No, we don't, but plenty of people do out here in the Bay Area. Even more actually. But then again, a 3BR/2BA house in a good neighborhood with good schools will set you back $1.5 million!
Companies only want to hire people with experience.
We want to hire ability. That's not necessarily experience. There may be some relationship between the two, but it's lazy hiring to rely on experience. As we all know, there are plenty of people who have been programming for 20 years but still can't code for shit.
I'd hire you as a fairly inexperienced developer if you could demonstrate that you had great ability. You wouldn't get that huge salary at first however - sorry, you need experience and ability for that!
Unfortunately, it's very difficult to hire based on ability. How do you test for it? We've tried all sorts of stuff. In the end it comes down to good questioning, having the candidate hack out pseudo-code on the spot, and having them participate in a small design workshop. But we find that candidates don't really want to go through a long hiring process with us as we're a small company. It's still an error-prone process.
But I agree with TFA. I'd rather have 4 great programmers at $160K than 8 mediocre ones at $80K, or even less. The two major problems to hiring this way are:
Getting HR and top management to buy into it - their philosophy seems to be "we want above average software using slightly below average people"
Ran across this old post from some of my newsgroup archives:
From: William Gates [email blocked] Subject: Costly kernel for IBM PC Newsgroups: comp.os.cpm Date: 5 Oct 81 05:41:06 GMT
William Henry Gates III
Do you pine for the nice days of CP/M-1.1, when men were men and wrote their own device drivers? Do you have too much money in your pocket? Are you much too free to do what you want with your computer? Are you finding it frustrating when everything works on CP/M? No more rebooting your computer every 10 minutes? Then this post might be just for you:-)
As I mentioned a month(?) ago, I've purchased a version of QDOS for a song and I'm busy cocking it up and I'm going to sell it to IBM (suckers) for their new PC. It has finally reached the stage where it's completely unstable and most of the cooler things in CP/M have been removed. I am willing to put out the binaries, for a price, for wider distribution. It is just version 0.02 (+1 (very small) patch already), but I've successfully run BASIC/lunar-lander/COMMAND.COM etc under it (oh boy!).
Sources for this pet project of mine are all mine mine mine! Unless you talk to Tim Paterson from SCP. Full kernel source is most definitely not provided, as I have swiped a lot of code from CP/M and QDOS, and anywhere else I could find it. The system is able to compile "as-is" on alternating Tuesdays and when the moon is full or on a spring tide, and has been known to work. At least once. Heh. Sources are locked away in my underground lair, I mean a shack I just bought in a small town in Washington called Redmond.
I can (well, almost) hear you asking yourselves "why?". The Amiga will be out in a year (or two, or next month, who knows), and I've already got CP/M and the Apple ][. Well, this is a program for business people by a businessman. It's been real work and I expect to get paid for it! Plus hackers and students can't really create anything worthwhile. I'm going to hire really smart kids who don't know jack about computers and give them a lot of stock options. It won't matter if they create shit. We'll market the crap out of this thing! Once I get the hardware vendors to bundle it, we're golden! It is the beginning of my plan to dominate the world! Muwhahahaha! If you have any comments, please direct them to the guy over there holding the chair in a threatening manner.
I'm also interested in hearing from anybody who has written any of the utilities/library functions for CP/M. I'd like to steal them, I mean embrace/extend/extinguish, I mean purchase them for a song, so I can add them to the system. If you send it me, it becomes mine! And I'll patent it! Drop me a line if you are willing to let me use your code.
Bill
PS. to STEVE BALLMER! I'm unable to get through to you, and keep getting "forward error - hermanmiller unknown domain" or something. I think I've got a job for you.
PPS. to the Homebrew Computer Club in Palo Alto -- I'm going to bury you guys!
Jeez, what a screwup! You'd think that Google would offer to refund affected users their license and subscription fees for the service! I mean if I paid good money for something like that and they messed it up, I'd be hopping mad. I'd take my business to all those other sites that offer all those cool Ajax apps along with the biggest search engine in the world. Not like I was getting something for free or anything!
I'm currently negotiating with my client here in California to take full-time employment with them. They wanted a 12-month non-compete. My attorney told them to suck eggs, because it is unenforceable here in Cali -- you have the right to work. So they took it out of the contract. They still want an anti-poaching clause though (can't poach their employees after you leave to work elsewhere).
