Mon Apr 15 13:13:34 2002

I'm hoping that trust is rewarded. Yes, I'm asking this *again*.(It seems  do this every six months).

It always helps to reevaluate my skill set(or what's lacking I guess)... :/

Here's my post on an IT board:

i__love__joe asked this question on 4/15/2002:
I've been developing web sites for three years now. I like the work. I've done some independent vanilla HTML work and I work for a large publisher on a small ASP/SQL Server site.

I know a little ASP.
I know some good amount of CFML.
I know HTML and code it by hand.(4 compliant/CSS1)
I know Photoshop very well.

And yet, when it comes down to it, I want to be able to put references or degrees on my resume exemplifying my mastery. I want to stop relying on putting every ounce of experience down. Yes, yes, I know, experience is what's important but I'm still looking for paper validation. I also want to be able to focus on a track to learn which technologies I need first.

The more I think I know, the more I realize that I'm getting my doors blown off by some 17 year old hacker.

I want to be able to master a technology set that will serve me in as many platforms as possible but that is also in as high a demand.

Until now, I've been thinking that's CFML, since the new Cold Fusion MX runs on any Java platform (unix, mac osX) but also runs on Win and supports .NET.

What degrees should I focus on? CIW? Macromedia certification(for CF)? MS certification? MCSE? Isn't the MCSE becoming execessively prevalent?
Would A+ or Network+ help?

Which would be the easiest for me to get quickly?
Which are the least prevalent?(most rare)

I've had a much easier time mastering CFML than ASP. I think ASP's general structure is overly-complicated. I can do rudimentary stuff and I can reverse-engineer complex systems but I can't *build* complex systems. Any ideas on how to rectify that.

So far, these are the topics I think I need:

SQL/databases
XHTML
XML
VML
Flash
ASP.NET(is this easier than ASP wi VBS?)
Java/J2EE/Beans
Networking MS
Networking Nix/X
Hardware

It seems like it's impossible to learn it all... :(

I keep falling further and further behind.

A couple of years back I posted a question similar to that. Since then, I focused on other things but now I'm back and I'm looking to focus on a small set of technologies.

I mean, seriously, is it possible for a non-tech college grad(even a compu sci grad) to learn *every* platform?

BTW, is it me, or does the job market look sick?

M.

Paper Tiger? Maybe but I want to be one.

I've made a pretty heavy decision. I'm going to take the LSAT in September and try to get into law school.

On the bright side, I'm enthused that I have direction again.  I'll be honest. I don't know enough to get a better tech gig, unless we're talking BPR and business consulting. I was trained in my MBA to do that. Everything else I've learned in the last two-four years.  Unfortunately, most new jobs require technology skills I just don't have. And they don't pay anywhere near as much as they used to. A hard-core, experienced programmer like Paolo can make 85-100k but even then, it's not a huge amount of money for what they know.  Moreso, I'm growing frustrated with my overall level of un-l33tness.

On the bad side, I'm kind of tormented by the fact that i don't know as much as I would like.  That serves as a source of constertation to no end. I can't seem to pick topics up as quickly as I would like, either. Moreso, I'm afraid that if I take the law route, I'll lose whatever little tech l33tness I had(does that make sense?)...

M.

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Mon Apr 15 13:42:33 2002

Heck, I'm sticking to the IT field, and there's still boatloads of tagnuttery that I haven't even been exposed to, let alone learn (or even have time to learn).

And as you note, time is an issue and there's not enough of it to learn things that might/would help your career.  I can empathize with you there: In the current sucktacular job market, I've seen too many job openings that require tech skills that I don't have or have enough of.  I can't tell you how many openings I didn't submit to because they wanted (in addition to my core networking skillz) 2+ years of VB/Java/Cobol, or 4+ years Cisco experience, or 5 years working in "Enterprise environments" or 1000+ employees.

But that's my rant/ramble.  From my standpoint of being in the IT sector and being unemployed/underemployed for the last year (May 7 is my layoff anniversary :angryfire:), I say: Tech sector be damned.  Pursue something that will utilize the MBA that you earned.  Or try law school, as you mentioned.

Mon Apr 15 18:12:02 2002

Basically, it seems that the HR people know they will get a lot of applicants for any position, and they want to make life easier for themselves (the basic motivation of all HR people) and eliminate a lot of people without having to do any work.  Therefore they add a whole bunch of cert requirements and years of experience for any job that gets advertized.

The thing you also have to realize is that tons of jobs aren't advertized.  Somebody knows somebody who knows somebody and they get interviewed and hired for a position and it never makes the paper or the web.  Only if a company is having trouble finding someone will they put out an ad.  These are almost always for high-level positions where they need a "drop-in-replacement" for whoever was doing the job before, so they just list whatever experience he/she had and aim for a complete duplicate.

The fact that the tech sector is in such a slump these days means they can get away with this.

You have experience maintaining and updating an ecommerce web site for a fairly high-level business.  That counts for far more than some paper cert.  The thing is, though, that you have to think about the salary level you are expecting.  You do seem fairly obsessed about salary level-- this is probably the wrong thing to focus on right now.  If you can get into a good situation where it is your job to learn new technologies and to business-type stuff as well as pure technological tagnuttery, you are going to be in a much better position.  Look at me-- I am doing design work in Photoshop for a graphical user interface for our new product, I'm writing a magazine article for a security publication, I'm updating the web site, I test new products, I consult with the CEO, I do basically everything.  Am I making a fortune?  No, not hardly.  But if I stick around here and the company starts to do well, I will be in a good position to negotiate a better salary based on what I've done for the company.

Look at it from the corporation's point of view.  Do they just need an admin monkey or web monkey?  Better for them to hire some teenage paper cert that they can pay a tiny salary to and he'll be happy.  But if they need someone who can do more than just tagnuts, maybe they will find your skills more valuable than just another MSCE.  A company so brain-dead that they can't tell the difference between a paper tiger and an experienced, well-rounded tech guy isn't worth working for anyway.

Anyway I have to go, I have tons of work to do today.  But I'll get back to this later.

Mon Apr 15 18:56:39 2002

Though for me I think just working with people you enjoy working with would be more rewarding than being some kind of uber-geek.

Mon Apr 15 19:06:10 2002

The best thing you can have is experience. I love when some punk right out of school interviews with me going on and on about certificiations, and I as him/her a simple question and the cannot answer it.

Anyways, in Law if you work hard enough, and you know the right people, you can make money quick.

Not so easy on the computer industry, no matter what aspect. You need knowledge, hard work, know the right people, have a good economy and work for the right company.

Losing my tech l33tness is exactly why I don't manage more than 5-10 people. Any more than that and I would be considered a real manager, and lose a lot of my hands on stuff. Blech.

I guess when you think about it, it all comes down to WHAT YOU LIKE. If you don't know what you like, you better find out. There is nothing worse than spending 10 years in a career, only to find it's not for you. (kinda like my karate class, in which after 5 years, I find that Akido is more my style).

