And Lord knows, I love pudding. But this is getting a little funny.
A fair number of the places to which I apply for a job don’t believe that I can actually program. My resume shows kernel coding at DRI, application writing at Symantec, systems software at Apple, client/server web work at Thomson and Surya, mobile applications at Sony, but there still seems to be a question of whether or not I can actually program.
Since I have started my job search, I have written a web portal in Python/Turbogears, a data mining application in Python, a small programming exercise in Java, and just yesterday, was asked to write a Ruby on Rails application, preferably with Cold Fusion and calls back to Java via JRuby. Which I am working on right now. I’ve taken tests about CSS and XHTML, and aced them, but been asked if I know plain old HTML.
Here’s the deal. There’s always going to be new technologies. No matter what YOU know, I can pull up a list of equal size of technologies you have never used. But if you know everything on your list, I’m betting you’ll be able to learn mine as well.
Anyway, just venting. And any potential employers, this isn’t directed at you. I know there’s a need to ensure new people know their stuff. But I’ll let you in on a secret. I never came into any job knowing all the technologies they used ahead of time. That never stopped me from learning them and being the best developer they had on whatever project I was assigned. Skill isn’t based on the acronyms you recognize. It’s based on the ability to solve problems.
Just taking a short break while Eclipse installs a Ruby on Rails development environment for me…