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  • Can you work for the big (Google, Microsoft, Facebook etc.) without getting too much involved?

    - by Developer Art
    Having seen people talking about interviewing and working for the big companies, I keep wondering how much are you expected to actually get involved in there. 1) That's because I keep seeing folks from Google and Microsoft and others writing in forums, blogging, tweeting, speaking at conferences and seemingly doing this on the 24/7/365 basis from their office, apartment, hotel and even plane. Are you really expected to commit that much if you come to work for them? Do they want you to think about your work while you're eating, sleeping, taking a shower, making love and so on? Can you in fact "switch off" at five and go home forgetting everything? Perhaps you have a hobby, family life, kids, friends, personal projects anyone? Is it so that if you work for the big then you're expected not to have any life outside of the company? You can't develop own projects, have own clients and just have another life? 2) One other thing is the work contracts the big use. I've heard for instance that when you join Microsoft you need to provide a list of projects you're currently working on and after that anything new you'll come up with during your employment automatically belongs to the company. Are all of the big doing this? Can you deny signing a contract until such clause is removed or with the big it is "take it or leave it" because the legal department won't accept any change? Can you make them write the contract in that manner that they step away from anything you've developed in your private time? Of all the big I have only been at SAP during my internship. Lately while browsing through the old papers I've found my old contact which stipulated they owned everything I developed or invented during my employment, which I would never have signed these days. On a side note I don't think I would return to SAP since I remember most people there were clueless and provided the impression they were simply sitting out their years waiting for the retirement. But anyway, what do the other big put in their contracts? How far do you get involved when you go working for the big? Or perhaps fully committed with your body and soul? P.S. I'm not planning to join any of them I'm just curious.

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  • High paid non-finance programming roles? [closed]

    - by Ian
    Besides finance (front-office/high frequency trading) developer roles, are there any other very well paid programming roles, specifically for C++ or Java? One particular industry I would find interesting is the energy industry? However, I completed an internship for one of the massive energy companies and their "IT department" was nothing more than Microsoft Access- they outsourced all the technical work to IBM and Accenture. EDIT: USD 110k+ Defense would sounds great except the fact I am not a US citizen :)

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  • Shoring up deficiencies in a "home grown" programmer?

    - by JohnP
    I started out by teaching myself BASIC on a Vic 20, and in college (mid 80's) I had Fortran, Pascal, limited C, machine and assembler (With a smattering of COBOL). I didn't touch programming from approx 1989 to 1999. At that point, I was lucky enough to get hired as a Clipper programmer. Took me about 6 months to learn most of it, and by now (13 yrs) I'm pretty expert in it. I have also picked up Cold Fusion, some C#, some ASP, SQL, etc. I know programming structures, but in most languages I'm missing the esoterics, and I know my code could be much tighter. The problem is that I've learned what I needed to, to get the job done. This results in a lot of gaps in practical knowledge. I am also missing out on a TON of theory. Things like SRP, Refactoring, etc are alien terms. (Although I grok the intent after a short read). In addition, I am in the position now of teaching junior programmers the company and our software, and I don't want to pass on the knowledge gaps. I know this is somewhat of a subjective question and may be closed, but how do you go back and pick up what you've missed?

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  • What percentage should a consulting company take off the top of your pay?

    - by JasonStoltz
    Let's say that, hypothetically, a programmer is being paid $40 / hour for a 6 month contract, through a contracting agency. That contracting agency is being paid $85 / hour for every hour that programmer works by the client. So the programmer only actually takes home 47% of what the client is paying per hour. Is this normal, or is the percentage unusually low? Other things to consider: The consulting agency isn't paying benefits P.S (If this is normal, I'd also be curious what the justification would be to take that high of a percentage. And if it is NOT normal, what would be a normal percentage?)

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  • How to convince boss to start using Codeigniter or YII at work?

