Subj : Re: Software Job Market Myths
To   : comp.programming,comp.software-eng
From : rem642b
Date : Mon Aug 15 2005 06:05 pm

> From: amor...@xenon.Stanford.EDU (Alan Morgan)
> The CPU might be obscure

If that's the case, where they don't have *any* compiler whatsoever
yet, I would think an optimized compiler is a ways down the road. First
they need *any* compiler whatsoever to get other departments able to
use the obscure CPU.

Or if they've already done that first cut of compiler, and it works
fine, except the code when examined by their assembly-language team is
seen to be very sub-optimum, then indeed they may need somebody able to
make the compiler more optimized.

> the language might be obscure

Why do they even bother with such a language? If they don't have a good
answer, then I suggest they switch to a more reasonable language, for
which good support is already available. But if they have a really good
reason for using some obscure programming language, I'd like to hear
it, and then maybe I can suggst viable alternatives, or emulate the
whole language in Lisp.

> they might be in the compiler business

OK, that's the one case where they have legitimate need for experts in
optimized compilers. I suppose some of their existing team died or
retired or "sold out" to another company that had better pay and better
working conditions, and they're looking for replacements, or they've
increased their variety of compilers and simply need more staff to get
everything done in a timely manner? This is why I ask the question, to
find out if such a purely legitimate reason exists.

> or they might be adding some useful extensions to an existing
compiler for whatever reason.

And they need experience with *optimized* compilers specifically for
what reason? Inquiring minds would like to know. Also I'm curious what
language for what CPU and what specific extensions.

> Or they might be looking for people with experience working with
> large, complex apps *like* compilers, operating systems, etc.

Now that's totally different. I have plenty of experience working with
large systems with lots of components. I could qualify for that job in
a flash. The requirement for optimized compilers and the like, even the
title "systems progarmming", was a mis-director. This is *really* why I
need to ask the question, and get an answer from the OP, to find out if
I qualify despite not matching the originally advertised requirements.

> How about assuming the people who are hiring you know what they want
> and you try to figure out if you can supply it?

When they advertise a job but require 3-5 years experience in each of
ten or twenty technologies that were just invented within the past ten
years, there's no way they can really know what they want clearly
enough to write a decent job ad, so I have to find out what they really
want by asking them for details of their real needs.

> There are plenty of companies whose products are not directly related
> to OSes who have OS people working in house.

And I need to know whether that's the case, or whether their business
is operating systems or optimized compilers, or they have in mind a
totally different very complex system unlike anything ever done and
they just couldn't think of any way to express it except by saying
"systems progamming, such as operating systems and optimized compilers".

> Did you contemplate clicking on the "PDF" link under "View or Download"?

How exactly is that likely to take me to a plain-text or HTML file that
I can view over a VT100 terminal emulator??

> your inability to find Sun's Annual Report

I admit, I'm not good at finding some categories of information even
with the help of Google search engine. I found tutorials in perl, php,
cgi, and a bunch of other things and used them to teach me the basics,
with only a little bit of help from newsgroups when I got stuck. But
every so often a question comes up where I try Google and nothing
likely turns up and at some point I have to call it a waste of effort
to continue to thrash around searching for a needle when I don't have
any magnet of the right type to find it in the haystack.

> and your inability to click on a link to download a PDF

It's not inability, it just the wisdom to know when some action is
totally inappropriate and not worth doing. I don't have any way to view
PDF files, so why do you think I should download any PDF file?
Only an idiot would do what you suggest under such circumstances.

If you had only a MS-Windows machine, would you download a program
that was machine language for Atari or Commodore or Macintosh or PDP-10??
What if five people on the net called you stupid for not being able to
find the link to the PDP-10 program to download, when you had already
skipped that because you could tell just from looking at the name of
the link that it wouldn't be runnable on your machine? Would you stand
by your decision not to download that worthless program, or would you
give in to social pressure and download it anyway?

.