Subj : Re: CV, work-history, 91C, CompSci?, Applet? (was: Software Job Ma...) To : comp.programming,comp.software-eng From : JXStern Date : Thu Sep 08 2005 03:27 pm On Thu, 8 Sep 2005 09:19:39 +0100, Chris Hills wrote: >In article , Robert Maas, see >http://tinyurl.com/uh3t writes >>(Regarding MicroSoft Word and documents of its format:) >>> From: Chris Hills >>> The use of plain text simply says you can not use the current standard >>> tools of your profession. >> >>I have never programmed in APL, which requires a special character set. >>All the langauges I've programmed in, both assembly langugage and >>higher-level, have used plain ASCII text files as source files. Not one >>of them used MicroSoft Word format files as source or as library or as >>object or as executable or as anything else associated with it. Lisp >>documentation strings are in plain text. JavaDoc is in plain text. >>Neither is in MicroSoft Word format. There is nothing in my profession, >>writing software, that requires or uses MicroSoft Word format in any >>way. > >This shows why you have been out of work for a decade and are likely to >be so for the foreseeable future. Wait a second, let's take a look at this. >There is a LOT more to programing than writing source code in an ascii >editor. In theory, yes. In practice, it's far less clear. Me, I worked out my personal software process twenty years ago and document everything in sight before, during, and after. Last place I worked liked all of that IN THEORY, but in practice, I was about the only developer on the ground who actually DID it, and the few documents by others that I saw tended to be pretty sketchy and quickly left to get out of date. The place I'm working now HATES the very idea of documentation internal or external (and quite the topic for another thread!). You may have heard of XP, which quite shares this attitude. >You use Word for CV's and documentation. > >BTW I did once come across some one who wrote a program in word as a doc >file. renamed it to *.c and wondered why the compiler did not like it. Place I work would probably go the other way, rename a .cpp file to ..doc and say the documentation was finished. >>I have never claimed expertise with MicroSoft Word. I am not seeking a >>job using MicroSoft Word, such as word-processing, or >>receptionist/secretary, or advertising copy, etc. Accordingly what you >>said, that MicroSoft Word instead of plain text is a tool of my >>profession, seems to be completely wrong. > >Word is the de-facto standard (for the majority of the world) word >processor for documentation, CV's resumes reports, srequiremtns and >specification etc > >Doing documentation in plain ascii went out over a decade ago. It >appears you are at least a decade out of date in the tools of your >profession. Yes, but he does seem willing to do documentation in HTML, which is roughly what they do do in my current shop. >As I have run, in the past a small specialist job agency I can tell you >without references there is no way I would put you forward for anything, And I suggest he take note of this. I've never run an agency. Thought I might like to work in one, just to observe. Could probably do it, too, I've done pure sales jobs from time to time, mostly back in the day, I can be suitably glib. Many, really most, hiring in the industry these days involves recruiters, who must be satisfied as gatekeepers before you get "put forward". I have, however, hired developers, both directly and through agencies. Would I grant an interview or offer a job to Robert Maas, if I had some legacy code he might be qualified on, or some light web work he could probably help out with? Well, all I can say is, "maybe". I once worked in a place that ran a typical recruiting ad (in the classified section of the newspaper, back in the day) which bragged they were a "culturally diverse equal opportunity employer". I just want to say they REALLY lived up to those words, and probably would have offered Mr. Maas a position (yeah, ok, he was still current back then, but you see what I mean!) Mr. Maas may be making things hard on himself, and may be out of sync with some of the industry's current practices, but I recognize him as a "type" which is common enough in the field, just a little grey around the edges and at the end of a particularly bad run. I don't doubt there are dozens like him lurking this group, but then, not so many developers ever touch a newsgroup, and it's something in his favor (IMHO) that he's even here. For all this talk about requirements, he's very expressive online, in writing, even as he denigrates its importance for whatever deep-seated personal, contingent historical, or variant professional reasons. Sort of reminds me of Kent Beck! J. .