    - by mahen23
    Hello, i work for a web development company and during the one year i have spent here, there were no improvements in the technologies we used to built our websites. I introduced jquery to them (buying the Novice to Ninja by Sitepoint) and now, i want to get rid of all these crappy PHP from scratch and use a PHP framework instead. So what reasoning i can use to convince my boss to switch, and how to convice the other developers too?

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  • what are the duties of a software control management (scm) engineer in a large company?

    - by Alex. S.
    I'm curious about what are the canonical responsibilities of such specialized role. Normally, I expected this to be part of the tasks of a normal developer, but in large companies I know this role is to be fulfilled by an engineer in his own. In my current company, there is a possibility for a new opening in a SCM position, so I could apply, but first I would like to hear about what, in your experience, characterize best this role.

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  • Plays Well With Others - Influence versus Authority

    - by KKline
    Originally appearing on http://KevinEKline.com on Nov 13, 2010 You’ve probably found that the prefix “lead” is a fairly common occurrence in the technology world. We have “lead developers”, “lead DBAs”, “lead architects”, and “lead consultants”. Yet, we don’t have “lead managers”, “lead directors”, or “lead VPs”. Why is that? Well, there are probably a number of different reasons for having “lead” technologist titles depending on who you ask. For example, the HR department might say that adding “lead”...(read more)

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  • Developing Good Contacts

    There are millions of was you can develop good networking contacts, but you must be open to meeting new people. In the information technology industry, everyone is a potential client. So any place you can meet people is a good place to develop good networking contacts. Here are a few examples Online Discussion Forums – Online forums are a great place to show your knowledge of a subject and allow you to meet people that share your same interests Blog Networks – Allowing others to read your thoughts and comment on them. In addition, you can so the same on other blogs with in the network. Networking Sites – Networking sites are a great way to find new contacts based on your current contacts because you can share common friends, and possibly common interests Volunteering – Volunteering is a great way to meet new contacts, and you can help others at the same time Civic Organizations – Participating in organizations or clubs like the Lions Club, Rotary Club, and religious affiliated organizations because you can meet people of all walks of life, and can share and contribute ideas for common goals Chamber of Commerce – This is another great way to meet contacts especially if you are interested in starting your own business. The chamber is a great way to meet other business oriented people who are always looking to collaborate and improve their business. Family and Friends – Family and friends are another excellent to meet new contacts, because they can always be on the lookout for opportunities for you. For example your brother hears that a friend of his needs a new website, so he gives him your number and highly recommends you. This is really good because the potential client is looking for the service you can perform, and you where already highly recommend.

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  • What is the difference between being an IT in investment bank and a professional IT company?

    - by deepsky
    Suppose there are two positions: IT in investment bank: developer for the infrastructure or the platform a famous IT company: embedded developer, linux As far as I understand, since in the investment bank not everyone will have the chance to work for the core trading system, most people just do the same job as they do in a normal IT company. And some of the tasks can even be outsourced. But in a professional IT company, you will have more chance to practice your coding skill and enhance your professional knowledge. So there are many choices when you want to change your job while the IT in invest bank not. Is this correct?

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  • Reading/resources for improving architect and senior engineer skills

    - by laconicdev
    I am working on improving my architect / senior engineer skills. In particular, I want to focus on "getting lost in the weeds" - spending a lot of time on a problem while a better solution could have been achieved and "not seeing the forest for the trees" - missing the big picture and only providing part of the functionality - issues. What is some recommended reading/source material that can help me along? Thanks!

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  • Does it really takes 5-10 years (or more) to be really good in programming?

    - by Ygam
    I don't get it. Why is there such a notion that it takes this long to be really proficient in a single language? I somehow think that this statement meant that it takes such a long time to master your language, and use it in a lot of context (web programming, desktop applications, mobile applications, etc.). Adding to that, sometimes you get stuck on a single language in your job and doing repetitive things and don't have much time to study other languages, thus for a certain amount of time, you don't really do much learning at all, and that adds to the amount of time. What do you think?

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  • What does it mean if a job requires a "Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or related field"?

