when hiring new programmers...

[erwos]

I have a degree in CS. I can freaking program in anything, as long as you give me a few days to get up to speed. Hell, I converted some Fortran once upon a time for an aerospace job, and believe me, I never saw any Fortran in school.

That said, no guarantees about whether it's going to be particularly _attractive_ code.

 

[Crusty]

Originally posted by: erwos
I have a degree in CS. I can freaking program in anything, as long as you give me a few days to get up to speed. Hell, I converted some Fortran once upon a time for an aerospace job, and believe me, I never saw any Fortran in school.

That said, no guarantees about whether it's going to be particularly _attractive_ code.

Anybody with a CS degree should be able to do that. If someone graduates with a CS degree and can only program/understand (insert favorite language here) there's a problem with the school and I would question the quality of the degree.

I'm not saying that the degree program should be filled with classes like "C++", "java", or "fortran", but in the process of taking all the other classes there should be a variety of languages used. C/C++ for an OS class, haskell/scheme for an algorithms class etc.

I cringe when I see an OS class taught in Java.

 

[Cogman]

Originally posted by: Crusty

Originally posted by: erwos
I have a degree in CS. I can freaking program in anything, as long as you give me a few days to get up to speed. Hell, I converted some Fortran once upon a time for an aerospace job, and believe me, I never saw any Fortran in school.

That said, no guarantees about whether it's going to be particularly _attractive_ code.

Anybody with a CS degree should be able to do that. If someone graduates with a CS degree and can only program/understand (insert favorite language here) there's a problem with the school and I would question the quality of the degree.

I'm not saying that the degree program should be filled with classes like "C++", "java", or "fortran", but in the process of taking all the other classes there should be a variety of languages used. C/C++ for an OS class, haskell/scheme for an algorithms class etc.

I cringe when I see an OS class taught in Java.

People will do that? Yikes, Glad my school is good that way (Though, we don't have a whole lot of languages taught here, mostly C++ and Java, I find the teachers a pretty good about giving us what we need).

 

[Kirby]

Originally posted by: Cogman

Originally posted by: Crusty

Originally posted by: erwos
I have a degree in CS. I can freaking program in anything, as long as you give me a few days to get up to speed. Hell, I converted some Fortran once upon a time for an aerospace job, and believe me, I never saw any Fortran in school.

That said, no guarantees about whether it's going to be particularly _attractive_ code.

Anybody with a CS degree should be able to do that. If someone graduates with a CS degree and can only program/understand (insert favorite language here) there's a problem with the school and I would question the quality of the degree.

I'm not saying that the degree program should be filled with classes like "C++", "java", or "fortran", but in the process of taking all the other classes there should be a variety of languages used. C/C++ for an OS class, haskell/scheme for an algorithms class etc.

I cringe when I see an OS class taught in Java.

People will do that? Yikes, Glad my school is good that way (Though, we don't have a whole lot of languages taught here, mostly C++ and Java, I find the teachers a pretty good about giving us what we need).

We used Java for GUI, but everything I've done so far in my CS major has been in C or C++. OS was definitely C. There is a Programming Language class I'm taking next semester, and it has some scripting languages and functional languages (ML I believe). I'm sorta looking forward to learning some functional languages.

 

[Madwand1]

Originally posted by: OogyWaWa
when companies are hiring new programmers, is it better for said programmer to be extremely versed in one/two languages and its most popular framework or to be versed in many languages, have knowledge of the popular frameworks, but not necessarily a programming god of one language.

Why would anyone care about the hundreds of languages you've worked with and forgotten or even remember but will never use in the current company? If you're going to design a new language or toolkit or something of that sort, of course that sort of exposure might be beneficial, but otherwise it doesn't do much good.

What matters almost always is knowledge of the target language, and in many cases that's tested in some non-trivial depth. IMO, for example, there's no such thing as knowing a little bit of C++ to get by on a new job -- you either know it fairly well, or you're a dangerous amateur who needs to learn it better, and I would test for just that as a part of the hiring process.

That said, the really good company / hiring process will look beyond the immediate and obvious for real talent (and often junior inexperienced talent), but those cases are not the norm, and although we might see ourselves as mostly untapped talents, the notion of average serves a need, and being seen as beyond average often becomes in part having above-average performance in the specific technical evaluation.

 

[OogyWaWa]

hmm, a lot of good points have been discussed. but, in reference to listing a lot of languages on your resume makes it look like you are padding for inexperience, what about web programmers? a real webprogrammer is going to easily know a good amount of languages/framworks. ex.: xhtml, xml, css, ajax, soap, javascript, jquery, php, mysql, etc. etc. I suppose you could put 'web programming languages' down, but how do they know wtf that means? maybe you are a .net web programmer, or javaEE, or php, etc.

Obviously the languages you know would come out in a conversation about projects you have done, but thats during the interview. I think there might be a few thoughts on this: 1) the resume is padded for inexp. 2) he knows a lot of technologies related to his work, 3) he's a smart ass who programs a lot

anywho, when i see a resume that has a fair number of languages listed i tend to think they are more of a computer nerd, which to me is a good thing. If you've got just Java, C++, or VB on there; I read it and think these are the classes he/she took in college and they don't really know shit. Now, maybe if was a little more in depth, like Java EE, Swing, VB.net+LINQ, or something a little more detailed (aka some frameworks listed) I would think they actually know something about what they are doing. They may not be an expert in the fields listed, but having knowledge of what they are and how the work (in a nutshell) is a lot better (imo) than some chump who wrote a few hello-worlds for his CS minor.

but, then again I've never had to hire anyone, so I suppose I don't really have this kind of exp.