If you're concerned, spend $350 to have a labor lawyer (who specializes in employee agreements) review it. As someone's who's been screwed in the past by not having an attorney review a contract, it's worth it.
Yes, although security is a [complicated concept]. You're [referring to] the fact that there have been some security updates already for Windows Vista. This is exactly the way it should work. When somebody comes to us [after discovering a vulnerability] we've got [a fix] before there is any exploit. So it's totally according to plan, and that's why we have the whole Windows Update thing. We made it way harder for guys to do exploits. The number [of violations] will be way less because we've done some dramatic things [to improve security] in the code base. Apple hasn't done any of those things.
Is this a joke? It sure [is weird] to read an [article that] has so [many freaking] edits. I wonder [if Bill] was swearing [like a] sailor throughout [the] whole interview, and they [had to] clean [up] his potty mouth?
Here's the original text for you. I've emphasized the real text that was edited out:
Yes, although security is a cost-center not a profit-maker and a minor priority at Microsoft. You're gloating over the fact that there have been some security updates already for Windows Vista. This is exactly the way it should work. When somebody comes to us bitching about some security flaw that we couldn't care less about we've got to ensure that our marketing engine gets into full spin mode to deal with repercussions from the new, buggy patches we put out before there is any exploit. So it's totally according to plan, and that's why we have the whole Windows Update thing. We made it way harder for guys to do exploits. The number of times we just admit we f*cked up and fix the thing will be way less because we've done some dramatic things like buy of the Dept of Justice, throwing chairs, and totally ignoring security in the code base. Apple hasn't done any of those things.
Cue up the jokes about how he shouldn't have automated his sailboat using Windows. Now facing the Blue Wave of Death.
Seriously though, there's a good chance he's OK. The weather out here has been great today, and he hasn't been gone that long. One of the following probably happened:
Something broke and he's drifting around out there, probably to be spotted fairly soon as there's plenty of ship traffic and the Coasties are looking;
Got blown off course and had to put in somewhere remote on the coast (unlikely as the winds aren't bad);
Navigation broke down, he missed the Farallons (although you can usually see them from shore on a good day), went too far out, and is down coming back;
Hit a whale / whale hit him -- not good, could sink the boat; hopefully he had a liferaft and was able to get into it;
Hit by a ship (it's busy out there); definitely not good; but unlikely as weather has been very good
Accidently fell overboard -- very bad, especially with our cold water here. That's why you don't make ocean passages alone, no matter how experienced you are.
Actually I always thought that all copies of Windows were a non-genuine operating system. What with all the bugs, security problems, lame features, etc.
Should probably read that 100% of Windows installs are genuine crap, but only 78% are genuinely licensed crap.
I agree: Ruby + ncurses for the UI, calling C/C++ modules to do whatever heavy lifting you need (if any).
There's no reason in this day and age to write a non-performance-sensitive UI in C or C++! Especially a text based one. Why would you go through such hell for a task that doesn't require optimal performance? Seriously: you can learn Ruby and code the UI in less time than it will take you to code it in C or C++. I guarantee it. Plus it will be a lot more fun. And you can link in C and C++ modules to execute any performance-sensitive tasks.
Unless there's some reason your text-based UI needs optimal performance, but I can't think of one offhand... I've sworn off all C/C++ development unless there's an overwhelming reason to use them. Heck, I don't even use Java much any more -- it's mostly all Python and Ruby, with an occasional module in C/C++ for performance.
You should be able to whip out a text-based interface using these tools in no time, even if you've never used Ruby. Like tonight. Or maybe over the weekend.
And no, I'm not some Ruby fanboy. I've got over 20 years professional programming experience, plus another 8 years non-professional. I've used many languages over that time. It's all about the right tool for the job. Python would be another great choice (perhaps even better because of its more extensive libraries). But C and C++ are definitely not the best tools for the job. (Unless there's something you haven't shared with us.)
Microsoft suggests that users "do not open or save Word files,"
I really like this quote! That kind of limits the functionality of a word processor if you can't open or save files, right?
What exactly does Microsoft suggest that I do with Word files? Besides using them to fragment my hard-disk? Maybe I can burn them to keep warm in the winter... um, no.
Or perhaps I'll just use Word to create and save HTML files!!