    - by Bill
    Specifically, what is meant by "related field"? I'm in the process of pursuing an IT Infrastructure B.A.S. from the U of M (Twin Cities), but have been playing around with the idea of just doing the CSCI B.S. I don't want to be a hardcore programmer, but would having the CSCI degree, instead of the ITI degree, open more doors to whatever profession within the IT world I end up setting my sights on?

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  • Do I expect too much work from an employer? [closed]

    - by Ant
    I recently switched jobs because I was not challenged enough, the work would come in waves, and I HATED the people I worked with. I am a recent college grad, May 2009, and based off the 3 internships I had, and 2 full time jobs I obtained, I am finding that employers can not keep me satisfied with the amount of work. At my new job, I like the people I work with, I am challenged, but I still do not get enough work. I hate down time. I always want to have something to work on AT LEAST 6 out of the 8 hours. I was surprised that my new employer actually hired me because the majority of the technologies they implement, I had minimal exposure to. I never programmed in the technologies they use outside of one class in college. My greatest strength is that I am an extremely fast learner. I can pick up new technologies with relative ease. They gave me a project to work on by myself and I think they assumed it would take me longer to complete. Now that I finished that app, they are struggling to find something for me to do. I am not sure if it is bad timing being close to the holidays, my manager dealing with personal issues at home, how quickly I finished the first project, or that I expect too much out of an employer? If so, what are good things to do on all this downtime?! EDIT: Thanks for all the feedback! EDIT 2: I am going to "unaccept" the answer in an effort to keep the question open. As a few people have mentioned, this is a great discussion on how to grow as a new worker in the programming field. EDIT 3: I am attempting to revive this question so the moderators will see the support to re-open it.

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  • Why job postings always looking for "rockstars?" [closed]

    - by Xepoch
    I have noticed a recent trend in requesting programmers who are rockstars. I get it, they're looking for someone who is really good at what they do. But why (pray) make the reference to a rockstar? Do these companies really want these traits as a real rockstar? Party all night and wake up to take care of quick business in the morning? Substance abuse, Narcissism with celebrity, Compensation well exceeding their management, Excellent at putting on a short-lived show, Entertainment instead of value, 1 hit (project) wonders or single-genre performers, Et cetera What is wrong with Senior or Principal Software Engineer who has an established and proven passion for the business? Rather do we mean quite the opposite, someone who: rolls up the sleeves and gets to work, takes appropriate direction and helps influence teams, programs in lessons' learned and proper practices, provides timely communication to the whole team, can code and understand multiple languages, understands the science and theory behind computation, Is there a trend to diversify the software engineering ranks? How many software rockstars can you hire before your band starts breaking up? Sure, there are lots of folks doing this stuff on their own, maybe even a rare few who do coding for show, but I wager the majority is for business. I don't see ads for rockstar accountants, or rockstar machinists, or rockstart CFOs. What makes the software programmer and their hiring departments lean towards this kind of job title?

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  • Most Useful New Technology?

    - by Craig Ferguson
    I'm looking to take a sort of sabbatical, and I'd love to use it to learn a new technology. My question is this: What's the most useful "new" technology for a software engineer to use? Node.js, iOS programming, Android, something else? I'd prefer to stay away from anything too new or experimental, since those are, in my experience, rarely actually used in professional production environments (for better or worse). Does anyone happen to have stats on how many jobs there are for each new technology or have anecdotes about how fun each one is? I've been using python/Django, so that's out, and it's similar to Ruby so i don't think learning Ruby would be that useful to expanding my skills. Anyone have any other ideas?

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  • How could your company's learning/development department best serve you?

    - by MTR
    I'll preface my question with a disclaimer - I am not an engineer, I'm just someone who works with them full-time, in a learning and development capacity. Given that, one of the comments I get regularly from the engineers I'm tasked with developing is that they feel that they're having solutions (both technical and non-technical) for development "pushed" at them vs. anyone from my field consulting with them to determine what they really need. So my question is - if you could give your company a list of the top 3-5 things they could do - in a classroom, or elsewhere - to develop meaningful skills that would help you be a better engineer, a better employee, and one more likely to STAY with the company for the long haul, what would make the cut and why? Thanks in advance for your responses.

