With so many application variations, how to choose which one to specialise in

Question

I was sat infront of Stackoverflow last night and I was dumbfounded with the number of individual tags. It got me thinking about how many different flavours of applications there are out there. Personally, I'm a C# man but even I'm finding that with WCF, WPF, ASP .NET 4, Silverlight and MVC, there is getting so much choice and am beginning to get bogged down with which one to learn. I understand that they each have their own purposes, but I'm finding that this decision is harder than when ASP .Net first came out and it was the ideal tool to use over plain HTML.

I'd be interested in hearing others views, whether I'm the only one out there who finds that the Microsoft suite is increasing quicker than I can keep up with, or just your general views/opinions.

Answer 1

It's the revenue model. Been that way for years. Stick with the basics: C++, C#, ASP, SQL, XML. The rest comes pretty easily around those.

Answer 2

I'd simply go down the route of learning what you need and/or what interests you. Maybe think about contributing to an Open Source project you like, as this will gain you exposure to new ways of programming and new Frameworks.

There are so many different "technologies" simply because they all target different things - for example, if you have an interest in interactive applets, then WPF/Silverlight might be right for you. If you need to design a website that is testable, think about ASP.Net MVC. If you can't decide - close your eyes, point that the screen and start learning one. One will lead to another and you'll soon be on the right track.

Disclaimer - the "right track" is many things to many people. Don't let too many choices stall your learning - pick one and go for it!