existing opening. Converting a company to linux, and developing new systems is a large task for even a small (100-200 employees) business. But a rewarding one.
> moving everyone to .NET and so I want to leave ASAP
So you stuck it out with crappy VB6 all these years for the sheer enjoyment of it, and now that they're finally moving to a half-way decent platform, you're bailing?
Just because your employer is moving to .NET doesn't mean you can't do some development on Linux using MONO. It seems ironic to me that in may ways .NET un-shackles windows developers from the windows platform more than previous Microsoft development technologies did.
Also, why not try and affect change from within your own company, rather than going somewhere else? If there is an existing open equivalent to something you're thinking of using then make the case for that. Also investigate languages like Java, Python and Perl which can run on multiple platforms. They all have large developer communities and mature libraries for doing lots of different things.
It would seem to me that sticking out the transition to .Net and working on Linux on the side would be the best way to make the transition.
.Net, your VB skills are soon going to be hard to market, and you don't have any real Linux skills just yet.
With
If you stick it out, you will have a much better skillset to show the market.
Why run from .NET? Pretty soon* you can develop in .NET for the linux plaform
*I am aware that it is already working, but it's not quite there yet
I'm not sure how you'd do that other than ask. I work for Lockheed Martin Air Traffic Management. We do unix development, and in fact as part of a leadership development program, I'm currently working on porting a Windows-based testing app to cross-platform (read: Java GUI and ANSI C backends on Linux). I'm not sure how much we're hiring, but it certainly isn't obvious from the job description (Software Engineering) that you could end up doing development in linux.