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  • Would there be any reason not to use github (or any open source hosting site) for my code?

    - by Jetti
    So I just created my first github repo and started to wonder if there would be any reason why somebody shouldn't post their code. I don't mean the obvious, such as code that is IP of somebody else or any other possible legal situation; I'm talking about a newbie posting their own, albeit terrible, code. I've heard several times on this site that one of the things that a some of the hiring managers do is check out the person on Github (or similar site), so what if the code is lacking? Would the position desired matter? (ex Junior Developer vs Senior)?

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  • Curating projects of deceased friends

    - by Ant
    A very good friend of mine, and an avid programmer, recently passed away. He left nearly 40 projects on BitBucket. Most of them are public, but a few of them are marked as private. I've decided to take on curation duties for the projects rather than leave his work to disappear. If you have been in the same situation, what did you do? Did you open-source everything? Continue development? Delete it all? I'm very interested to hear other people's experiences. There are a few reasons why some of the projects are marked as private (private projects on BitBucket are visible only to invited users and the original creator): One of them is an iOS web app that was free in the app store. I've had to remove the app from the store as I'm shutting down his web sites as a favour to his widow. However, I've already made the app public under the GPL v3 (he was a big GPL supporter). One of them contains proprietary code. It can't be open-sourced. Others are very much work-in-progress. I don't know if he intended to make them into hosted, paid services or if he wanted to give the code away under an open-source licence when they were finished. Here's a list of the private projects: Some kind of living cell simulator that uses SBML along with Runge-Kutta and Euler algorithms to do... something. There's a fair amount of code here but I don't know what it does or how far along it is. No docs. An accountacy application; it seems to have a solid DB design behind it but there's little code on top of that. A website whose purpose is to suggest good restaurants. Built on yii. Seems to have a lot of code but I'd need to set up a WAMP stack to see how far along it is. A website intended to host memorials to people who suffered from the same problem he was. Built on Joomla. I'm not sure how much of the code is just Joomla and how much is custom; again, I'd need to get Joomla running to find out. I'd just introduced him to Mercurial and BitBucket. All of the private projects are single commits of codebases he wasn't using version control with/was previously using SVN. I don't have the SVN repositories so I can't see the commit logs.

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  • Do you have any offers in hand [closed]

    - by akp
    Recently, I was asked by an interviewer that - "Do you already have any job offer in hand ?". I am wondering, what could be the intention behind asking this question. What the answer suggests to interviewer? I mean what kind of information he wants dig through this question? YES answer - Does this means that the candidate already has an offer,.. so he wont take this offer seriously and turn out to somebody else. OR No answer - Does this means that candidate is not able to get through any of the interviews before.. Help me to understand this ..

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  • Need Directions to become a programmer [closed]

    - by Omin
    Before youguys go on about how there are many types of programmers, please read through the post. Long term goal: Develop my own software (company) Short term goal: Get a job that involves coding/programming Current status: Support Analyst (at a software company but does not involve any programming) with 40k salary, 3rd year computer engineering student I had everything figured out. I'm going to develop a 2D scrolling game for iphone or android, publish the app, sell a bunch, and then apply at a studios as a software developer. And then something hit me. I think I need to get a job that involes programming to learn as much as I can in the shortest time possible. So I got a phone interview at a fast growing start up software company, passed that no problem, but then had to take an online technical assessment. That failed miserably. I thought that if I could just present myself, show that I am hard working, positive attitude, eager to make self improvements, type of a guy, I could get the job. I was wrong. And now, I am lost. Im thinking of staying with my job until I find a new one as a programmer. I will be working, self studying, and trying to make this happen without finishing university. I forgot to mention that the online technical assessment was based on data structures/algorithms, OO design, runtime complexity. I was hoping that I could get some guidence. Should I be focusing on app development or study computer science fundamentals? I have a list of books I can be going through: Learning C# O'Reilly (I got interested in C# because of Unity3D and Mono), C# 5.0 in a Nutshell, Head First Design Patterns, Code Complete, Introduction to Algorithms, Programming Interviews Exposed, Cracking the Coding Interview, The Google Resume.