Don't make mistakes that can cost you years, you will never get them back. Find something that makes you happy and stay with it. Money is only money.

Mon Apr 15 19:49:06 2002

You have experience maintaining and updating an ecommerce web site for a fairly high-level business.  That counts for far more than some paper cert.  The thing is, though, that you have to think about the salary level you are expecting.  You do seem fairly obsessed about salary level-- this is probably the wrong thing to focus on right now.  If you can get into a good situation where it is your job to learn new technologies and to business-type stuff as well as pure technological tagnuttery, you are going to be in a much better position.  Look at me-- I am doing design work in Photoshop for a graphical user interface for our new product, I'm writing a magazine article for a security publication, I'm updating the web site, I test new products, I consult with the CEO, I do basically everything.  Am I making a fortune?  No, not hardly.  But if I stick around here and the company starts to do well, I will be in a good position to negotiate a better salary based on what I've done for the company.

I understand where you're coming from. That situation isn't here. The armature is almost dead. We've cut most of our products, instead focusing on selling only back issues and some lousy photos. They leave me mostly to myself now and only pester me when the site is down(our host's fault). Some would say: "Great! Use the time to learn new stuff!" Others would say: "Try and turn the business around."  Turning the business is impossible. Management won't give me any freedom. As for learning...where do you think I've been reading that huge SQL book I dled?

Look at it from the corporation's point of view.  Do they just need an admin monkey or web monkey?  Better for them to hire some teenage paper cert that they can pay a tiny salary to and he'll be happy.  But if they need someone who can do more than just tagnuts, maybe they will find your skills more valuable than just another MSCE.  A company so brain-dead that they can't tell the difference between a paper tiger and an experienced, well-rounded tech guy isn't worth working for anyway.

Hm.

As for Duff. You're right. I'm going to hyper specialize in something I like.

I'll focus on CFML/Flash/REBOL. It's what works for me. I like doing it and I think, wi my PS skills, I could get good at it. Fuck ASP and it's overly complex VBS architecture(that's only easy for programmers) and screw Java with it's J2EE, J2SE, J2DE, beans, swing, applets, servlets and other infinite crap you have to learn before you even start coding.

EM, money is important to me. Take teaching. I love teaching. It's great and the kids are the best part but..God, the money SUCKS for the amount of work I put in.

I don't want to spend my life treading water. I want security.

M.

Mon Apr 15 20:01:15 2002

Hell even I am in fear of the layoff we are going to have here the 2nd week of may, and I have lived thru 4 of them in the past 7 months...

If you want security, get out of the tech industry.

Mon Apr 15 20:27:37 2002

m.

(Edited by Madan at 1:31 pm on April 15, 2002)

Mon Apr 15 22:36:49 2002

If you do decide to law school, good for you. Right now I'm still struggling with that decision. Don't let worry about what 'could have been' or 'should have been'. Look to the future, and decide, not a fiscal decision, or a security decision, but decide what will be best for you. Make the decision based on what you feel will give you the highest job satisifaction. What I want out of life, is to go to work everyday, and feel I made a difference in someones life. That even if for a small aspect, I made it better.

That's what I'm trying to decide right now, what will give me a higher amount of satisfaction, and I doubt the IT field is gonna do it for me.

As for tagnuttry, you'll always have google. It's like having a little geek in your back pocket.

Mon Apr 15 22:38:11 2002

You say money is important, but then you say you want money because you want security.  Hate to say it, but money won't buy you security.

Quite frankly, you have a good full-time job as a teacher and a web admin job on top of that, plus you do consultant work--- where does all your money go?  You probably make, what, more than $60k US (about $90k canadian) with all your jobs?  I'm only guessing, but you did start the "how much money does everyone earn" thread.

Madan, I worked for a full year at EA as a Quality Assurance Tester/Analyst for $9.50 an hour ($1 more than most people, because of my background)  With heavy overtime (I mean HEAVY, my highest week was 88 billed hours) I cleared just shy of $20k for a YEAR.  BEFORE taxes, mind.

I supported myself AND my mother in an expensive apartment in Vancouver, and I would still go out and treat my girlfriend (now wife) for dates half the time.  And I had high-speed internet and cable and whatnot.

20 friggin k a year.  CANADIAN.

Okay, now I make 32.5k, and if I can hang on and the company can hang on for a little while longer, I'll be able to increase that.  I save about $1k per month.  I bought a $2000 laptop using my debit card, boom, right out of my bank account.  I'm thinking of putting money into a mutual fund soon, because it ain't doing shit in the bank.

I'd love to earn more money, don't get me wrong.  I'd LOVE it.  I'm working towards it.  But I don't need that money for security.  My wife and my meagre paycheck are all the security I need.

Now, if you really want security, you ought to find a nice dull government job, lick people's backsides for a while to build up seniority, and set yourself up for life.  Boom, you have security, which is what you said you wanted.

If it's really money you want and not security (and forgoing any reason or explanation of WHY you'd want money) then working in the tech field isn't for you.  You can make big money as a lawyer if you are willing to work like hell and are smart and make the right connections.  A friend of my wife did a killer interview and got signed up with a prestigious law firm in New York, he's making shitloads of money.

Of course he spends it all, but that's not the point.  He has the money.  But the money wasn't the motivation for him anyway-- he wanted the challenge, the excitement, the thrill of being a big-city lawyer like the fatcats you see on Sex and the City

Is that what you want?

You signed up to be a teacher despite the low (according to you) salaries.  Why?  Was teaching something you wanted to do?

I can't ask you to have all the answers right away because nobody does-- I certainly don't, I'm making half of it up as I go along, like everyone else.  But you should think about it carefully.

What do you want?

Mon Apr 15 23:19:56 2002

I hate to get all Babylon-5 on you, Madan, but in order to really give you the answer you need, we have to figure out what you want.

??? What I want?

 I
 I
 I
 V

;)

You say money is important, but then you say you want money because you want security.  Hate to say it, but money won't buy you security.

It will buy me fiscal security. That's exactly what I'm talking about.

Quite frankly, you have a good full-time job as a teacher and a web admin job on top of that, plus you do consultant work--- where does all your money go?

You've got a point. I'm not bitching about what I have now. I'm bitching because:

A. If I lose a gig or two, I'm stuck with less than 35k a year.
B. I don't feel like I'm moving forward. I feel like I'm stuck in neutral. Not that I'm in a bad place. But I want to feel like I'm getting better, you know? You're learning your tagnuts and stuff in your new job and I'm stuck in a rut.

You probably make, what, more than $60k US (about $90k canadian) with all your jobs?  I'm only guessing, but you did start the "how much money does everyone earn" thread.

