Apparently no companies in my area actually do any hiring themselves anymore.
Two suggestions: look further afield, and don't bother talking to recruiters. Go around them. Join the ACM, or any local developers' groups, go to the meetings and meet people. Go to SF conventions. Seriously, it helps.
A few companies (Apple and Google) have HR reps who actually understand what they're talking about, but the rest of them are only trying to play buzzword bingo.
I still get a chuckle out of the ditz a couple years back who asked me if I had "client/server", with no idea at all of what the terms meant.
The previous use of them was the proof that they existed. The burden of proof was on Saddam's regime, not on the weapons inspectors. to show that the stockpiles which he acknowleged having at the time of the cease-fire, had been destroyed in accord with the cease-fire terms. He chose not to comply, so that he could bluff his neighbors into thinking he might still have them. As it happens, his own officers were surprised as hell that they didn't have that ace in the hole.
You're all barking up the wrong tree. The iPod 4D will keep all of your music in a parallel dimension, giving you infinite capacity while reducing the protrusion into 3D space to whatever size you find comfortable to operate.
you only get security updates unless you pay for the newest version.
Nope. Apple releases security updates for older versions of the OS. Install a copy of Jaguar sometime, and see how many updates there are to load when it first sees the net.
The (relatively) non-free market in India has destroyed much of its economy.
I think you've missed the real story here, which is that India's economy is improving at a drastic rate as India gets over its traditional habit of trying to follow the Soviet central-planning model. High tech isn't the only area where the difference is dramatic. India was unable to feed itself only about fifteen years ago, and today is a major food exporter to the rest of Asia, for example.
I would suggest Electrical Engineering rather than Comp Sci.
I'll second that. I have certainly seen CS graduates with very poor understanding of what the machines actually do in the hardware, and that often manifests itself in very basic performance mistakes in their code (needless integer/float conversions, etc.)
A university CS/CE graduate should either have enough hand-on programming experience to know which end of a compiler goes up, or enough theoretical knowledge to know the difference between the basic data structures. I'm not getting that from the candidates I'm interviewing.
I find that the quality of applicants varies enormously, even from the same school. I do see rather a lot of "grade inflation", but new CSEE graduates who had a 3.0 or better GPA are usually at least trainable.
What I try to seek out is whether a newly-minted CS degree holder likes the field, or just got steered to it by a guidance counselor. If the interest is there, the talent can generally be trained in.
For a brief period after 9/11, the tolerance of the USA for criminal regimes had worn very thin. Regrettably, the will to act seems to have dissipated with Kim, Assad, and Mugabe still in power, but that's the way things go sometimes.
I think it may have more to do with generations of religious zealotry
Partially, but I'd say it has more to do with the local thuggocrats flooding their countries with propaganda that blames the USA for their own incompetence. Castro does the same thing.
The "full compliance" demand was manufactured by the US administration as an excuse to invade Iraq.
Wow, what an amazing stretch! Imagine the temerity of the USA expecting that an aggressor who had invaded a neighbor and been defeated, who obtained a cease fire under the condition of cooperation with the weapons inspectors (among other things), should actually be required to comply with the terms they'd promised!
Frankly, all the justification required for resumption of hostilities occurred on a regular basis when Iraqi missile crews lit up their radars and tracked a US or British fighter in the no-fly zones.
Saddam was given a hell of a lot of rope to hang himself with.
Actually another country had a few WMDs before Iraq.
Which were used to end a war against a country that had mounted a sneak attack. Rather different from Iraq, which had attacked Iran and Kuwait without provocation.
they had been destroyed by the time Bush decided to go there.
Possibly, although they could also be in Syria.
In either case, it wasn't the job of the weapons inspectors to go and find them, it was Saddam's obligation to destroy them and document having done so. Playing shell games with access to sites was his way of keeping his neighbors (mostly Iran) guessing as to whether he was still capable of mounting a chemical or bio attack.
Too bad for Saddam that he decided to play chicken with the weapons inspectors instead of complying fully as he was required to do. If he hadn't decided to bluff, then he might very well still be torturing his people to death in large numbers today.
I've seen worse than that. Back during the dotcom madness here in the valley, I saw trucks that were nothing more than rolling billboards. No cargo capacity at all, these stupid things were just taking up a space in traffic to advertise vendors like "iPlanet".
I still have no idea what iPlanet was trying to sell, but I did make a point of sending them mail explaining why I would never do business with them. Hopefully, they went belly-up and took a pot of stupid money down the drain with them.
Slashdot Mirror
Apparently no companies in my area actually do any hiring themselves anymore.
Two suggestions: look further afield, and don't bother talking to recruiters. Go around them. Join the ACM, or any local developers' groups, go to the meetings and meet people. Go to SF conventions. Seriously, it helps.
A few companies (Apple and Google) have HR reps who actually understand what they're talking about, but the rest of them are only trying to play buzzword bingo.
I still get a chuckle out of the ditz a couple years back who asked me if I had "client/server", with no idea at all of what the terms meant.
-jcr
Since when is a twenty year old use of WMD
The previous use of them was the proof that they existed. The burden of proof was on Saddam's regime, not on the weapons inspectors. to show that the stockpiles which he acknowleged having at the time of the cease-fire, had been destroyed in accord with the cease-fire terms. He chose not to comply, so that he could bluff his neighbors into thinking he might still have them. As it happens, his own officers were surprised as hell that they didn't have that ace in the hole.