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  • How to mention your responsibilities if you are the only programmer in resume [closed]

    - by user105919
    I worked for a company for 1.5 years as web developer. As i was the only IT person in the company , i used to do all work by myself. Now i am applying for new job and i want to write all the sys admin stuff i used to do there. Now my main concern is that if the new employer call that old company then they will only say that he was web developer a sthey won't know the technical diff between sys admin and php coding. will the employer trust me or not

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  • Using some kind of version control when working alone and with small projects?

    - by Roflcoptr
    Very often I'm working on small projects only for myself. I'm working on one machine, but recently I thought about using some kind of version control nevertheless. This would have some benefits as for example: I don't have to care anymore for local backup Mistakes can easily made undone History can be maintained But on the other hand it has also some drawbacks like for example: Additional resources required Time to setup, get used to it, etc. From your experience, is it a good thing to use revision control when your working alone?

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  • Years experience over unfinished degree?

    - by Daniel Lewis
    I'm currently in my placement year and working for a great software development company. It was always my intention of getting to this stage through university, getting enough academic experience as well as the year’s placement and then try to get a full time programming job without the need to finish my degree. I decided this from an early stage as I have never really liked the whole university environment. I was so unhappy at university and I’m so happy now I’m on my placement year, I really don’t know if I can go back. My question is, do you think companies will take me on if I apply for other jobs after my placement year and not penalize me for not finishing my degree? I guess at the end of the day I don't want to look back on my life and think "god, why didn't I just spend one more year being unhappy to have a job I love" but I know that even if I get a degree I could still end up without a programming job and this worries me more than anything.

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  • The type of programmer I want to be [closed]

    - by Aventinus_
    I'm an undergraduate Software Engineer student, although I've decided that pure programming is what I want to do for the rest of my life. The thing is that programming is a vast field and although most of its aspects are extremely interesting, soon or later I'll have to choose one (?) to focus on. I have several ideas on small projects I'd like to develop this summer, having in mind that this will gain me some experience and, in the best scenario, some cash. But the most important reason I'd like to develop something close to “professional” is to give myself direction on what I want to do as a programmer. One path is that of the Web Programmer. I enjoy PHP and MySQL, as well as HTML and CSS, although I don't really like ASP.NET. I can see myself writing web apps, using the above technologies, as well as XML and Javascript. I also have a neat idea on a Facebook app. The other path is that of the Desktop Programmer. This is a little more complicated cause I really-really enjoy high level languages such as Java and Python but not the low level ones, such as C. I use both Linux and Windows for the last 6 years and I like their latest DEs (meaning Gnome Shell and Metro). I can see myself writing desktop applications for both OSs as long as it means high level programming. Ideally I'd like being able to help the development of GNOME. The last path that interests me is the path of the Smartphone Programmer. I have created some sample applications on Android and due to Java I found it a quite interesting experience. I can also see myself as an independent smartphone developer. These 3 paths seem equally interesting at the moment due to the shallowness of my experience, I guess. I know that I should spend time with all of them and then choose the right one for me but I'd like to know what are the pros and cons in terms of learning curve, fun, job finding and of course financial rewards with each of these paths. I have fair or basic understanding of the languages/technologies I described earlier and this question will help me choose where to focus, at least for now.

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  • Counting product releases if you work on the backend/online services?

    - by stackoverflowuser2010
    I am trying to update my resume, and I would like to count the number of "product releases" that I was directly involved in with a company. It would seem to serve as a performance metric. The problem is that I was working on the backend of a very large distributed system, like along the lines of Hadoop or other huge database. We had regular 6-month major releases and other minor releases. My manager kept saying that "shipped" these releases, but "shipping" a product to me sounds like releasing single pieces of software, like Microsoft would ship Office 11 or something. Any ideas on "product releases" for backend service engineers, or any other type of performance metric?

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