Hm. 60k isn't a lot. Hell, if you all weren't such generation X slackers, you'd be making a lot more. I mean, look at MWNH. He, like, makes more than God. I guess it bothers me a little that everyone else in my graduating class is starting to catch up to my pay. I always took my superior pay as a vindication for the reputation as a pariah that I had. Heck, sure I was scorned by many IT in my MBA but I showed them because my first year out, I was making over 90k(even if I *was* working over 110 hours a week for almost a year.5 straight). Now, I've lost some financial "steam" and they've caught up and, well, it stings.

Madan, I worked for a full year at EA as a Quality Assurance Tester/Analyst for $9.50 an hour ($1 more than most people, because of my background)  With heavy overtime (I mean HEAVY, my highest week was 88 billed hours) I cleared just shy of $20k for a YEAR.  BEFORE taxes, mind.

A. You're a slacker and you could have made more if you wanted to.
B. You were playing games all day.

But I hear what you're saying.

I supported myself AND my mother in an expensive apartment in Vancouver, and I would still go out and treat my girlfriend (now wife) for dates half the time.  And I had high-speed internet and cable and whatnot.

20 friggin k a year.  CANADIAN.

I think you're mistaking me! :) I'm not saying I'm going hungry. I'm going to buy a new car soon and I'm thinking about buying my own house. I've got a ton of cash in the bank. I spend very little. But I want more. Yes, I'm fucking greedy. Yes, I'm shallow for valuating my self-worth and equating it to my paycheck but, hell, it works.

Okay, now I make 32.5k, and if I can hang on and the company can hang on for a little while longer, I'll be able to increase that.  I save about $1k per month.  I bought a $2000 laptop using my debit card, boom, right out of my bank account.  I'm thinking of putting money into a mutual fund soon, because it ain't doing shit in the bank.

I'd love to earn more money, don't get me wrong.  I'd LOVE it.  I'm working towards it.  But I don't need that money for security.  My wife and my meagre paycheck are all the security I need.

My wife is above. I win. ;) Jk.

Now, if you really want security, you ought to find a nice dull government job,

Teaching.

lick people's backsides for a while to build up seniority, and set yourself up for life.  Boom, you have security, which is what you said you wanted.

If it's really money you want and not security (and forgoing any reason or explanation of WHY you'd want money) then working in the tech field isn't for you.  You can make big money as a lawyer if you are willing to work like hell and are smart and make the right connections.  A friend of my wife did a killer interview and got signed up with a prestigious law firm in New York, he's making shitloads of money.

Money is good.

Of course he spends it all, but that's not the point.  He has the money.  But the money wasn't the motivation for him anyway-- he wanted the challenge, the excitement, the thrill of being a big-city lawyer like the fatcats you see on Sex and the City

Is that what you want?

*shrug* Now I feel conflicted.

You signed up to be a teacher despite the low (according to you) salaries.  Why?  Was teaching something you wanted to do?

I thought I could make a difference. I can't. Noone can.

Thanks anyways. I'll try and figure things out.

j.

Tue Apr 16 01:37:30 2002

Quite honestly I make (rather MADE, until they took away bonuses, on call, over time and anything else that was not "salary), good money, but you know what, having to worry about the economy, watching your stock options dwindle to nothingness (my options were granted at 11.00 and 5.50 a share and currently our stock is at .79 a share), having to worry about layoffs and the loss of my health benefits that keep my Wife out of a wheelchair and fully functional (she has a seriously messed up back), and then having to look for a career again, in a seriously damaged feild that quite frankly THINK they can hire some college punk with a MCSE or RHSE and think they can run an Enterprise, so the companies would rather pay $35K per year for a noob who knows nothing, rahter than $80-$90 K for 12 years of experience who knows how to run everything the right way and not make noob mistakes.

My combined income is quite a bit more than MWNH, but I am stuck near Mass, paying a tonne for taxes, my college loans and two vehicles. After morgage, utilities and such, that leaves the Wife and I a whole $100 a month to do "something" with. This includes her income as well.

Financial security in my mind right now is worth taking a job you may not want. You can never get something for nothing. You may find the perfect job and get paid crap (like my Wife, she LOVES her job but gets paid crap to do it), or be like most others making good income but trudge unhappily to work daily. I'm kinda in the middle, I really like my job, but don't like having to lose sleep worring about what happens if I lose my job...

Ugh... sorry guys... Did not mean to bitch...

Just wanted to make sure you make the RIGHT decision Madan. Nothing today is perfect. You still are young, you still got money in the bank. Don't make the wrong decision. Asking people/friends what to do is a good idea, but remember, the final choice of your career and "life sytle" come right down to YOU. If you don't look 5 years down the line of where you want to be, or where you see these career options leading, you are just going to run yourself ragged or into the ground.

I may not like your choice in computers for the most part, but you are a nice person. I would hate to see you make the wrong decision and end up regretting part of your life for the rest of your life. We are a lot luckier than some people who never can have the opportunities we have. Just THINK, and more importantly FEEL. Money is very important, anyone who says otherwise is full of shit. But is money worth ignoring who and what you are? I don't think so.

Tue Apr 16 16:17:20 2002

I think ASP's general structure is overly-complicated. I can do rudimentary stuff and I can reverse-engineer complex systems but I can't *build* complex systems. Any ideas on how to rectify that.

The world does not need more lawyers.

Tue Apr 16 17:51:17 2002

I was extremely lucky landing the job that I have here in little-ol Nanaimo.  I work at the local University-College as the Technician/Admin for the program that I actually graduated from.  I'm part of a Union, so job security isn't much of an issue (even given the insanity of our current government)... I don't get paid as much as someone with the same responsibilities in the Private sector, but I'm more than happy for now.  ~30000/yr + all benefits works for me as a "first real job".

I can understand the lure of more money==fiscal security.  I think of it myself from time to time.  Generally, I come to the conclusion that, in todays Tech industry, job security is more important than having the biggest paycheque.  That's why I'm not too eager to look elsewhere even though I would love to live in Vancouver or Calgary or even Ottawa...

I look at my own "experience" and it is similar to yours in that there is a wide range of experience on all sorts of technology.  I'm taking care of W2K Server/Domains, Mandrake boxes with mySQL, IIS, QTSS, PHP, ASP, Windows clients, Mac Classic/OSX clients, 200 user Exchange server.... the list is long.  I love this job because I have such a variety of things to do, I never get bored.

That said, I have to expect that one day I will have to look for another job.  I'd have to specialize in something.  Right now, I have no idea what that would be.  I'd like it to be Mac stuff... but that would mean unnecessarily limiting my job options...

I've been slowly working towards an MCSE... but now that I know how much of a scam they really are, the motivation is dwindling rapidly.  

I have to echo what Jeremy said... Most of the credentials and junk that you see on job postings are just a smoke screen to weed out the lazy people.  Apply to everything you think you might be interested in... it certainly can't hurt.