 

[EagleKeeper]

If you are going to list a language that you are proficient in, then you should have on the resume a project/work experience that demonstrates.

If the lanuguage is due to a class or two, and you choose to list it; generate an area labeled exposure/training and place the language there.

 

[JACKDRUID]

Originally posted by: sourceninja

Originally posted by: troytime
good programming knowledge is a must, even if its not the language we're using
if they know the language we're using, even better

they also MUST program for fun/leisure

Guess I'm out. I used to program for fun. But now that it is my job, I only program outside of work when I have a task to accomplish and can't find a suitable application. Otherwise I'd much rather be outside or doing something away from my desk that I sit at for 10+ hours a day.

I feel you 10+ hours a day is enough.

though sometimes I do work myself over time trying to tightening existing code...somehow I get great accomplishment from it... I feel so overused.

 

[VinylxScratches]

When you say new programmers, do you mean new to the company, or a recent graduate that got a CS degree?

 

[clamum]

Originally posted by: VinylxScratches
When you say new programmers, do you mean new to the company, or a recent graduate that got a CS degree?

Read the thread.

New to the company.

 

[sourceninja]

Originally posted by: OogyWaWa
hmm, a lot of good points have been discussed. but, in reference to listing a lot of languages on your resume makes it look like you are padding for inexperience, what about web programmers? a real webprogrammer is going to easily know a good amount of languages/framworks. ex.: xhtml, xml, css, ajax, soap, javascript, jquery, php, mysql, etc. etc. I suppose you could put 'web programming languages' down, but how do they know wtf that means? maybe you are a .net web programmer, or javaEE, or php, etc.

Obviously the languages you know would come out in a conversation about projects you have done, but thats during the interview. I think there might be a few thoughts on this: 1) the resume is padded for inexp. 2) he knows a lot of technologies related to his work, 3) he's a smart ass who programs a lot

anywho, when i see a resume that has a fair number of languages listed i tend to think they are more of a computer nerd, which to me is a good thing. If you've got just Java, C++, or VB on there; I read it and think these are the classes he/she took in college and they don't really know shit. Now, maybe if was a little more in depth, like Java EE, Swing, VB.net+LINQ, or something a little more detailed (aka some frameworks listed) I would think they actually know something about what they are doing. They may not be an expert in the fields listed, but having knowledge of what they are and how the work (in a nutshell) is a lot better (imo) than some chump who wrote a few hello-worlds for his CS minor.

but, then again I've never had to hire anyone, so I suppose I don't really have this kind of exp.

I don't have a skills section in my resume. I put those skills in my job descriptions in my employment section.

I have a employment section that reads like
Blah blah corp
address/phone
Position title
Duties:
Java application development
Report writing using crystal reports
System maintenance script writing using bash
Getting coffee for the boss
etc.

Then my education

Finally I have these two lines

Code examples available upon request.
References available upon request.

Of course I almost never send a resume for a job application. I find out who the guy making the decision is and I write him a letter. In that letter I explain t he challenges and successes I've had in my career past and present, and what I feel i can offer them.

So far with this method I'm 3 for 3. With the cover letter and resume method I was 2 for 7. Usually after the interview they ask for my resume so they can have it on file and some references to call to back up my smack talk.

But I'm careful to never embellish. I don't uptalk my job descriptions of duties. For example if my job was to create interactive web reports that queried a single table and displayed the data in a table I would just say:

Created ad-hoc web based reports leveraging php and javascript using the query library.

Some people would write.

Developed full immersion web reporting leveraging advanced AJAX methods with PHP and high level javascript utilizing the Jquery library.

Which really overstates it and brings up my prospective employers hopes. And if he sees my php code examples for that task he is going to be sorely disappointed.

 

[SunnyD]

I think it depends on a lot of factors. And this is actually a topic that hurt me for several years in the market, or trying to get back into the market rather.

#1 - I don't think language is 100% relevant EXCEPT in the cases that the position is looking for an Expert-level programmer with a given tool set that will need near-zero ramp up time and be able to hit the ground running.

#2 - Just because you know "C", or "Java", or (insert language of choice here) doesn't necessarily know how to write code effectively. When I market myself these days, I have the luxury of marketing myself independent of my language skill set, and really emphasize the point that I am a software developer with an emphasis on problem solving and the fundamentals of development and programming, and that I realized that once I got that far, all it takes is learning the syntax of a language in order to move on. And you know what - I proved this quite handily at my previous position, having never touched Delphi in my life.

#3 - Play to your strengths... the key is to take #2, and then up the ante by going after positions you are strong in which then is a combination of #1 and #2. But the takeaway is don't be afraid to try! Worst that would happen on an interview is they're going to say no. Best is you land a job and take off.

In short, my answer is mostly no, particular languages and frameworks aren't entirely relevant, but they're not totally irrelevant either. You need to start somewhere though, so build off your strengths and then go from there.