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The Unemployable Programmer

unemployable.pen.io

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Re: The Unemployable Programmer

#391

Post by jqm »

jqm wrote: post #185

To me it sounds like someone "good with computers" but doesn't really know how to program. All that stuff about "commodore 64" and "garage startup" sounds a bit like a smokescreen. OK, you liked playing around with computers as kid. Great, most of us did. And that made you good enough with computers that you got a job at BigCo. Then you got a little lazy and stopped learning new stuff. It happens. This isn't a condem…

If poster is also author I may just be wrong. Maybe they can do web programming.

But the story just smells "funny" for some reason. I guess because I've met people like I'm referring to in parent comment. People who haven't put in the effort but want the advantages. People who know a little about computers or have been help desk and suddenly want to be programmers without the required skills or effort.

This might not be OP though. I maybe judged a bit hastily.

Re: The Unemployable Programmer

#392

Post by milspec »

vonmoltke wrote: post #320
HillRat wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's your skill set and background? I hired a dev team a few months ago in Dallas and it was incredibly difficult to find qualified candidates, of whom only a few made it through the tech interviews (and I'm not that tough an interviewer) -- twenty resumes (from a very good headhunter who culled out marginal candidates) meant a dozen interviews meant one hire. I'm not in the hiring market right now (and may not eve…

Thanks, I'll do that. For the record, my professional programming experience is about 2/3 real-time embedded signal processing code, 1/3 NLP research and prototyping. I have also had a straight EE role that involved some embedded and test set code.

I think I recall getting you an interview. (at http://advancedsecuritylabs.com/ in Florida) Did we not give you an offer? Did you reject an offer?

We could easily put you in San Antonio or Austin. We might even be able to do Seattle or Cambridge (near Boston), though those are tiny offices.

If I remember right and we did reject you, try a different office.

Re: The Unemployable Programmer

#393

Post by JoshTriplett »

genericuser wrote: post #377
JoshTriplett wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That still isn't a rationale; that's a stated requirement, but what problem is actually solved by limiting clearances?

Fewer people they need to monitor with the level of scrutiny, people with clearance safely assume they are being monitored at.

Interesting, I didn't realize it was considered an ongoing process. I guess that makes sense; otherwise a bad actor would just apply for clearance, get cleared, and then start doing things they shouldn't.

Re: The Unemployable Programmer

#394

Post by ForHackernews »

klibertp wrote: post #333
vonmoltke wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is an absolutely baffling article. The job market for developers is not glutted by over-supply, it's one where marginally-qualified people get hired for salaries well above the national average because companies need SOMEONE to do the job. And virtually nowhere cares about degrees, especially for experienced devs. What is baffling is this Valley-centric, web and mobile development-centric line being repeated c…

> outside the web and mobile fields in general Why don't you just change the domain your working in? Why not web dev? If you're a programmer, you should be able to code anything, anywhere, with a bit of effort. I skimmed your post ( https://wmkrug.com/on-the-technical-skills-shortage-and-hiri... ) and honestly I'm not sure. I mean, you're saying that requiring "years of experience" in "specific technology" makes "goo…

> If you're a programmer, you should be able to code anything, anywhere, with a bit of effort.

Is that really true? I do database programming, and I feel like I would be absolutely screwed if somebody demanded I do, say, embedded programming for small microprocessors. I guess theoretically I could study up, but it would be at least a year or two before I could be competitive in interviews, right?

Maybe I just suck and there are genius programmers who are equally competent at embedded systems, mobile development, distributed systems...

Re: The Unemployable Programmer

#395

Post by tracker1 »

s73v3r wrote: post #357
vonmoltke wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hence the reason I said "web and mobile development-centric" in the post that started this sub-thread. I'm actually writing a UI in Angular right now or a Java-based system I wrote. I hate it. It is a pain I'm going through because I need a UI for this prototype, but there is no way I would want to do this full-time.

If you hate it, why are you using Angular?

Angular gained a lot of popularity by being an earlier contender at the time it was released... React is on the rise now, and may overtake it... Angular2 is more like React and a departure from it's prior take.

Businesses move slowly, and new project uptakes on technology is usually 3-5 years after initial release... .Net was out int 2002, but it wasn't until close to 2005 that it really started getting popular... jQuery was 2006, and almost an exception, but still not really strong until 2009... 2009 started Node, but it didn't start to shine until 2012-2013... it takes a while.

As it stands, at this point Angular is out there and a lot of current jobs are using/require it... if you can't sell a better option (polymer, react, etc), then you're stuck with it.

Re: The Unemployable Programmer

#396

Post by tracker1 »

andywood wrote: post #335
vonmoltke wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is an absolutely baffling article. The job market for developers is not glutted by over-supply, it's one where marginally-qualified people get hired for salaries well above the national average because companies need SOMEONE to do the job. And virtually nowhere cares about degrees, especially for experienced devs. What is baffling is this Valley-centric, web and mobile development-centric line being repeated c…

I've never worked in the valley, and I usually don't have much to do with the web or mobile. I don't have a degree, and the subject has literally never once come up in an interview. In 17 years, I've never encountered anyone who cares. Also, the vast majority of job descriptions read something like "Degree in CS OR equivalent experience" and therefore explicitly do not require degrees.

