Esther Schindler

Why was this blocked?!

I've wondered about this myself. The only way that a mobile platform will survive is if there are apps for it, which means developers have to be willing to invest their time (and money) in writing those apps. But at this point, do mobile OSs other than iOS and Android have cooties? What would it take for a developer (or her client/employer) to decide to target BlackBerry or Microsoft? Maybe folks here can offer their views. Because I'm not sure of the answer.

Huh? It leaves out Plone?!

Good point, Marty2, but in this case I just linked to it. I don't know the folks who created this.

The author told me: I want my headstone to say "Truth oozer."

I disagree, Andrei. Based on the people who responded to my question, the opinions were evenly split by gender.

See the extensive comments on the blog post. I think others have made clear why this qualifies as sexism.

Might be a good article but it's not developer related.

Should link to the original at networkworld

Usually I do -- I think I was in a rush when I did that one. Sorry!

Well this wasn't self serving in any way, as it's not my site or my article -- and I don't even know the author. (At least I don't think I do.) I posted it to dzone only because I thought it was interesting... which, apparently, it was. I'm not in a position to know the facts about this law (it sure isn't my area of expertise); but I thought it worthwhile to draw the article to developers' attention. In other words: I have no skin in this game. With respect, I submit that you may not be aware of the algorithms behind web ads. (I don't know anything about the SQL site's specifics, so I'm comfortable in speaking generally here.) Often, they are keyword driven. That is, an article with a metatag of "sql server" or "database" or even "mysql" can be set to bring up a Microsoft ad because, they assume, if you're reading about those topics you're interested in the subject and thus a better sales prospect for databases. This is done by ad sales, not editorial. Whether print- or online-based, writers (happily) remain blissfully unaware of who the advertisers are. (They're simply glad that there ARE some, because that's what pays the bills.)

So you prefer to pay a subscription fee for articles? Do you disbelieve the NY Times or other newspaper because it accepts advertising?

It works fine for me with FF on the Mac. (And I posted this link, so it's not surprising that I can see it. :-) ) I'll see if I can get to the bottom of this...

Are you using Chrome? The site has had a few weirdnesses with Chrome that the developers are still trying to fix.

Completely predictable information; nothing non-obvious here.

Huh? It's the announcement of one software dev company acquiring another. Naturally they're going to put it in the best light on their blog.

It depends where you are and in which industry you work. Some are still hurting. Others are indeed doing better. Personally, I'm writing far more messages to people that say, "Congrats on your new job!" than "Oh I'm so sorry about the layoff" these day. That sure wasn't true 6 months ago.

Good advice here.

So you think saying, "this could be improved" is the same thing as "I think this is crap"?

I'd love to see research on that topic too. In fact, I had a long talk with one major research firm about them doing a study about the relative importance of fast hardware, choice of tools (i.e. all other things being equal, would you take a job at the company that gave you the fastest computer of their choice, or the company that let you pick your OS/hardware? all other things being equal, would you choose a telecommuting job over one that had awesome medical benefits? and so on). They loved the idea - but couldn't find clients to commit to buying the report. (You'd think that the big company HR departments would care, but I don't think HR departments are used to paying for research. And that's without the obvious teaspoon of salt: that HR departments don't care what attracts developers, since they get plenty of resumes already and reject them on arbitrary criteria.)

Part 2 is posted here: http://www.javaworld.com/community/node/2796

How so?

Huh?

That's pretty darned funny.

Huh? ::confused:: The article is free.

It wasn't obvious to their clients.

@omairkhawaja The study only included IDEs that had enough users to make the cut. You wouldn't want them drawing conclusions based on the experiences of, say, 10 people. @willcode4beer That's one of the reasons this kind of survey is so interesting. It's easy to assume that one's own opinions (of IDEs or anything else) are representative of everybody else. Especially when you hang out with people who share your opinions... which is natural, since we like to talk to people we agree with. This particular study didn't do any comparisons or examine opinions based on breadth of experience; other EDC reports do. (This one is a freebie after all so it won't go into as much detail.) Because... well, if you've only used one product, you might be able to say if it fulfills your (known) needs, but you might not be able to compare it to what other products deliver. (Which is good and bad, since you don't know how much to appreciate the good features or to be distressed by the lousy ones.)