-jcr
Lots of web designers fuck up. It's an issue.
-jcr
You're all barking up the wrong tree. The iPod 4D will keep all of your music in a parallel dimension, giving you infinite capacity while reducing the protrusion into 3D space to whatever size you find comfortable to operate.
-jcr
you only get security updates unless you pay for the newest version.
Nope. Apple releases security updates for older versions of the OS. Install a copy of Jaguar sometime, and see how many updates there are to load when it first sees the net.
-jcr
The (relatively) non-free market in India has destroyed much of its economy.
I think you've missed the real story here, which is that India's economy is improving at a drastic rate as India gets over its traditional habit of trying to follow the Soviet central-planning model. High tech isn't the only area where the difference is dramatic. India was unable to feed itself only about fifteen years ago, and today is a major food exporter to the rest of Asia, for example.
-jcr
I would suggest Electrical Engineering rather than Comp Sci.
I'll second that. I have certainly seen CS graduates with very poor understanding of what the machines actually do in the hardware, and that often manifests itself in very basic performance mistakes in their code (needless integer/float conversions, etc.)
-jcr
A university CS/CE graduate should either have enough hand-on programming experience to know which end of a compiler goes up, or enough theoretical knowledge to know the difference between the basic data structures. I'm not getting that from the candidates I'm interviewing.
I find that the quality of applicants varies enormously, even from the same school. I do see rather a lot of "grade inflation", but new CSEE graduates who had a 3.0 or better GPA are usually at least trainable.
What I try to seek out is whether a newly-minted CS degree holder likes the field, or just got steered to it by a guidance counselor. If the interest is there, the talent can generally be trained in.
-jcr
Why do you insist on a single reason?
For a brief period after 9/11, the tolerance of the USA for criminal regimes had worn very thin. Regrettably, the will to act seems to have dissipated with Kim, Assad, and Mugabe still in power, but that's the way things go sometimes.
-jcr
There was at least as much proof of that as there was the WMDs... i.e. very little.
The WMDs had been used extensively during the Iran-Iraq war. Thousands of dead and wounded are not "very little" proof.
-jcr
If the USA only wanted the oil, we could have just bought it from Saddam and let him continue to murder his own people at will.
-jcr
When will people understand that speaking in absolutist good & evil terms are never true and that it just makes people more hateful.
Sorry, you're wrong. Slavery is always wrong. Need more examples?
-jcr
I think it may have more to do with generations of religious zealotry
Partially, but I'd say it has more to do with the local thuggocrats flooding their countries with propaganda that blames the USA for their own incompetence. Castro does the same thing.
-jcr
The "full compliance" demand was manufactured by the US administration as an excuse to invade Iraq.
Wow, what an amazing stretch! Imagine the temerity of the USA expecting that an aggressor who had invaded a neighbor and been defeated, who obtained a cease fire under the condition of cooperation with the weapons inspectors (among other things), should actually be required to comply with the terms they'd promised!
Frankly, all the justification required for resumption of hostilities occurred on a regular basis when Iraqi missile crews lit up their radars and tracked a US or British fighter in the no-fly zones.
Saddam was given a hell of a lot of rope to hang himself with.
-jcr
Actually another country had a few WMDs before Iraq .
Which were used to end a war against a country that had mounted a sneak attack. Rather different from Iraq, which had attacked Iran and Kuwait without provocation.
-jcr
they had been destroyed by the time Bush decided to go there .
Possibly, although they could also be in Syria.
In either case, it wasn't the job of the weapons inspectors to go and find them, it was Saddam's obligation to destroy them and document having done so. Playing shell games with access to sites was his way of keeping his neighbors (mostly Iran) guessing as to whether he was still capable of mounting a chemical or bio attack.
-jcr
And the Iraqi Government had Weapons of Mass Destruction
Yes, they did.
Too bad for Saddam that he decided to play chicken with the weapons inspectors instead of complying fully as he was required to do. If he hadn't decided to bluff, then he might very well still be torturing his people to death in large numbers today.
-jcr
You do realize that telling all of your employees to STFU is a lousy thing to do in the first place, don't you?
I'm glad you're not in charge at Apple.
-jcr
Well - probably the same reason most people aren't. I just don't have time.
;-)
That's what I figured.. I'll refrain from dropping the open source guilt-trip on your head.
-jcr
My only wish is for GIMP to grow up a bit - it still doesn't have what I need to replace PShop. Maybe someday soon.
Why aren't you writing what's missing for your needs?
-jcr
"Game", not "toy".. ;-)
-jcr
I've seen worse than that. Back during the dotcom madness here in the valley, I saw trucks that were nothing more than rolling billboards. No cargo capacity at all, these stupid things were just taking up a space in traffic to advertise vendors like "iPlanet".
I still have no idea what iPlanet was trying to sell, but I did make a point of sending them mail explaining why I would never do business with them. Hopefully, they went belly-up and took a pot of stupid money down the drain with them.
-jcr
If you have your own license, VirtualPC cost $129.
I don't think you can still buy it without a windows license, since MS bought connectix.
You don't need to get mad everytime someone shatters your world.
My world isn't "shattered" just because some twit of an AC annoys me.
-jcr
In this case, the blogger was GIVEN the information without solicitation.
You didn't read the lawsuit, did you?
-jcr
No - Apple got the cover story because the iMac looked damn sexy
Nope. Time didn't know what it looked like when they made the deal.
-jcr