.COM layoff victims of the world, UNITE

[PCResources]

NG, thin clients rely on poor bandwidth, once bandwidth is increased, thin clients will require heavy duty mainframes, and the price is still to high for most people..

However i do agree with your take on PHP, in combination with MySQL and Linux Servers and Desktops, it would be a great system...

Now i am off to bed...

PM me if you are interested about my offers..

Patrick

 

[StageLeft]

VB, ASP, SQL is a solid skill set but unfortunately a lot of people have it. I have this and was laid off beginning of this year. Still unemployed. Since that time to enhance my resume I've recently gotten my MCSD and it seems that it was well worth it as I may have a job opening up soon.

Being laid off sucks, but it doesn't suck as much as being out of work for 6.5 months Anyway although you'd be entry level Java its still worth learning to shove on the resume. If you get a cert thats all the better. Since you have VB, ASP, SQL now you've got MS pretty well covered; now just get some Java and/or C++. Thats all you can do. I also see a lot of jobs that require some unix experience so if you can install that at home and screw around its better than nothing.

.NET may be the next big thing but it ain't yet, so stick with what works

I've kept an eye on the industry - because I've had a lot of time to do it - my advice is start right now going for something productive like a certification. Never in my wildest dreams did I think I'd be unemployed this long so I didn't bother until I was two months into the jobless scene. If your area is bad or only so-so for jobs leave NOW. One mistake I made was trying to have things pan out in my city. My time wasn't totally wasted as I got my MCSD but right now you have to go looking for the jobs. Getting a job now is a hell of a lot harder than before if you don't have much experience, so expect a lower salary. Just do anything you can to get experience until the market picks up.

But like I said you don't want a gap on your resume, so fill it with something productive like self study of MCSD and it will improve it a bit. Unfortunately you have to get hired for experience but certs you can do on your own and thats the lovely thing about them.

Goodluck

 

[ugh]

<< Ugh! No more thick clients. No more &quot;so-and-so's desktop is having DLL registration problems again.&quot; You want to use my apps? Open your browser and point to it. >>


I agree, but not all apps are suitable to be developed in such a way. The &quot;web&quot; market now is too saturated in this point of time IMO.

 

[ugh]

<< Being laid off sucks, but it doesn't suck as much as being out of work for 6.5 months Anyway although you'd be entry level Java its still worth learning to shove on the resume. If you get a cert thats all the better. Since you have VB, ASP, SQL now you've got MS pretty well covered; now just get some Java and/or C++. Thats all you can do. I also see a lot of jobs that require some unix experience so if you can install that at home and screw around its better than nothing. >>



Youch.... 1/2 year really does suck. I'm a bit better than you, I didn't get 3 months pay. But I was still sitting in the office {g} Thank goodness I found a new job b4 the company shut down...

C/C++ skills IMO, are always in demand. I guess you can never get enough C/C++ pple around.

 

[Freejack2]

<< Youch.... 1/2 year really does suck. I'm a bit better than you, I didn't get 3 months pay. But I was still sitting in the office {g} Thank goodness I found a new job b4 the company shut down... >>


Umm if your company can't pay you anymore doesn't that give you the right to apply for unemployment?

 

[LuckyTaxi]

All i hear is MCSE MCSE. Stupid certifications. Half the crap you study for you probably won't remember. Even worse, you probably wouldn't need to implement them.

 

[ugh]

<< Umm if your company can't pay you anymore doesn't that give you the right to apply for unemployment? >>


Umm... Not sure about that, but even if I do apply for unemployment, it doesn't change a thing.

 

[AdamDuritz99]

man i'm soo happy to read this thread. i've been learning php by myself for the past 3 months. it's deffinatly gonna make it big i think, but uhh it cant do everything yet. i thought i read somewhere that it doesn't have any ecryption functions that deals with ssl you have to use cgi still or something like that. i may be wrong though. can somebody pm me and tell me more about that if you know. thanks

 

[mithrandir2001]

<< All i hear is MCSE MCSE. Stupid certifications. Half the crap you study for you probably won't remember. Even worse, you probably wouldn't need to implement them. >>


I agree...MS certifications are largely a joke. I remember getting the push to earn an MCSD right out of college, but I wrote it off as too expensive and time-consuming. Looking back, I was right to shun the MCSD. I have never been asked in an interview if I've taken any of the MCSD classes, nor does it seem the lack of a certification has put me at a disadvantage from an employability standpoint. I can understand why. A certification means you passed a few exams...it does not ordain the ability to WRITE SOLUTIONS. Solid corporate experience writing real software and generating real value is what gets you in the door.

Certifications are OK if you are changing careers or you are in a field where they are &quot;required&quot;: networking/Cisco/Novell/etc.

 

[markjrubin]

It's funny. I come from a more Unix based background and when I was most recently looking for jobs, it seems that there were at least 4 to 5 times as many MS-centric jobs listed. PHP is cool, but very few BIG (aka, people that pay well) groups use it. I'm taking the time to go back and get my master's degree. Also, Java Certification can do wonders for you.

Mark

 

[ugh]

<< I agree...MS certifications are largely a joke. I remember getting the push to earn an MCSD right out of college, but I wrote it off as too expensive and time-consuming. Looking back, I was right to shun the MCSD. I have never been asked in an interview if I've taken any of the MCSD classes, nor does it seem the lack of a certification has put me at a disadvantage from an employability standpoint. I can understand why. A certification means you passed a few exams...it does not ordain the ability to WRITE SOLUTIONS. Solid corporate experience writing real software and generating real value is what gets you in the door. >>


While I agree with your points, it really depends on where you work. In my country, paper qualifications are very sought after. A sad thing, I know, but it's a way of life here. Is it the same in US?