Not always, signal9. Certainly, that's a relevant bit (which some of the comments on the blog post pointed out), but unless you're working for a competitor, few bosses would begrudge a few minutes of your time chatting with somebody you used to work with. Surely they don't think you'll never talk with your old buddies again? And that the conversation won't turn to "Damn, we've really been having a hard time getting the FooBar module through QA" or other shop talk? How much a "few minutes" might be is a big question, though. As is the nature of the help, and the way that you're approached.

oh? Explain why. Show your work.

See? That demonstrates the breadth of the definition. Because I've heard it used more to describe "This is THE person who knows ALL ABOUT this subject."

Well if you want to talk about job availability... Java is certainly more lucrative. Indeed.com tracks salaries indirectly (they show job openings across multiple sites; the only jobs that advertise salary are likely to be the cheaper ones) but the comparison is still useful: http://www.indeed.com/salary?q1=java&l1=&q2=ruby&l2=&q3=python&l3=&tm=1 Java developer: $80k. Ruby developer: $68k.

"Niche language" refers to market share, i.e. "what percentage of developers spend any of their time writing in this language?" It's not a statement of which is "best" or "most loved" or "most suitable;" it's an issue of "how much work is there if I want to specialize in it?" And the earlier reply is accurate. Ruby generates noise. Its supporters are plenty loud. They are also active and enthusiastic, which can be a good thing. For example, it's good for book sales. They'll buy Ruby and RoR books. And I know that if I publish an article about Ruby on CIO.com -- and I have done so, go ahead and search -- I'll have lots of site traffic. However: statistically, Ruby is _not_ used as often as you might imagine it is. I've looked at the data from Evans Data (which specializes in software dev market research) on programming language usage in North America (as well as other regions, such as Asia Pacific). Ruby's use is about the same as Python. Ruby users are just louder. C/C++ may not be "sexy" anymore, but a very high percentage of developers -- sorry, I'm not permitted to say the number without explicit permission -- use C/C++ at least part of the time. Ditto for Java.

Why do you turn off JavaScript?

So wait -- the graphic designer (who you know for damned sure runs JavaScript) decides how the app works online? Not the developer? Not the user or the client? The bookstore's purpose is to sell books. WIthout a way for non-JS users to buy books, the site would be making 40% less sales. And that's a *graphic artist's* call?!

Well, there are other problems, but the information is still awfully interesting. I wrote a whole long response but it was too big for a reasonable dzone reply. It turned into a blog entry of my own here: http://advice.cio.com/esther_schindler/is_computer_language_popularity_important

Clearly, polterguy, you have never tried to find the appropriate press contact for an open source project by looking on its web site. There's nobody who has the role of "speaker to the media," and nobody who takes the time to put together a press release about the new version (at least one that doesn't look an awful lot like a build report). These folks aren't the only ones to act like they're in business. But they're still rare enough that I thought it was an important lesson to remind the FOSS community.

CIO.com asked Sun about it... http://www.cio.com/article/149200

It's certainly replaced it for me. The information is much more practical and down to earth... for folks who have to work for a living, not just say "Hey cool!" I do wish that some of the categories could be reorganized. There's no obvious place to tag anything career-related, for instance (such as "best tech interview questions") or steps in the development process (such as Testing or Requirements). Not everything is divided along language or tool lines.

The key word is "should" know. It's amazing how few people really do. The problem is that developers are rarely comfortable with their writing skills. (And considering the number of developer-written articles I've edited, they usually have good reason for that self-assessment!) Many are also shy about self-promotion, which is of course the main purpose of a resume. So developers' resumes are often chock-full of tech words (which do help with HR departments' tropism for buzzword compliance), and rarely talk about *achievements.* When someone is considering hiring you, they only want to know two things: What do you know, and how well can you use it? (Well, three, but "how much do you expect to be paid" isn't covered by a resume.)

Did the article help you, dgary?

There's a US site that lets you see salaries for a whole bunch of positions -- and compare them. http://www.indeed.com/salary?q1=java&l1=&tm=1 for example.