jobs

What would motivate you to change jobs?

My company is having troubles finding good canidates 'off the streets' so we are looking to pull great programmers from other companies. My question is: What do you look for in a company to decide if you want to take the risk and change jobs? I'm really looking for specifics. I know most programmers look at the environment, culture, and...

How does one become a consultant?

I hear stories about the mythical "Highly Paid Consultant". They are the people who the corporate bigwigs call in to design and implement the huge, mission-critical systems that will make or break the business. Let's assume that I was an expert in some field of computers (I'm not, but let's just assume). How would I become a consultant?...

Is now a good time to move jobs?

In light of the current worldwide economic downturn, is now a good time to be looking elsewhere for a job? I'm currently in the process of interviewing with a few different companies, but I'm worried that I'm not doing the right thing. My main reason for looking for other employment is to gain the technical experience I don't feel I'm g...

Should developers worry about ageism?

Having worked in software development for 12 years, I've recently started to worry about ageism in the industry. Seeing I'm not too bad at what I do I've never really worried about where my next job's going to come from, but the more I look around me the younger software developers seem to get. Although I feel I'm now at the top of my p...

Need advice on getting a job in a foreign country

Hello, I am a citizen of the United States of America and I want to get a job in the United Kingdom. Sounds good on the surface but I am looking for some advice on what to expect in the way of taxes (and the salary planning associated with them), legal issues and anything else that might not be that obvious. If you have done the ExP...

What are suitable performance indicators for programmers?

Hi, I am wondering what performance indicators people encounter, and think are realistic, for programmers in the workplace? I've seen numerous articles (I can't recall a really good one that I read right now) that detail how programmers will optimise for the metric they are being measured by (whether that be lines of code etc.). Howev...

Should developers go to grad school?

In one of the early SO podcasts, my evil twin (Obvious Troll) asked if he should go to grad school - and the answer was a resounding "meh". Now, since then, I've made my decision - but I still want to know: Do you think it's worthwhile for a "software engineer" to get a masters in Software Engineering? Update: To extend the question...

A Career in Operating Systems?

I'm currently taking a class in operating system development. I really enjoy the course work and find myself doing extra credit on every assignment. I have also been working on some open source OS projects in my free time. I can't really find anyone on Monster.com looking for OS programmers though. Has anyone out there gone down this ...

Suited programmers, Power Points and career evolution

Maybe this is a naive question, I don't know but here's what have been happenig to me lately. I've always thought real coders, real programmers were the ones to make the code. I agree a good coder does actually matter (as opposed to hiring just a good software architect but hiring standard coders). Lately nontheless, I've been more and...

What process do you use to recruit programmers?

What process do you use to recruit programmers? we have a multi stage interview process... Pre interviews... Resume review..... then if they are interesting :- stage 1: come have a chat, talk about what you have done, discuss the position, dig a bit into they approach software development stage 2: Coding Test Stage 3: Generally disc...

What does a company have to offer you for getting you employed?

We are a fast growing software development company and are looking for software developers. I would like to know, what attracts a software developer most on a company. Is it the kind of software project? The team? The money? The chance on advancement? Please answer by giving some kind of top-5-list (or more items, if you like). ...

What's a good way to enter the professional world of programming?

This is a pretty broad question; I'm fairly certain I'm proficient in Java (aced the APCS exam, which was by far the easiest AP imo though), and learning Python. I'm in my senior year of high school and programming's what I've wanted to do since the 6th grade. Thoughts on ways to start building up a resumé? (Open source projects? Interns...

Job concentration change..

There is a potential offer at the company which I just started. I am still on contract pending hire, and they have a person leaving the team that supports Lawson (HR, Payroll) and some other related applications/systems. Their original intent was to put me on the regular support staff which is mostly developing, but much supporting appli...

Government Work vs. Private Sector?

Besides pay and benefits, what would you consider the pros and cons of these non-contractor jobs: Working for a company that creates commercial (shipping) software. Working for a company on software used internally. Working on software for the government. ...

Where would you advertise for a UK based telecommuting PHP developer?

This is not an advert - it's where would you put an advert for the best effect. Clarification: it's a employer aiming to find a new (full-time) employee. ...

Getting a software development job after being out of development for a while

Hi, I used to work as a software developer in the past, mainly using C and Java professionally and then spent 1.5 years away from a development role trying the "other" side of things (like project management etc.) I have now decided that I would like to get back to development but am struggling to find a role as recruiters and companies...

Interview Questions – what should be asked?

Tomorrow I am interviewing a person for the Job as Software developer. What questions should I ask him? Should I ask him to write some sample code ? ...

Bioinformatics: job opportunities?

Anyone have experience in the bioinformatics field comment on what type of programming jobs are available? So far during my coop terms (similar to paid internships), it's been database joins, queries and number crunching. Is there more to the field than that? ...

What do webdeveloper employers look for most in website contracting

I am a software developer looking to make money. I have been self-teaching myself C++, C#, PHP, [X]HTML, CSS, Javascript and SQL for the last four years and am very comfortable with each language listed. During those four years I was living at home; which made it easy to focus on programming more then if I had to support myself. My prob...

Placing an advert for developer – what should be in the Advert?

Hi I am busy working out the wording for advert for a junior software developer. The Ad will be place in a number of web sites. What should be in the Advert? ...