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Work Samples and the Non-Disclosure Agreement?
ahowl asks: "At my previous employer, I signed a traditional NDA, and when I was laid off, I signed another agreement stating I wasn't taking anything with me that belonged to the company. This included all the scripts, stored procedures, and anything else that I had created while employed. However, most of the subsequent jobs that I was looking at wanted work samples. If this continues I could have a ton of work I've done that I can't show anyone, so what can I do?"
Do some work on the side and use that as work samples.
When I want your opinion I will beat it out of you.
Probably more practical to find an existing project that needs help. Easy enough to find on Sourceforge. Besides, your interactions with other project members will probably do more to establish your reputation than just creating some code that might or might not be interesting to others. Developing software is mostly a collaborative effort these days, and when you demonstrate your ability to collaborate, you're demonstrating a job skill that's just as important as coding.
Plan A:
Assuming you still have the work you did saved somewhere acaccessible.
Put together some work samples that you believe present no possible harm to your previous employee, Do whatever you have to to make them safe (perhaps print them out, draw permanent marker over sensitive parts and scan them back in!)
Email/mail the samples to your previous supervisor, and write the same message you wrote to slashdot here, but more emotional. Say you want to run your work samples by her to make sure they're ok. (emphasize how careful you'll be not to let anyone keep them or make copies)
If he is reasonable then he'll ok, at least parts of your work samples.
If not go to plan B:
Plan B:
Write some new samples! Spend up to a week writing a quick application that highlights your skills. It's time well spent and shows an employer that you program on your own time, and that you're self-motivated.
Keep up all updated, we're all wishing you the best of luck!
when I was laid off, I signed another agreement stating I wasn't taking anything with me that belonged to the company.
You are in a difficult position, my sympathies.
Why did you sign? Did they offer a greater severance if you signed? You have no reason to sign or agree to anything new when you're being terminated unless there is a benefit to you. You've already lost your job...
But even if you didn't sign, that wouldn't help much, since you're still covered by the orignal NDA.
You might show a copy of the old NDA to the new company and explain that's why you can't show them examples. Or ask the old company to allow you to show the new company a few things.
That still doesn't make any sense. I code in whatever style the company dictates. Style has nothing to do with my programming ability.
So they laid you off, and asked you to sign another agreement, and you agreed?
WTF?! You allowed them to damage your resume and job search for no reason. Too many people are allowing corporations to control them by contracts. If you are out of school, dont sign your future away, they will let you go when times get tough, look after yourself first.
Sheesh, maybe after everyone realizes that 100 hour weeks, no vacation, and NDA's are not worth after you are laid off and alone.
Not speaking as a professional programer, but throwing the ideas out.
A code sample would very rarely consist of an entire functional program, or need to provide a window into the IP of a company.
It may consist of a function that was re-written in the code base. Or it might be a subroutine with comments indicating what this subroutine does, what parameters it may require, and what it returns. It may also consist of a set of requirements, so that a prospective employer can determine if you can program to the requirements.
I would be very surprised if any developer has not worked on some project that snippets of code they developed would not be available for outside review. Projects that were canceled or never went into production would be prime candidates for places to look. Granted even those generate functions that developers re-use in other projects that are completed, but they are a place to look.
-Rusty
You never know...
I, too, have been wrestling with this situation. I am being paid by my current employer to write complex software, but should I wish to leave, I want to be able to showcase the work I do to others.
Enter Open Source (Select "Redundent" now...)!
I started about a year back by just subscribing to the devel lists of about 15-20 different open-source apps that I used regularly (and a few that I didn't... but that interested me).
My initial motivation was "Lets get my name somewhere on the 'credits' list and then I can add that to my resume", but that wore off quickly. I discovered that there was an incredible number of people who were far more capable at writing code than I was. So I took the opportunity to learn from them.
Books, college classes, on-the-job learning and experience are all thrown away...if you find a good complicated project dealing in programming languages you don't understand and concepts you haven't explored, you'll eat it right up and it will have a ripple effect throughout your entire skillset (no matter how unrelated the project may be to your current work).
So my advice (and point): Find some projects that are appealing to you, subscribe and read the devel mailing lists: you'll benefit. Even if you don't get the opportunity to "showcase your work", you'll become far better at your trade... and that might be obvious enough to an interviewer to make providing examples of your work irrelevant.
"God is dead!" - Nietzsche
"Nietzsche is dead!" - God
They probably tied the severance package into it somehow.
I think you are trying to waste everyone's time by arguing with people over how they use a word that has a pretty fuzzy definition which can pertain to formatting, ways of approaching problems, intangibles, or what kind of underwear you prefer. And you try to tell them to use a fuzzily defined word that could also apply many different aspects of how software is made in its place. And I think what "style" is supposed to mean in the two previous posts is more than obvious from their context and content.
I think you are confusing trying to make everyone use a very nondeterministic, flexible, and idiomatic medium of communication exactly the same way as you do with effectively refuting a point. It's natural language. You have to think to use it. Deal with it.