All of THAT said... if you're really feeling that Law School is the way out for you... go for it.  Why not?  We need more lawyers anyway, right? ;)

Hopefully that was helpful in some way... otherwise just ignore my ramblings ;)

Tue Apr 16 18:29:40 2002

Tue Apr 16 18:53:55 2002

??? What I want?

I
I
I
V

You want a .jpg of a heavily tanned woman with fake breasts?

It will buy me fiscal security. That's exactly what I'm talking about.

Bullshit.  Money won't buy you security of any kind, fiscal or otherwise.

Suppose you earn $100k per year.  This buys you fiscal security, right?  Not hardly.  What if your expenses are $99.5k per year, or higher?  What if your taste for the finer things in life increases so that you now require $120k to really enjoy things, or more?  Now you've got less security, you not only can't afford to lose your current job, you need to replace it with something better.  And what if you do lose your current job?  I don't care how much you have saved in the bank, it goes VERY quickly once you're unemployed.  More quickly the higher lifestyle you're used to, I might add.

So where's the security?  People say "oh if I only won $1 million in the lottery, I'd be forever happy, and I'd never have to work again".  WRONG!  What doesn't go to taxes goes to silly toys and expensive vacations, and you'll find that without working the rest disappears VERY rapidly.

A. If I lose a gig or two, I'm stuck with less than 35k a year.

Which exactly confirms my point above.  More money actually gave you less security, because before you were satisfied with 35k a year, now you can't tolerate it.

B. I don't feel like I'm moving forward. I feel like I'm stuck in neutral. Not that I'm in a bad place. But I want to feel like I'm getting better, you know? You're learning your tagnuts and stuff in your new job and I'm stuck in a rut.

But I was stuck in a rut in this same job at the same company a year ago (well, maybe not stuck in a rut, but unable to really advance)  I played my cards well and worked hard, and here I am.  But the future is never guaranteed.  

Hm. 60k isn't a lot. Hell, if you all weren't such generation X slackers, you'd be making a lot more. I mean, look at MWNH. He, like, makes more than God. I guess it bothers me a little that everyone else in my graduating class is starting to catch up to my pay. I always took my superior pay as a vindication for the reputation as a pariah that I had. Heck, sure I was scorned by many IT in my MBA but I showed them because my first year out, I was making over 90k(even if I *was* working over 110 hours a week for almost a year.5 straight). Now, I've lost some financial "steam" and they've caught up and, well, it stings.

I like how you categorize everyone who doesn't earn at least 60k as "slackers", Madan.  That's an awful lot of people you've just insulted.  Not everyone considers working 110 hour weeks for years on end to be something they would ever want to do, no matter what the financial payoff.  I consider it a wasted life.  What the fuck is the point of money if you have no time to relax and enjoy it?

A. You're a slacker and you could have made more if you wanted to.
B. You were playing games all day.

Fuck off.  I try to help you and this is what I get?  Let me explain something to you, Madan:

Working for EA was in no way "slacking off" or "playing games all day".  I wanted to work for EA because they were the largest video and computer game company in BC, and there were jobs available.  Since I was SEVEN YEARS OLD, I have been designing (and sometimes even programming) games for myself.  It was a lifelong dream to work for a game company.  I read interviews with Richard Garriott and Chris Roberts in the early 90s and felt a deep ache that I wasn't there, that I had missed my chance to be in this industry that had given me so much pleasure over the years.  

But I gave up on the dream, because it wasn't "realistic", and finished my degree, and became a teacher, because it was "safe" and "secure" and all that other bullshit.  

When you join a gaming company today, you HAVE to start at the bottom rung.  Everyone says "oh I'd love to be a video game designer" and they all expect to be Sid fucking Meier right away, and have minions designing the art and code to bring their vision to life.  It doesn't work that way.  You want to work at EA, you start out in Quality Assurance, and earn $8.50 an hour, $9.50 if you have a degree.  You work a GRUELLING number of hours, go without sleep, go without seeing your friends or your loved ones, and you end up with about $20k a year.  You aren't "playing games", you are systematically testing every single fucking aspect of the game in accordance to the design document and your own knowledge, and replicating every single goddamn bug dozens of times to make sure you know what causes it.  You start to hate games, to get sick at the sight of them, to become physically ill at the thought of playing them.

Okay, so maybe you rise a little in QA after three or four years of 100-hour weeks.  Now you're a Senior Tester at $12 an hour.  Whoop-de-fucking doo.  In a few more years if you lick the right people's asses, you MIGHT get into Asssistant Producer level, or around $30k salary, with no overtime pay.

Or maybe you're an experienced programmer or modeller/artist with a $20,000 education at one of the finest training institutes in North America and years of experience under your belt.  You get to start at $35k, maybe $40k if you're a hotshot.  Salary, so no matter how many 100-hour weeks you put in (and the programmers put in plenty) you get no more.

That was the DREAM, you understand.  I was following my fucking DREAM, and that was the reality.  You can understand if I'm a little bitter about it.

Yes, I'm fucking greedy. Yes, I'm shallow for valuating my self-worth and equating it to my paycheck but, hell, it works.

It's a one-way ticket to unhappiness, though.  If your entire sense of self-worth is based on your salary, what happens if the market changes?  What happens if you lose your tech job?  Do you now think of yourself as worthless, a slacker, a loser, a failure?  

My wife is above. I win.  Jk.

It's nice to have a real person and not a .jpg, though.

*shrug* Now I feel conflicted.

You should.

I thought I could make a difference. I can't. Noone can.

So you haven't made any difference in any of your student's lives?  Are you sure about that?

Thanks anyways. I'll try and figure things out.

You're welcome. I'm sorry for blowing up at you but you really hit a sensitive spot.  

Tue Apr 16 19:59:36 2002

Yes.  Stop thinking of ASP as "complicated" and stop thinking of ASP as a language.

???? ASP is a wrapper for scripting. I said VBS in ASP. Please don't put words in my mouth and leave the psychic mind-reading bullshit at home.

ASP *is* complicated. Even some ASP forum MS ppl I've met don't exactly know when to include VBS on the page or set it on another page.

It's overly complicated. Six lines when I can finish the same job in CFMX in two-three? No fucking excuse for that.

The world does not need more lawyers.

World doesn't need any more wannabe techies either.
Any other suggestions?

     
Chrisale,

I'm not exactly here much... but your question and the subsequent replies struck a chord with me so here goes.

! I've seen you lurk a bit but almost never respond.

I was extremely lucky landing the job that I have here in little-ol Nanaimo.  I work at the local University-College as the Technician/Admin for the program that I actually graduated from.  I'm part of a Union, so job security isn't much of an issue (even given the insanity of our current government)... I don't get paid as much as someone with the same responsibilities in the Private sector, but I'm more than happy for now.  ~30000/yr + all benefits works for me as a "first real job".