 

[mithrandir2001]

I think the people who say PHP will take over ASP are the same who say Linux will take over Windows. It ain't happening...at least, not in the next 5 years.

Corporations tend to stay with MS products and ASP is a proven platform. I like ASP alot, warts and all. I see no point in learning PHP. I will learn ASP.NET because that's where the money is going to be.

While you can say PHP is better because &quot;...&quot;, I well know that what's best isn't necessarily the marketplace's favorite. Macintosh was easily superior over the IBM PC, but where the money goes determines who wins. Linux might be better than Windows, but I rarely ever see employment opportunities for Linux development in a corporate environment, so I stick with MS tools.

 

[AdamDuritz99]

<<I think the people who say PHP will take over ASP are the same who say Linux will take over Windows. It ain't happening...at least, not in the next 5 years.

Corporations tend to stay with MS products and ASP is a proven platform. I like ASP alot, warts and all. I see no point in learning PHP. I will learn ASP.NET because that's where the money is going to be.

While you can say PHP is better because &quot;...&quot;, I well know that what's best isn't necessarily the marketplace's favorite. Macintosh was easily superior over the IBM PC, but where the money goes determines who wins. Linux might be better than Windows, but I rarely ever see employment opportunities for Linux development in a corporate environment, so I stick with MS tools. >>

ehh,, i do agree that you are right. kinda sux too. but i really think php will do good in the market place.

 

[ugh]

<< While you can say PHP is better because &quot;...&quot;, I well know that what's best isn't necessarily the marketplace's favorite. Macintosh was easily superior over the IBM PC, but where the money goes determines who wins. Linux might be better than Windows, but I rarely ever see employment opportunities for Linux development in a corporate environment, so I stick with MS tools. >>


While you may follow where the money is, some will follow where their heart goes

 

[konichiwa]

You mean to tell me someone's HEART leads them to a certain PROGRAMMING LANGUAGE??

ROFL!

 

[ugh]

<< You mean to tell me someone's HEART leads them to a certain PROGRAMMING LANGUAGE??

ROFL! >>



Ok, mebbeh not HEART; but their own liking/geek factor

 

[tigerbait]

<< Why not invest in things that will always be relevent (e.g., engineering)? >>



True that. Making me feel good about what I'm studying.



Sorry to hear about the layoffs. I hope you find work ASAP.

 

[ugh]

<< Why not invest in things that will always be relevent (e.g., engineering)? >>


Umm.... This is some type of engineering. Software engineering to be exact

 

[nd]

<<

<< Why not invest in things that will always be relevent (e.g., engineering)? >>


Umm.... This is some type of engineering. Software engineering to be exact >>

There are some requirements for a type of programming to be considered &quot;software engineering&quot; I believe. I don't know what these are, but I'm reasonably confident that web/database development does NOT fall into this category (a niche area, a skill, where no CS algorithmic theory or engineering principles are necessary).

Don't take offense, I'm just being truthful.

 

[RossMAN]

Someone has that sig, i laugh at it every time... it is very funny, made my girlfriend (for tonight) blow a mouthful of champagne in my ear...

Woah you can afford the entire evening? How much did that cost you?

 

<< I agree...MS certifications are largely a joke. >>


Could you pass one? Id have to say probably not.

 

[Shazam]

JSP pages are compiled just once, so there are good performance gains from using Java now. There is also an application called HotSpot from Sun that (supposedly) takes your code and optimizes it.

.NET is still a big mystery. Whether MS can actually follow through in the functionality and actually have it work and work well is another story.

PHP doesn't scale (yet). Neither does PERL (yet). Neither will land you a &quot;great&quot; job, simply because large corporations are loathe to adopt open source, free solutions (no central support network) - I'm not saying this is right, I'm just saying that this is what happens.

C/C++ is somewhat (relatively) esoteric. If you want to stay with web stuff, C/C++ won't really help you. If you want to write hardcore telecom/embedded chip apps, then this is your ticket. Unfortunately for me, I don't want to do this.

Ahh well. The company I worked for went belly up a couple of weeks ago. Hopefully something will turn up soon.

 

[nd]

<< PHP doesn't scale (yet). Neither does PERL (yet). >>

What, exactly, do you base these statements on? Everything I've read indicates that PHP is a speed demon, blowing ASP away -- especially with the Zend optimizer for PHP4. Scalability on a application-level is much more dependent on your code itself rather than the language used here. I don't know why you say perl doesn't scale either. Have you ever heard of slashdot? It uses mod_perl extensively.

 

[Shazam]

AFAIK, PHP and PERL cannot be run in a scalable/redundant multi-server cluster, in that a user can hit an application and have the request be sent to a server based on load. I think there are initiatives under way however. Haven't checked in a few months.

 

[nd]

<< AFAIK, PHP and PERL cannot be run in a scalable/redundant multi-server cluster, in that a user can hit an application and have the request be sent to a server based on load. I think there are initiatives under way however. Haven't checked in a few months. >>

Hmm.. I'm certainly no expert, but this seems to be a web server/OS issue, and not related to PHP/Perl. Load balancing and stuff exists on Linux, so I don't see why it shouldn't be possible (though this is outside my realm of expertise).