Re: <offtopic>Opinions About Cold Fusion</offtopic>

Hi Len

Tools are careers - at least today.

So when I go to employ someone (being old fashioned) I look for an 
application developer - figuring that if you know how to build 
applications you can adapt to the tools.

That may be true but the industry (at least here in oz) is based on 
tools. So I'm having extreme difficulty finding people to work for me 
because they want to be "Oracle" programmers or "SAP" programmers or ...

I'm starting to wander if they even see the projects in terms of 
outcomes or just "I spent x years working with product y doing z". ie 
Even the resumes don't reflect completion, only practice. I worked for x 
years on ... rather than I built this and this and this - or the team I 
worked with completed these projects.

The world has changed ...

Rick

PS being true to yourself and your goals is also old school (but I don't 
intend to change either).

Len Bullard wrote:
> I agree with Michael.   Tools is tools.  All stuff really.   The more
> important questions are about the tasks, the customers, and the ability to
> influence directions.
>

string() from XPath 1.0

Hello,

while reading the description of the function string(), I stumbled upon
the following:

``An object of a type other than the four basic types is converted to a
string in a way that is dependent on that type.''

Probably I'm overlooking something obvious, but... what else is possible
except boolean, number, string and nodeset/node?

Thanks in advance for suggestions!

--

-- 
Oleg Parashchenko  olpa <at>  http://xmlhack.ru/  XML news in Russian
http://uucode.com/blog/  Generative Programming, XML, TeX, Scheme
http://olpa.livejournal.com/

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Re: <offtopic>Opinions About typecasting..

Quoting Rick Marshall <rjm <at> zenucom.com>:

> Tools are careers - at least today.

Very true.

> So I'm having extreme difficulty finding people to work for me
> because they want to be "Oracle" programmers or "SAP" programmers or ...

it's where the money is....

> I'm starting to wander if they even see the projects in terms of
> outcomes or just "I spent x years working with product y doing z".

That sort of stuff is no longer important.

> Even the resumes don't reflect completion, only practice. I worked for
> x years on ... rather than I built this and this and this - or the team
> I worked with completed these projects.
>
> The world has changed ...

Yes, and it's a good thing.

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Re: <offtopic>Opinions About typecasting..

I believe this is very close to on topic actually, with some quick editing

On 4/2/07, david.lyon <at> preisshare.net <david.lyon <at> preisshare.net> wrote:
> Quoting Rick Marshall <rjm <at> zenucom.com>:
>
> > Tools are careers - at least today.
>
> Very true.
And they all have awful XML based configurations files. Somebody
should standardize,

>
> > So I'm having extreme difficulty finding people to work for me
> > because they want to be "Oracle" programmers or "SAP" programmers or ...
>
> it's where the money is....
>
Can one get this 'money' by putting out a resume claiming to be an
'XML' programmer or specialist?

> > I'm starting to wander if they even see the projects in terms of
> > outcomes or just "I spent x years working with product y doing z".
>
Cheers,

Bryan Rasmussen

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Opinions About typecasting..

Hi Bryan,

>> Can one get this 'money' by putting out a resume claiming to be an
> 'XML' programmer or specialist?
No.

I believe that you have to turn up for work, sign some forms and then 
wait till payday.

Only then can you get paid for it.  there's more to it than what you 
write on your resume.

But I do know of one guy that charged $250,000 p/a as a 
'interoperability consultantant'. He didn't actually do any programming 
or implementation. Just looked at (message) exchanges at a stock-broking 
company.

Like Rick suggested, he didn't actually "accomplish" anything in the 
sense that us old farts think of. He just stayed, got payed and then 
moved on.

Personally, I'm not that comfortable with that approach but others are.

It was said that he was able to develop quite a comprehensive collection 
of music on his iPod by the time of leaving. So I'm not prepared to say 
that he did nothing at all.

Regards

David

RE: <offtopic>Opinions About Cold Fusion</offtopic>

> The world has changed ...

If it has changed, then I think it has changed in the direction of requiring
developers to be skilled in (or at least capable of using) a much greater
and faster-changing set of tools than in the past. There was a time when you
could spend 15 years being an IBM mainframe COBOL programmer, and you never
touched anything except IBM mainframe COBOL. Today I consult to
organizations that employ six developers who between them use 30 or 40
products and tools, with new options constantly being assessed and adopted.

I guess that you're right that there are many people on both the employer
and employee side who think of developer competence in terms of specific
tools. There are even some universities who pander to this. It's a stupid
attitude, but you're right that it is quite widespread.

Michael Kay
http://www.saxonica.com/

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RE: string() from XPath 1.0

> while reading the description of the function string(), I 
> stumbled upon the following:
> 
> ``An object of a type other than the four basic types is 
> converted to a string in a way that is dependent on that type.''
> 
> Probably I'm overlooking something obvious, but... what else 
> is possible except boolean, number, string and nodeset/node?

XSLT 1.0 added a fifth data type, "result tree fragment", and defined how
result tree fragments were converted to strings.

And many XPath implementations allow calls out to Java (or similar
languages) to return wrapped Java objects, supporting implementation-defined
sets of operations often including conversion to string.

Michael Kay
http://www.saxonica.com/

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RE: Opinions About typecasting..

> But I do know of one guy that charged $250,000 p/a as a 
> 'interoperability consultantant'. He didn't actually do any 
> programming or implementation. Just looked at (message) 
> exchanges at a stock-broking company.

Actually, he probably listened to the arguments of the programmers who
wanted to do it using tool X, and the arguments of the programmers who
wanted to do it using tool Y, neither of whom was able to explain the
business reasons for their preference; and then he told the managers which
lot to back, and saved the company $2m a year by helping them get off the
fence.

(Alternative ending: he told the managers which lot to back but they ignored
his advice and employed another consultant to give a third opinion...)

Michael Kay
http://www.saxonica.com/

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Re: Opinions About typecasting..

Michael Kay wrote:

But I do know of one guy that charged $250,000 p/a as a 'interoperability consultantant'. He didn't actually do any programming or implementation. Just looked at (message) exchanges at a stock-broking company.

Actually, he probably listened to the arguments of the programmers who wanted to do it using tool X, and the arguments of the programmers who wanted to do it using tool Y, neither of whom was able to explain the business reasons for their preference; and then he told the managers which lot to back, and saved the company $2m a year by helping them get off the fence. (Alternative ending: he told the managers which lot to back but they ignored his advice and employed another consultant to give a third opinion...)

quite possibly....

if so then I really need to get back into the corporate world because that sounds like the easy life to me....

are you listening Len ?

Re: Opinions About typecasting..

"They also serve who only stand and wait"  - Milton, John

>>> David Lyon <david.lyon <at> preisshare.net> 02/04/07 09:23:15 >>>
Michael Kay wrote:
>> But I do know of one guy that charged $250,000 p/a as a 
>> 'interoperability consultantant'. He didn't actually do any 
>> programming or implementation. Just looked at (message) 
>> exchanges at a stock-broking company.
>>     
>
> Actually, he probably listened to the arguments of the programmers who
> wanted to do it using tool X, and the arguments of the programmers who
> wanted to do it using tool Y, neither of whom was able to explain the
> business reasons for their preference; and then he told the managers which
> lot to back, and saved the company $2m a year by helping them get off the
> fence.
>
> (Alternative ending: he told the managers which lot to back but they ignored
> his advice and employed another consultant to give a third opinion...)
>   
quite possibly....

if so then I really need to get back into the corporate world because 
that sounds like the easy life to me.... 

are you listening Len ?

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