Good job C. :)

I can understand the lure of more money==fiscal security.  I think of it myself from time to time.  Generally, I come to the conclusion that, in todays Tech industry, job security is more important than having the biggest paycheque.  That's why I'm not too eager to look elsewhere even though I would love to live in Vancouver or Calgary or even Ottawa...

:)

I look at my own "experience" and it is similar to yours in that there is a wide range of experience on all sorts of technology.  I'm taking care of W2K Server/Domains, Mandrake boxes with mySQL, IIS, QTSS, PHP, ASP, Windows clients, Mac Classic/OSX clients, 200 user Exchange server.... the list is long.  I love this job because I have such a variety of things to do, I never get bored.

Geek!

That said, I have to expect that one day I will have to look for another job.  I'd have to specialize in something.  Right now, I have no idea what that would be.  I'd like it to be Mac stuff... but that would mean unnecessarily limiting my job options...

I'm happy I found out about CFMX. That opens a huge door. You can now artifically use .NET in a Mac environment and preliminary tests of the CFMX Server backbone show that it is solid like a rock. :) Still a ways to go but definitely entering the radar. Definitely a blip.

Dynamic web sites on X anyone? ;)

I've been slowly working towards an MCSE... but now that I know how much of a scam they really are, the motivation is dwindling rapidly.  

I agree wi EM. 2k MCSE <> NT MCSE. Although they don't carry the weight they used to.

All of THAT said... if you're really feeling that Law School is the way out for you... go for it.  Why not?  We need more lawyers anyway, right?  

:)

Jeremy Reimer ,

Quote:
??? What I want?

I
I
I
V

You want a .jpg of a heavily tanned woman with fake breasts?

Uhm, that's BROOKE BURKE. As in, my avatar? As in, perfection attained? As in hot enough to melt lead just by looking at it? As in hotter than the surface of a Neutron Star? As in hotter than the pizza that scalded the roof of your mouth last nite? As in hot enough to misfire every neuron in your brain?

That hot. But hey, if you don't find her attractive, don't worry, I hear there's a large gay population in Canada.

;)

:p

Quote:
It will buy me fiscal security. That's exactly what I'm talking about.

Bullshit.  Money won't buy you security of any kind, fiscal or otherwise.

?? Are you talking trash again? Being able to buy a nice new car is security. Being able to not worry about where your next meal or paycheck is also security. Please, PLEASE no more semantics ok? Save it for nibs or rr or whomever.

Suppose you earn $100k per year.  This buys you fiscal security, right?  Not hardly.  What if your expenses are $99.5k per year, or higher?

:rolleyes:

Fucking please. If you're living at a reasonable level and if I maintain the lifestyle I have now(which I never said I would change but thanks for assuming), 100k would be huge.

What if your taste for the finer things in life increases so that you now require $120k to really enjoy things, or more?

It wouldn't.

I wasn't talking about some hypothetical Scrooge McDuck. I was talking about me. 100k would be fantabulous.

Which exactly confirms my point above.  More money actually gave you less security, because before you were satisfied with 35k a year, now you can't tolerate it.

35k in America <> 35k in Canada.

35k in Miami, where mean rent is over 1500 a month for an AVERAGE apartment is a problem.

I'm glad you live in an area where a small house(1-2 rooms) doesn't go for 195k but Miami is expensive.

Go bitch at a New Yorker that he/she doesn't need more money for rent, while you're at it. :rolleyes:

"Sure, you COULD make more money but then you would get used to living in something other than a BOX. That's not security!"

:rolleyes:

Quote:
Hm. 60k isn't a lot. Hell, if you all weren't such generation X slackers, you'd be making a lot more. I mean, look at MWNH. He, like, makes more than God. I guess it bothers me a little that everyone else in my graduating class is starting to catch up to my pay. I always took my superior pay as a vindication for the reputation as a pariah that I had. Heck, sure I was scorned by many IT in my MBA but I showed them because my first year out, I was making over 90k(even if I *was* working over 110 hours a week for almost a year.5 straight). Now, I've lost some financial "steam" and they've caught up and, well, it stings.

I like how you categorize everyone who doesn't earn at least 60k as "slackers", Madan.

Uhm, no. OSY != "everyone".

You're all smart. Technically competent. You *could* make that much easily. Many people that have IQs of 12 can't. The average person couldn't under most non-fortuitous circumstances.  Underperformers == slackers.

That's an awful lot of people you've just insulted.  Not everyone considers working 110 hour weeks for years on end to be something they would ever want to do, no matter what the financial payoff.  I consider it a wasted life.  What the fuck is the point of money if you have no time to relax and enjoy it?

I never called "everyone" a slacker. And Peter, fe, wouldn't have to work 110 hrs/week. He knows like ten times what I do about networking and code. He could make 125k working, what, 45-50 hours? Or Paul, or Harb or Bad Andy...etc. etc. etc.

Quote:
A. You're a slacker and you could have made more if you wanted to.
B. You were playing games all day.

Fuck off.

With Brooke? ;)

I try to help you and this is what I get?  Let me explain something to you, Madan:

Working for EA was in no way "slacking off" or "playing games all day".  I wanted to work for EA because they were the largest video and computer game company in BC, and there were jobs available.  Since I was SEVEN YEARS OLD, I have been designing (and sometimes even programming) games for myself.  It was a lifelong dream to work for a game company.  I read interviews with Richard Garriott and Chris Roberts in the early 90s and felt a deep ache that I wasn't there, that I had missed my chance to be in this industry that had given me so much pleasure over the years.

Cue: Violins.

But I gave up on the dream, because it wasn't "realistic", and finished my degree, and became a teacher, because it was "safe" and "secure" and all that other bullshit.  

And you were making a "difference". Don't forget that bullshit.

When you join a gaming company today, you HAVE to start at the bottom rung.  Everyone says "oh I'd love to be a video game designer" and they all expect to be Sid fucking Meier right away, and have minions designing the art and code to bring their vision to life.  It doesn't work that way.  You want to work at EA, you start out in Quality Assurance, and earn $8.50 an hour, $9.50 if you have a degree.  You work a GRUELLING number of hours, go without sleep, go without seeing your friends or your loved ones, and you end up with about $20k a year.  You aren't "playing games", you are systematically testing every single fucking aspect of the game in accordance to the design document and your own knowledge, and replicating every single goddamn bug dozens of times to make sure you know what causes it.

By playing the game. Unfortunately, you were playing EA. EA sucks, so you have my condolences.

You start to hate games, to get sick at the sight of them, to become physically ill at the thought of playing them.

Yeah, I can see that happening to me......NOT. ;)

Okay, so maybe you rise a little in QA after three or four years of 100-hour weeks.  Now you're a Senior Tester at $12 an hour.  Whoop-de-fucking doo.  In a few more years if you lick the right people's asses, you MIGHT get into Asssistant Producer level, or around $30k salary, with no overtime pay.