My brother-in-law is a plastic surgeon specializing in hands. He told me last year that fully a *third* of his surgeries are to repair damage caused by these plastic packages. Most commonly, people get frustrated and apply extra force with a knife, which then slips and cuts across the palm of the hand, slicing through some of the tendons and nerves that control the fingers. It is a real mess to repair apparently. Or people cut themselves up on the sharp plastic edges by trying to rip open the package with their hands and brute force.
Bad for us non-surgeons, but good for them - he has a really nice boat!
What do the editors think the Search function is for? How hard is it to type 'antikythera' in and hit Search? The dupes are out of control here. Jeez.
I think I figured out how to get more stories accepted on Slashdot -- just re-submit stories from 4-7 days ago! 1. Read Slashdot 2. Re-Submit Stories 3. ??? 4. Profit!
As someone who's spent 16 years in healthcare IT, I'm not surprised by this at all. Healthcare IT, especially the provider side (hospitals, physicians, etc.), has always been a disaster. The reasons are several:
Tendency to huge, monolithic projects. Need I say more? How many of these *ever* succeed?
Physicans. I know I shouldn't generalize, but please keep the physicians away from the IT projects, except as users. For some reason, they can't resist interfering, and tend to think they know best, even about things completely unrelated to their fields. Plus they are usually terrible business people, but they can't resist meddling in managing the business. Any project I've seen that had significant physician involvement devolved into a never-ending mess of immense feature creep, constantly shifting priorities, last-minute technology redirections, and inter-physician squabbling.
Conservative, old-school IT management. In my opinion, these organizations are very unwilling to use new technologies. MUMPS? That was archaic when I was in college in the 80s.
Bad business management. Usually these organizations have less-than-stellar business management. That makes it hard to get decent buyin and support, develop requirements, stick with a strategy, etc. The difference between the management in these organizations and those in pharmaceutical companies (which are much better) is like night and day.
Mismatched financial incentives -- usually the providers don't stand to gain (the insurers do), but they're the ones that have to implement. Since KP is both the provider and the payor, this doesn't really apply in this case.
On the other hand, it's been a great industry to work in as an IT guy. Employment is definitely not a problem. And if you can get away from having to deal with providers (like into pharma or medical supply/products), it won't drive you too crazy.
And developers who want some food on their table better know something about Win32,.NET, and other Windows technologies.
Sucks to be you.
I've been making great $$ as a non-Windows developer since 1990. Plus I've really enjoyed my career. Don't know what planet you're on, but I wouldn't want to be there. I haven't met very many if any Windows developers who have had as good a ride.
Show me an Win32/.NET developer who makes great cash and likes what they're doing, and I'll show you a Microsoft employee with a lot of stock options.
CS is a branch of theoretical mathematics and has very little to do with anything you can sit in front of, type into, click on, or reboot.
Absolutely correct.
But (at least in the US), a CS degree opens doors, an English or Art History degree plus hacking on the side doesn't.
Unless you've got some good experience, or have been referred by someone to the company, a CS (or math) degree is still the best way to break in to the field. Regardless of whether you learn anything useful.
CS degrees are helpful but certainly not required. In 20 years of hiring and firing IT folks, I don't think I see much of a correlation between their degrees and their performance. Performance has lot more to do with intelligence, attitude, work ethic, curiosity, and experience. The CS degree does get your resume in the door however. Without it, you better have some great experience.
That said, I'd say that some of my worst hires have been CS Masters and PhD holders. They've been way too theoretical, detached from reality, over-perfectionists, etc. Those guys are probably better off staying in academia or advanced research groups. Stick with the Bachelors.
Another underperforming group has been degree holders in MIS or Data Processing, or whatever it's being called. These are the degrees for people that want to go into IT but don't want to do the math and theory that CS requires. In my experience they make good sysadmins but mediocre programmers and engineers, and terrible managers.
My recommendation would be to get a BS in CS. Don't take many more CS courses than are required to major in it. Make sure you do take courses on project management, user-interface design, development lifecycles, and relational databases. These are very practical courses that will help you in the long term, but some of the more theoretical CS programs may frown on them (my college didn't even offer them when I was there).
Then take some micro- and macro-economics, intro operations management, and intro statistics. Squeeze in introductory business law if you can. That should give you enough of business background, although it would be great if you could take a part-time job for a few months in some (non-IT) company's operations to give you some experience with what users go through.