It will vary from company to company and culture to culture... I have a friend at a large aerospace company who was basically told he had 3 years to get his degree or he was out... He's now a mid-level project manager and does 2-3 the workload of his closest peers, but H.R. policy was that he shouldn't have been allowed into his current position without it.

Re: The Unemployable Programmer

#397

Post by milspec »

eropple wrote: post #219
manyxcxi wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm in Seattle and am getting lots of contact from recruiters in DFW and Austin, and not just the usual LinkedIn spam BS. My background is heavy on DevOps and I've got about a 50/50 split on .NET and Java.

I can corroborate this, though more from the LinkedIn side of things. Out of every twenty LinkedIn messages I get, probably six are SF, four are Boston (I'm local), two each are NYC and DC, and two or three are between DFW and Austin. (The last couple are usually Idaho or Nebraska or one of the other corporate-fief states.)

Depending on the town and your specialty, you might be surprised. Not every place outside of the typical hot spots is corporate-fief. Specialization means you can have a good job market without the crowds causing traffic jams and running up the cost of living.

For example, you might not expect much good in Melbourne, FL. You'd be wrong if you happen to like low-level code (assembly, reverse engineering, vulnerability research, embedded development, etc.) or EE stuff. There are both larger companies (Harris, Lockheed, Northrop Grumman, and the http://advancedsecuritylabs.com/ part of Raytheon) and lots of startup-ups.

Since a specialized area (like Melbourne, FL doing low-level stuff) doesn't have too many nerds outside that specialty, the cost of living stays low. You can get a cheap house within a mile of work and there isn't much traffic.

Re: The Unemployable Programmer

#398

Post by speeder »

drfritznunkie wrote: post #115
speeder wrote: post #60

What about people that instead NEVER had a job? I got my degree in 2009, at the height of the crisis (for now at least... here in Brazil the crisis of 2009 is finally getting worse), I NEVER had a legal job, all the stuff I put in LinkedIn were semi-legal or outright illegal stuff (or my startup). Also my programming language of choice were clearly a poor choice, I learned C, and C++ and whatnot when I was a kid (I w…

How are they poor choices? Methinks you're just looking in wrong places if they're languages you want to continue using at a job. Embedded is hot right now, so sign up for the Jack Ganssle's Embedded Muse Newsletter http://www.ganssle.com/tem-subunsub.html . The jobs are going to be mostly US based, but some place to start. And look for companies that you know are going to be using C/CPP from their products. Even if…

They are poor choices because most jobs available to me are for java/ruby/python/etc...

I personally like Lua (that I NEVER saw a job opening for this), and C and C++ that I learned as a kid.

When I find the rare C or C++ job, usually they want 20+ years of experience or soemthing impossible like taht to me (I am 27 years old, obviously I can't have 20 years of experience), or are jobs in other countries, but unwilling to help with visa.

C and C++ became sort of too specialized, only use for high-performance stuff, even games now (what I really like to code) several companies prefer to use .NET or Java, the few C or C++ jobs that exist usually are in countries with some engineering history (like Germany, I saw lots of C++ jobs there), or in US (that has lots of jobs of lots of things).

Re: The Unemployable Programmer

#399

Post by tracker1 »

sjcrank wrote: post #235
outworlder wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> He told me he's dying for entry level .NET/ASP and Java developers Why does he need so many entry level programmers? > We talked about pay, and it wasn't terrible impressive Is the recruiter trying to staff a company with mostly entry-level programmers, paying low wages? I've seen plenty of companies like that, including those who used mostly trainees. Usually, the work environment was the crappiest possible, and w…

In the interest of building an experience-diverse workforce employers need entry level, mid level, and experienced developers with skills in their core stack, which in many cases is Java or .NET. My theory is that technology trends are leading the entry level developers to learn Python, Ruby, and JavaScript rather than .NET or Java, thereby reducing the supply and putting these candidates in high demand.

So, they could hire another senior person at 2.5x the pay instead of 3-4 junior devs. The problem is a lot of younger managers don't understand the different in ouput can vary a lot from developer to developer. And on top of that quality output can be far more maintainable.

All they care about is # of jira/tfs tickets that are open, and the number of features, and how many warm bodies based on their averages they need. The smoothest project I ever worked on was staffed by all senior people, with relatively diverse and overlapping skills. That wouldn't be possible with 3x the developers if 2/3 of them were junior to mid level.

Re: The Unemployable Programmer

#400

Post by tracker1 »

doktrin wrote: post #190
mkozlows wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HN may be an echo chamber, but look what you're saying: Employers are desperate for developers, including entry level ones, mostly using older tech stacks, and they'll pay solid money for them. It doesn't sound like you're describing a world in which someone with 10+ years of solid experience with techs is going to be struggling to find a job, right?

> It doesn't sound like you're describing a world in which someone with 10+ years of solid experience with techs is going to be struggling to find a job, right? Overqualification (or the perception thereof) happens. The development world, like most others, is a bit of a pyramid. More experience doesn't necessarily translate to more positions being available. Some (many, even) are specifically targeted at young, entry…

And a lot of these companies should consider bringing on one more senior person instead of 2-3 junior ones.
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