What kind of asses? Did they taste good? Be honest! :biggrin:

Or maybe you're an experienced programmer or modeller/artist with a $20,000 education at one of the finest training institutes in North America and years of experience under your belt.  You get to start at $35k, maybe $40k if you're a hotshot.  Salary, so no matter how many 100-hour weeks you put in (and the programmers put in plenty) you get no more.

You were a programmer? You were a modeller? Really? Wow. Which games. Have I played them?

That was the DREAM, you understand.  I was following my fucking DREAM, and that was the reality.  You can understand if I'm a little bitter about it.

And you left. Hm. You left the dream. To work in IT. Which makes more money. More security? More stability? Hmmm. For whom? For your wife? For your wife and for yourself?

Quote:
Yes, I'm fucking greedy. Yes, I'm shallow for valuating my self-worth and equating it to my paycheck but, hell, it works.

It's a one-way ticket to unhappiness, though.  If your entire sense of self-worth is based on your salary, what happens if the market changes?  What happens if you lose your tech job?  Do you now think of yourself as worthless, a slacker, a loser, a failure?

Probably.  

Quote:
My wife is above. I win.  Jk.

It's nice to have a real person and not a .jpg, though.

Ouch.

Quote:
I thought I could make a difference. I can't. Noone can.

So you haven't made any difference in any of your student's lives?  Are you sure about that?

Noone fucking knows. I think I do one minute and the next I wonder. There's no way to be sure. I get along better with my students than most. I'm younger. I can relate better and they respect me a bit more. I push them relatively hard but....

Who fucking knows? Noone. Noone fucking knows.

Quote:
Thanks anyways. I'll try and figure things out.

You're welcome. I'm sorry for blowing up at you but you really hit a sensitive spot.  

That's ok, everyone else does.

:)

m.

(Edited by Madan at 1:00 pm on April 16, 2002)

(Edited by Madan at 1:04 pm on April 16, 2002)

Tue Apr 16 20:53:59 2002

I agree wi EM. 2k MCSE <> NT MCSE. Although they don't carry the weight they used to.

the problem seems to be... though... that at least with businesses around here there is still a serious stigma about the value of MCSEs.

I have heard that the W2K exams are much tougher and more resistant to the overnight crammer... but still, it's so much money for uncertain gain.

I've seen you lurk a bit but almost never respond.

Ya, I hardly even lurk here much.  Just not enough time.

Geek!

You called? ;)

Dynamic web sites on X anyone?

Dude... PHP+mySQL==free fun for the entire family.

Tue Apr 16 21:31:36 2002

Uhm, that's BROOKE BURKE. As in, my avatar? As in, perfection attained? As in hot enough to melt lead just by looking at it? As in hotter than the surface of a Neutron Star? As in hotter than the pizza that scalded the roof of your mouth last nite? As in hot enough to misfire every neuron in your brain?

That's nice.  But it's still just a .jpg.  

One of the things that happens (at least it has to me) when you're married (assuming your wife is reasonably hot to begin with, which Jennifer is) is that the relationship you have (assuming it's a good one, which it is) starts to grow and change, and you start finding this person, who formerly was just another person who you happened to like a lot, is becoming more and more attractive to you.  This is why EM always talks about how his wife is hotter than -insert hot woman here-  It really starts to happen that way.  

?? Are you talking trash again? Being able to buy a nice new car is security. Being able to not worry about where your next meal or paycheck is also security. Please, PLEASE no more semantics ok? Save it for nibs or rr or whomever.

But knowing that you can pay for a car or a meal or whatever is only security as long as you have your job!!  As soon as you lose it, everything flies out the window.  How is that security???

Security is when you don't have to worry about money ever again, ever.  That only happens when you reach Steve Jobs-level money.  We're talking the $500 million and up only club.  Maybe less, maybe the $100 million people don't worry about money much either, but you know what I mean.

Fucking please. If you're living at a reasonable level and if I maintain the lifestyle I have now(which I never said I would change but thanks for assuming), 100k would be huge.

But you're close to that now!

35k in America <> 35k in Canada.

35k in Miami, where mean rent is over 1500 a month for an AVERAGE apartment is a problem.

I'm glad you live in an area where a small house(1-2 rooms) doesn't go for 195k but Miami is expensive.

House?  You are talking about an actual house???

I live in Vancouver, Madan.  An average house goes for about $2 MILLION.  In the suburbs, maybe half that.  If you drive out a thousand miles into nowhere-land, maybe you'll find something for $150k.  In Vancouver you can't even get a 1-bedroom condo for that.  Sheesh!

And my rent is about $1k/month, too.

Uhm, no. OSY != "everyone".

We're not a bunch of superior people, either.

You're all smart. Technically competent. You *could* make that much easily. Many people that have IQs of 12 can't. The average person couldn't under most non-fortuitous circumstances.  Underperformers == slackers.

FUCK THAT.  Do you think it's that easy to make $100k, just because you know tagnuts?

I never called "everyone" a slacker. And Peter, fe, wouldn't have to work 110 hrs/week. He knows like ten times what I do about networking and code. He could make 125k working, what, 45-50 hours? Or Paul, or Harb or Bad Andy...etc. etc. etc.

Oh, sure.  It's just SOOOO to make $125k knowing networking and programming.  

BULLSHIT!

We have a top-notch programmer here who can do fucking EVERYTHING, he writes DEVICE DRIVERS, he thinks Unix in his head, he's put together a huge project from scratch.  He's not making anywhere NEAR that.  And he's LUCKY to have this job.

(Incidentally, I don't think PeterB knows "ten times" as much about programming and networking as you do.  I'd put it on the order of about 100 times.  Programming is hard, if you haven't found this out by now, and programming well (and fast) is extremely hard.  And yet...

Most programmers aren't rich!  Real money is made in management, but most good programmers are shitty managers.  PeterB has talked about this.

Cue: Violins.

Fuck you.

And you were making a "difference". Don't forget that bullshit.

Yeah, I wanted to "make a difference" as a teacher, and while I was teaching, I did.  I influenced lives in a minor yet still important way.

By playing the game. Unfortunately, you were playing EA. EA sucks, so you have my condolences.

EA may indeed suck, but other gaming companies aren't much better.  Try reading fatbabies.com sometime.

Yeah, I can see that happening to me......NOT.  

Sure, Madan, just because that kind of disillusionment and hatred of games happened to, oh, everybody who ever worked in QA, it doesn't mean it would happen to you.  I forgot-- you're "special" :rolleyes:

What kind of asses? BB's ass?

If you're a tester, you lick the lead's ass.  Then if you're a lead you lick the PM's ass and the assistant producer's ass.  When you're the ASSistant producer, you lick the associate producer's ass.  AND SO ON.

You were a programmer? You were a modeller? Really? Wow. Which games. Have I played them?

