Juddog
Diamond Member
This is mostly a question for you mainframe developers out there with some experience, and also for any programmers out there.
I used to be a mainframe programmer / analyst, from 1997 - 2002 or so all I did was mainframe work. JCL, MVS/TSO, CICS, COBOL, Easytrieve, etc.. I have hundreds of dollars in programming books, SQL, Informix, Unix, etc. and mainframe books you can't even seem to buy.
Then the industry that I was within flopped in 2002, the company I was working for (Consolidated Freightways) declared bankruptcy and laid everybody off within the programming department. This caused a flood of extra programmers for any available COBOL / mainframe slots in the area. My outlook was bleak, despite applying to hundreds of jobs I only got maybe 5 interviews over the next 6 months, and every one that I did apply to, I was competing against maybe 30 other mainframe programmers that had applied. In addition some other companies folded in the area, making it so even simple jobs were close to impossible to get (for example one guy I talked to went through over 600 resumes for a simple receptionist job).
I moved back East with my girlfriend (now fiance) to try and rebuild my life, got back into doing helpdesk type work for the last 5 years or so. I have gotten some base IT support certs, A+ and Net+ mainly.
What I am wondering is : is it worth it to start trying to study mainframe programming again, spend hours and hours memorizing coding, or should I give up, go back to school for 3-4 years and start over as a client / server programmer? I am one of those people who actually did enjoy coding, but don't know any of the more common languages like C++ or VB (well I have done a little bit of C++ but that was 10 years ago).
Cliff notes:
* got laid off, couldn't find another job due to flooded market
* moved to east coast
* would like to get a job programming
I used to be a mainframe programmer / analyst, from 1997 - 2002 or so all I did was mainframe work. JCL, MVS/TSO, CICS, COBOL, Easytrieve, etc.. I have hundreds of dollars in programming books, SQL, Informix, Unix, etc. and mainframe books you can't even seem to buy.
Then the industry that I was within flopped in 2002, the company I was working for (Consolidated Freightways) declared bankruptcy and laid everybody off within the programming department. This caused a flood of extra programmers for any available COBOL / mainframe slots in the area. My outlook was bleak, despite applying to hundreds of jobs I only got maybe 5 interviews over the next 6 months, and every one that I did apply to, I was competing against maybe 30 other mainframe programmers that had applied. In addition some other companies folded in the area, making it so even simple jobs were close to impossible to get (for example one guy I talked to went through over 600 resumes for a simple receptionist job).
I moved back East with my girlfriend (now fiance) to try and rebuild my life, got back into doing helpdesk type work for the last 5 years or so. I have gotten some base IT support certs, A+ and Net+ mainly.
What I am wondering is : is it worth it to start trying to study mainframe programming again, spend hours and hours memorizing coding, or should I give up, go back to school for 3-4 years and start over as a client / server programmer? I am one of those people who actually did enjoy coding, but don't know any of the more common languages like C++ or VB (well I have done a little bit of C++ but that was 10 years ago).
Cliff notes:
* got laid off, couldn't find another job due to flooded market
* moved to east coast
* would like to get a job programming