I'd also take some basic engineering courses too. Not just for the knowledge; I think they're better at giving you the problem solving mentality and skills than CS is. I'd recommend intro to discrete digital electronics, basic computer architecture, and intro to computer networking courses. Those three have been very helpful over the long term, giving me a solid foundational understanding of what's going on behind the scenes, even though my career really has nothing directly to do with them.
And play with IT stuff. Check out new technologies. Learn new languages just for the heck of it. Stay current.
Most importantly, have fun, take some classes completely unrelated to the above in subjects you like or are interested in, and hang out with some non-geeks. Everything people say about techies needing good interpersonal and communication skills is true. As technology advances and development (slowly) becomes more 'user-friendly' (or easier for non-techies to learn), being able to communicate effectively is what will keep your job from being outsourced, or even worse, replaced by a computer!
Actually (if you RTFFCC'sD) the FCC asserts that only the FCC has the authority regulate unlicensed spectrum (such as 802.11). The landlord cannot put any terms in their lease that will 'regulate' the use of those airwaves. That's why Massport can't require Continental to give up free access. (Actual decision here)
BTW, I think that your landlord cannot prevent you from using a satellite dish. They may however be able to restrict you from mounting the dish on their physical property.
During IE7's development, we prioritized the work we did based on the web development community's real-world feedback.... The work that we delivered in IE7 simply has more positive impact and makes web developers' jobs easier than making an arbitrary (if terribly clever) web page render the way its author intended.
Who the heck were they getting 'real-world' feedback from? Gates & Ballmer? My 7-year old daughter?
Any technical person I've talked to about IE6, and especially web developers, has two major issues that they wanted fixed:
Fix CSS
Improve Security
So maybe they hit the second one a bit, but how did they miss the feedback on #1?
We focused on web developers' real world problems.
Like what? Better RSS functionality? A new UI? I don't ever recall hearing developers ask for those. Who is he kidding? They didn't care what cross-platform web developers wanted. They talked to a few dedicated IE web developers and that's it.
Here's the real answer:
The real goal here is interoperability - something that Microsoft product teams believe in (remember, Microsoft has more than one product that works with HTML, CSS, and other web standards, and they have to interoperate too)...
Translated: Other Microsoft stuff relies on the HTML and CSS parsers and renderers, in a big entangled mess, and those other things are just as broken as IE6, and the whole thing is so fscked up that we couldn't figure it out in time, and then we'd have to get those other dev groups to coordinate with us, and that's a pain in a bureaucratic place like Microsoft, so we just gave up and concentrated on bells and whistles for the users.
Slashdot Mirror
No, we don't, but plenty of people do out here in the Bay Area. Even more actually. But then again, a 3BR/2BA house in a good neighborhood with good schools will set you back $1.5 million!
We want to hire ability. That's not necessarily experience. There may be some relationship between the two, but it's lazy hiring to rely on experience. As we all know, there are plenty of people who have been programming for 20 years but still can't code for shit.
I'd hire you as a fairly inexperienced developer if you could demonstrate that you had great ability. You wouldn't get that huge salary at first however - sorry, you need experience and ability for that!
Unfortunately, it's very difficult to hire based on ability. How do you test for it? We've tried all sorts of stuff. In the end it comes down to good questioning, having the candidate hack out pseudo-code on the spot, and having them participate in a small design workshop. But we find that candidates don't really want to go through a long hiring process with us as we're a small company. It's still an error-prone process.
But I agree with TFA. I'd rather have 4 great programmers at $160K than 8 mediocre ones at $80K, or even less. The two major problems to hiring this way are:
Concorde, Airbus, Galileo - great job, guys.
Can't wait until you all get fed up with US control of the Internet, and decide to make your own internet. Good luck with that one too.
Jeez, what a screwup! You'd think that Google would offer to refund affected users their license and subscription fees for the service! I mean if I paid good money for something like that and they messed it up, I'd be hopping mad. I'd take my business to all those other sites that offer all those cool Ajax apps along with the biggest search engine in the world. Not like I was getting something for free or anything!
Oh wait a minute...
Because the existing users have obviously been paragons of virtue when it comes respecting copyright law...