No, I wasn't a programmer or a modeller.  I knew programmers and modellers.  I worked with them.  I talked to them.  I know what I'm talking about here.

And you left. Hm. You left the dream. To work in IT. Which makes more money. More security? More stability? Hmmm. For whom? For your wife? For your wife and for yourself?

Yeah, I left the dream, but not just for more money (although at the extremely shitty rate EA was paying, it was a large part of it)

No, I left because the corporate bullshit that didn't allow me to learn or DO anything new there.  My mind is like a sponge-- I SOAK up new knowledge and that was what I was craving-- but there was an iron wall between every level of employee at EA, and talent was always recruited from outside, except if you were the producer's brother-in-law, or whatever, you had NO chance at advancement.

That's what spoiled the dream for me.  Bullshit corporate politics, idiotic Dilbert-style managers, nothing but rules, rules, and more bullshit rules, and no innovation, no loyalty to people who stuck with the company.   So I left.

Noone fucking knows. I think I do one minute and the next I wonder. There's no way to be sure. I get along better with my students than most. I'm younger. I can relate better and they respect me a bit more. I push them relatively hard but....

Who fucking knows? Noone. Noone fucking knows.

I think you know, Madan.  Nobody else could know, but you would.

Think about it.

Wed Apr 17 18:50:23 2002

I have heard that the W2K exams are much tougher and more resistant to the overnight crammer... but still, it's so much money for uncertain gain.

I've heard the same thing. I agree with you. Thousands of dollars with classes. Hundreds with books. Either way, there's no sure bet that you'll make more dough.

Quote:  
Dynamic web sites on X anyone?

Dude... PHP+mySQL==free fun for the entire family.

I have to admit:
I have never used PHP.
The little I have seen however makes me think that it's a slightly easier, free form of ASP.

To me, nothing is easier than CFML because CFML *IS* simply HTML running with proprietary functions on a server.

Jeremy,

Quote:  
Uhm, that's BROOKE BURKE. As in, my avatar? As in, perfection attained? As in hot enough to melt lead just by looking at it? As in hotter than the surface of a Neutron Star? As in hotter than the pizza that scalded the roof of your mouth last nite? As in hot enough to misfire every neuron in your brain?

That's nice.  But it's still just a .jpg.  

Don't you *dare* defy the power of the Brooke. Damn YOU! DAMNNNN YOUUUU! :0

One of the things that happens (at least it has to me) when you're married (assuming your wife is reasonably hot to begin with, which Jennifer is) is that the relationship you have (assuming it's a good one, which it is) starts to grow and change, and you start finding this person, who formerly was just another person who you happened to like a lot, is becoming more and more attractive to you.  This is why EM always talks about how his wife is hotter than -insert hot woman here-  It really starts to happen that way.  

For love +1 then vision -1

;)

Quote:  
?? Are you talking trash again? Being able to buy a nice new car is security. Being able to not worry about where your next meal or paycheck is also security. Please, PLEASE no more semantics ok? Save it for nibs or rr or whomever.

But knowing that you can pay for a car or a meal or whatever is only security as long as you have your job!!  As soon as you lose it, everything flies out the window.  How is that security???

Nice try but you know exactly what I'm talking about.  Most careers, heck, most jobs are inherently stable. Otherwise we'd have a 50% unemployment rate.

Security is when you don't have to worry about money ever again, ever.  That only happens when you reach Steve Jobs-level money.  We're talking the $500 million and up only club.  Maybe less, maybe the $100 million people don't worry about money much either, but you know what I mean.

Money is good.

Quote:  
Fucking please. If you're living at a reasonable level and if I maintain the lifestyle I have now(which I never said I would change but thanks for assuming), 100k would be huge.

But you're close to that now!

I am?

Quote:  
35k in America <> 35k in Canada.

35k in Miami, where mean rent is over 1500 a month for an AVERAGE apartment is a problem.

I'm glad you live in an area where a small house(1-2 rooms) doesn't go for 195k but Miami is expensive.

House?  You are talking about an actual house???

Yes, you know. Four walls(with more internal) and a roof?

I live in Vancouver, Madan.  An average house goes for about $2 MILLION.  In the suburbs, maybe half that.  If you drive out a thousand miles into nowhere-land, maybe you'll find something for $150k.  In Vancouver you can't even get a 1-bedroom condo for that.  Sheesh!

:rolleyes:

Then I assume that everyone in Vancouver is living on the street.

And my rent is about $1k/month, too.

1k <> 1.5k

Quote:  
Uhm, no. OSY != "everyone".

We're not a bunch of superior people, either.

Mean intelligence in OSY(osyXmean) > Mean global intelligence(globalXmean).

Dim osyXmean = 140
Dim globalXmean = 100

If osyXmean > globalXmean Then
osy = 'superior'
end if

Quote:  
You're all smart. Technically competent. You *could* make that much easily. Many people that have IQs of 12 can't. The average person couldn't under most non-fortuitous circumstances.  Underperformers == slackers.

FUCK THAT.  Do you think it's that easy to make $100k, just because you know tagnuts?

If I knew what you did about networking, I probably could. Then again, I wouldn't be hanging out with my beautiful wife, like a certain Reimer. ;)

Quote:  
I never called "everyone" a slacker. And Peter, fe, wouldn't have to work 110 hrs/week. He knows like ten times what I do about networking and code. He could make 125k working, what, 45-50 hours? Or Paul, or Harb or Bad Andy...etc. etc. etc.

Oh, sure.  It's just SOOOO to make $125k knowing networking and programming.  

Uhm, I have a friend. He's MS cert up the ying(and yang). ASP bada$$. He makes 150 bucks an hour. Granted, he knows every MS technology under the sun. .NET, Soap, and all the other crap that makes me cringe. ;)

BULLSHIT!

Is very good fertilizer.

(Incidentally, I don't think PeterB knows "ten times" as much about programming and networking as you do.  I'd put it on the order of about 100 times.

Ouch.^2

but most good programmers are shitty managers.  PeterB has talked about this.

No, Peter disputed this.

Quote:  
Cue: Violins.

Fuck you.

I don't think your wife would like that. You should consult wi her first. :)

Quote:  
And you were making a "difference". Don't forget that bullshit.

Yeah, I wanted to "make a difference" as a teacher, and while I was teaching, I did.  I influenced lives in a minor yet still important way.

Cue: Violins.

Quote:  
By playing the game. Unfortunately, you were playing EA. EA sucks, so you have my condolences.

EA may indeed suck, but other gaming companies aren't much better.  Try reading fatbabies.com sometime.

ID rulez
Bungie rulez
Black Isle rulez
Bioware rulez
Blizzard rulez

Quote:  
Yeah, I can see that happening to me......NOT.  

Sure, Madan, just because that kind of disillusionment and hatred of games happened to, oh, everybody who ever worked in QA, it doesn't mean it would happen to you.  I forgot-- you're "special"  

Thanks. You're sweet.
:evilgrin:

Quote:  
You were a programmer? You were a modeller? Really? Wow. Which games. Have I played them?

