[DLC] Job Seeking

[Tim Gebhardt]

Dusten (and everyone I guess),

Don't shrug off the fact that you don't know the 'libraries exclusive to
java".  If you haven't spent any time in the arena of a particular
environment you probably don't "know" it.

Any programmer worth his or her salt can easily pick up how to do stuff in
their known languages in an hour or so ("How do I take a substring of this
string?" "How do I instantiate a new instance of this type of object?").
Actually "know"ing a language requires 2 things: knowing the important
libraries and knowing the culture of how people get stuff done in the
language.

Here's a great example: Nobody uses constructors in Java anymore. Huh!??!
This may be a little broad, but it's pretty much true.  Most libraries use
factory methods that return interfaces because this is much easier to mock
in order to make decent unit tests.

And those libraries you kind of shrug off ARE part of the language in
certain circles.  If you've done scientific Python programming and are
applying for a Ruby on Rails job you can tell yourself "Well Ruby's kinda
similar to Python (and it is), so that Rails thing should be pretty easy to
pick up."  But in fact it's the Ruby that would be easier to pick up to an
outsider, and an employer would be much happier if you knew Rails, or if you
had some Python experience with Django or Pylons or another similar web
framework.  Get what I'm saying?  The language isn't as important as
understanding how to get stuff done.  That mostly comes with experience.

-Tim Gebhardt
tim at gebhardtcomputing.com

On Tue, Jun 24, 2008 at 12:40 PM, Dusten Sobotta <dispraekailo at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Thanks for your responses everyone~
>
> I feel I can handle any project with C++ in a reasonable amount of time;
> and it's been my language of choice for quite a while.  When it comes to
> java, I can apply most of that knowledge; however it may take a bit longer
> given that I'm not as familiar with libraries exclusive to java.  I find
> scripting languages like php and perl to be manageable, but again it's a
> matter of applying knowledge from C/C++ and researching project-specific
> libraries, poking at example code, etc.
>
>
> I'm primarily looking for part-time or internship work, though I wouldn't
> be opposed to full-time C/C++ stuff either.
>
>
> On Tue, Jun 24, 2008 at 9:26 AM, Sean Neilan <sean at seanneilan.com> wrote:
>
>> I'm sure your right in some sense.. ;)
>>
>> -Sean Neilan
>> sean at seanneilan.com
>>
>>
>> On Jun 24, 2008, at 12:17 PM, "ChiLinux Guy" <chilinuxguy at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>  i disagree ross.  I say toss up a FULL AND COMPLETE resume attached just
>>> like you would applying for a job. Also, you should probably state if you're
>>> looking for full time, part time, or contract work.
>>>
>>> Also, if anyone has questions for him, direct them towards him OFF LIST.
>>>  I don't care if you want to hire him, if he knows PHP, or if he can do the
>>> crab walk while singing yankee doodle.  If you're interested in any of those
>>> fun facts, ask him, not all of us.  If he feels it's apporpriate to add to
>>> his list of things, he'll do so by sending a message saying "I forgot to
>>> mention the languages i know, etc.  here's a resume".
>>>  _______________________________________________
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