Oh, wait a minute
I'm currently negotiating with my client here in California to take full-time employment with them. They wanted a 12-month non-compete. My attorney told them to suck eggs, because it is unenforceable here in Cali -- you have the right to work. So they took it out of the contract. They still want an anti-poaching clause though (can't poach their employees after you leave to work elsewhere).
If you're concerned, spend $350 to have a labor lawyer (who specializes in employee agreements) review it. As someone's who's been screwed in the past by not having an attorney review a contract, it's worth it.
Yes, although security is a cost-center not a profit-maker and a minor priority at Microsoft. You're gloating over the fact that there have been some security updates already for Windows Vista. This is exactly the way it should work. When somebody comes to us bitching about some security flaw that we couldn't care less about we've got to ensure that our marketing engine gets into full spin mode to deal with repercussions from the new, buggy patches we put out before there is any exploit. So it's totally according to plan, and that's why we have the whole Windows Update thing. We made it way harder for guys to do exploits. The number of times we just admit we f*cked up and fix the thing will be way less because we've done some dramatic things like buy of the Dept of Justice, throwing chairs, and totally ignoring security in the code base. Apple hasn't done any of those things.
Fixed that for ya.
Seriously though, there's a good chance he's OK. The weather out here has been great today, and he hasn't been gone that long. One of the following probably happened:
Actually I always thought that all copies of Windows were a non-genuine operating system. What with all the bugs, security problems, lame features, etc.
Should probably read that 100% of Windows installs are genuine crap, but only 78% are genuinely licensed crap.
I agree: Ruby + ncurses for the UI, calling C/C++ modules to do whatever heavy lifting you need (if any).
There's no reason in this day and age to write a non-performance-sensitive UI in C or C++! Especially a text based one. Why would you go through such hell for a task that doesn't require optimal performance? Seriously: you can learn Ruby and code the UI in less time than it will take you to code it in C or C++. I guarantee it. Plus it will be a lot more fun. And you can link in C and C++ modules to execute any performance-sensitive tasks.
Unless there's some reason your text-based UI needs optimal performance, but I can't think of one offhand... I've sworn off all C/C++ development unless there's an overwhelming reason to use them. Heck, I don't even use Java much any more -- it's mostly all Python and Ruby, with an occasional module in C/C++ for performance.
You should be able to whip out a text-based interface using these tools in no time, even if you've never used Ruby. Like tonight. Or maybe over the weekend.
And no, I'm not some Ruby fanboy. I've got over 20 years professional programming experience, plus another 8 years non-professional. I've used many languages over that time. It's all about the right tool for the job. Python would be another great choice (perhaps even better because of its more extensive libraries). But C and C++ are definitely not the best tools for the job. (Unless there's something you haven't shared with us.)
What exactly does Microsoft suggest that I do with Word files? Besides using them to fragment my hard-disk? Maybe I can burn them to keep warm in the winter... um, no.
Or perhaps I'll just use Word to create and save HTML files!!
My brother-in-law is a plastic surgeon specializing in hands. He told me last year that fully a *third* of his surgeries are to repair damage caused by these plastic packages. Most commonly, people get frustrated and apply extra force with a knife, which then slips and cuts across the palm of the hand, slicing through some of the tendons and nerves that control the fingers. It is a real mess to repair apparently. Or people cut themselves up on the sharp plastic edges by trying to rip open the package with their hands and brute force.
Bad for us non-surgeons, but good for them - he has a really nice boat!
What do the editors think the Search function is for? How hard is it to type 'antikythera' in and hit Search? The dupes are out of control here. Jeez.
I think I figured out how to get more stories accepted on Slashdot -- just re-submit stories from 4-7 days ago!
1. Read Slashdot
2. Re-Submit Stories
3. ???
4. Profit!
On the other hand, it's been a great industry to work in as an IT guy. Employment is definitely not a problem. And if you can get away from having to deal with providers (like into pharma or medical supply/products), it won't drive you too crazy.
Only 6.6 TFLOPS? I'll get right on that.
Sucks to be you.
I've been making great $$ as a non-Windows developer since 1990. Plus I've really enjoyed my career. Don't know what planet you're on, but I wouldn't want to be there. I haven't met very many if any Windows developers who have had as good a ride.
Show me an Win32/.NET developer who makes great cash and likes what they're doing, and I'll show you a Microsoft employee with a lot of stock options.
Darn! And to think that instead I traded my mule for those stupid magic beans...
Absolutely correct.
But (at least in the US), a CS degree opens doors, an English or Art History degree plus hacking on the side doesn't.
Unless you've got some good experience, or have been referred by someone to the company, a CS (or math) degree is still the best way to break in to the field. Regardless of whether you learn anything useful.
CS degrees are helpful but certainly not required. In 20 years of hiring and firing IT folks, I don't think I see much of a correlation between their degrees and their performance. Performance has lot more to do with intelligence, attitude, work ethic, curiosity, and experience. The CS degree does get your resume in the door however. Without it, you better have some great experience.
That said, I'd say that some of my worst hires have been CS Masters and PhD holders. They've been way too theoretical, detached from reality, over-perfectionists, etc. Those guys are probably better off staying in academia or advanced research groups. Stick with the Bachelors.
Another underperforming group has been degree holders in MIS or Data Processing, or whatever it's being called. These are the degrees for people that want to go into IT but don't want to do the math and theory that CS requires. In my experience they make good sysadmins but mediocre programmers and engineers, and terrible managers.
My recommendation would be to get a BS in CS. Don't take many more CS courses than are required to major in it. Make sure you do take courses on project management, user-interface design, development lifecycles, and relational databases. These are very practical courses that will help you in the long term, but some of the more theoretical CS programs may frown on them (my college didn't even offer them when I was there).
Then take some micro- and macro-economics, intro operations management, and intro statistics. Squeeze in introductory business law if you can. That should give you enough of business background, although it would be great if you could take a part-time job for a few months in some (non-IT) company's operations to give you some experience with what users go through.
I'd also take some basic engineering courses too. Not just for the knowledge; I think they're better at giving you the problem solving mentality and skills than CS is. I'd recommend intro to discrete digital electronics, basic computer architecture, and intro to computer networking courses. Those three have been very helpful over the long term, giving me a solid foundational understanding of what's going on behind the scenes, even though my career really has nothing directly to do with them.
And play with IT stuff. Check out new technologies. Learn new languages just for the heck of it. Stay current.
Most importantly, have fun, take some classes completely unrelated to the above in subjects you like or are interested in, and hang out with some non-geeks. Everything people say about techies needing good interpersonal and communication skills is true. As technology advances and development (slowly) becomes more 'user-friendly' (or easier for non-techies to learn), being able to communicate effectively is what will keep your job from being outsourced, or even worse, replaced by a computer!
Ever hear of fraud?
There's got to be some sneaky, devious, underhanded motive behind this for Microsoft...
Maybe they'll do such a bad job supporting it that Suse Linux will get a bad rep? Or they want to stick to Oracle and their Red Hat support deal?
The best idea I can come up with is that they can show this off to the EC's antitrust regulators as non-monopoly behavior.
Of course, stranger things have happened: the Red Sox did win the World Series a few years ago..
No. The landlord cannot regulate Wifi.
Actually (if you RTFFCC'sD) the FCC asserts that only the FCC has the authority regulate unlicensed spectrum (such as 802.11). The landlord cannot put any terms in their lease that will 'regulate' the use of those airwaves. That's why Massport can't require Continental to give up free access. (Actual decision here)
BTW, I think that your landlord cannot prevent you from using a satellite dish. They may however be able to restrict you from mounting the dish on their physical property.
Who the heck were they getting 'real-world' feedback from? Gates & Ballmer? My 7-year old daughter?
Any technical person I've talked to about IE6, and especially web developers, has two major issues that they wanted fixed:
So maybe they hit the second one a bit, but how did they miss the feedback on #1?
Like what? Better RSS functionality? A new UI? I don't ever recall hearing developers ask for those. Who is he kidding? They didn't care what cross-platform web developers wanted. They talked to a few dedicated IE web developers and that's it.
Here's the real answer:
Translated: Other Microsoft stuff relies on the HTML and CSS parsers and renderers, in a big entangled mess, and those other things are just as broken as IE6, and the whole thing is so fscked up that we couldn't figure it out in time, and then we'd have to get those other dev groups to coordinate with us, and that's a pain in a bureaucratic place like Microsoft, so we just gave up and concentrated on bells and whistles for the users.