No, I wasn't a programmer or a modeller.  I knew programmers and modellers.  I worked with them.  I talked to them.  I know what I'm talking about here.

Who said you didn't know what you were talking about? You simply started to talk about modellers and programmers and I thought you were talking about yourself.

Quote:  
And you left. Hm. You left the dream. To work in IT. Which makes more money. More security? More stability? Hmmm. For whom? For your wife? For your wife and for yourself?

Yeah, I left the dream, but not just for more money (although at the extremely shitty rate EA was paying, it was a large part of it)

Point: Madan

No, I left because the corporate bullshit that didn't allow me to learn or DO anything new there.  My mind is like a sponge-- I SOAK up new knowledge and that was what I was craving-- but there was an iron wall between every level of employee at EA, and talent was always recruited from outside, except if you were the producer's brother-in-law, or whatever, you had NO chance at advancement.

Advancement to do new things ......

and make more money. :)

That's what spoiled the dream for me.  Bullshit corporate politics, idiotic Dilbert-style managers, nothing but rules, rules, and more bullshit rules, and no innovation, no loyalty to people who stuck with the company.   So I left.

And now you make more money. Cool.

But maybe you should give it back. You don't want to get used to a better lifestyle.

M.

Wed Apr 17 19:37:37 2002

Wed Apr 17 20:02:17 2002

m.

Wed Apr 17 20:44:33 2002

Madan:

re: PHP.

It's so much more than just a "free version of ASP".  There are so many free plugins and extensions for it (creating Flash on the fly... creating PDFs on the fly... so many other cool things) it just does SO MUCH MORE than ASP.  With the added benefit that it works on any plaform.  So you're not spending your time learning MS-only stuff.

I highly recommend investigating it.  It may not be as easy as CFM... but damn it's cool.

but anyway... that's for another thread.

Wed Apr 17 21:11:33 2002

where can I get the server and a tute?

M.

Wed Apr 17 22:29:02 2002

php is nice (especially 4.x) because it's cross platform for the most part but has some scalability problems. I'd put it at the same level of ASP 3.0.

Of course, ASP.NET raised the bar. A lot.

It's kinda funny seeing Microsoft or Apple come out with new things and the OSS squirrels running around in panic with something new to copy :)

PS: Chrisale, stop using my face! :)

(Edited by PaoloM at 3:30 pm on April 17, 2002)

Wed Apr 17 23:49:05 2002

Thu Apr 18 13:09:41 2002

It's yet another language for you to learn, which I really wouldn't recommend.  Stick with ECMAScript, or Java, or even VB/VBScript, if you know them.

Saying "it does more than ASP" is idiotic.  ASP is a fucking object model, not a language.  No, ASP can't generate pictures, or flash movies, or PDFs, or do *anything* other than maintain some session state and a provide access to HTTP headers and so on.  This is a Good Thing.  Rather than doing what PHP does -- for instance, re-invent database access APIs (many times over) -- it uses existing components.  If you can manipulate a database in VB, you can manipulate a database in ASP (and vice versa).  This dramatically reduces the learning required.

???? ASP is a wrapper for scripting. I said VBS in ASP. Please don't put words in my mouth and leave the psychic mind-reading bullshit at home.

ASP *is* complicated.

Even some ASP forum MS ppl I've met don't exactly know when to include VBS on the page or set it on another page.

It's overly complicated. Six lines when I can finish the same job in CFMX in two-three? No fucking excuse for that.

Here are three versions of an [obfuscated] bit of C code:
[code]
#include<stdio.h>
#define m main
#define C char
#define I int

I m(I c,C**g)
{
static C n[]="0123456789abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz                                ";
I o=sizeof(n)/sizeof(*n)-1;
switch(c++)
{
case 1:
for(;
(printf("Please enter a number (0 to exit): ") &&
scanf("%d",(I*)g) &&
*(I*)g) &&
(1[g]=(C*)16)&&

printf("That number in hex: %s\n",(C*)m(c,g))&&
(1[g]=(C*)2)&&
printf("That number in binary: %s\n",(C*)

m(c,g))
;)
;
break;
default:
I v=(I)0[g],b=(I)1[g];
if(!((0==b)||(b>36)))
do(--o)[n]=(v%b)[n];
while(v/=b);
}
return(I)(n+o);
}

I m(I c,C**g)
{
static C n[]="0123456789abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz                                ";

I o=sizeof(n)/sizeof(*n)-1;
switch(c++)
{
case 1:
for(;(printf("Please enter a number (0 to exit): ")
&&scanf("%d",(I*)g)&&*(I*)g)&&(1[g]=(C*)16)&&printf("That number in hex:

%s\n",(C*)m(c,g))&&(1[g]=(C*)2)&&printf("That number in binary:

%s\n",(C*)m(c,g)););break;
default:
I v=(I)0[g],b=(I)1[g];
if(!((0==b)||(b>36)))
do(--o)[n]=(v%b)[n];
while(v/=b);
}
return(I)(n+o);
}

I m(I c,C**g){static C n[]="0123456789abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz                                ";

I o=sizeof(n)/sizeof(*n)-1;switch(c++){case 1:for(;(printf("Please enter a number (0 to exit): ")

&&scanf("%d",(I*)g)&&*(I*)g)&&(1[g]=(C*)16)&&printf("That number in hex: %s\n",(C*)m(c,g))

&&(1[g]=(C*)2)&&printf("That number in binary: %s\n",(C*)m(c,g)););

break;default:I v=(I)0[g],b=(I)1[g];if(!((0==b)||(b>36)))do(--o)[n]=(v%b)[n];while(v/=b);}return(I)(n+o);}
[/code]

The only difference between them being the number of lines (i.e. whitespace).

None of them are particularly easy to follow; they make use of various nasty bits of the C language.

But, if you had to decipher them, which would you prefer to work with?  The top, middle, or bottom -- bearing in mind that the bottom version is the "least complicated" by virtue of having the fewest lines.  I don't know about you, but if I were trying to understand the code, I'd prefer the top form.  If all I had was the bottom form, I would go so far as to turn it into the top form.

Lines of code is an extremely poor metric for determining code complexity, and you would do yourself a favour if you stopped using it as such.

(Edited by DrPizza at 2:12 pm on April 18, 2002)

Thu Apr 18 13:11:40 2002

Thu Apr 18 14:48:28 2002

Thu Apr 18 14:50:12 2002

I think most C code would be enormously improved if it contained actual smileys.

:chuckles:

:)

Thu Apr 18 15:09:25 2002

Thu Apr 18 16:49:13 2002

PHP is fucking awful.

I don't know anything about it. Is it easier or harder than VBS/Jscript to learn?

It's yet another language for you to learn, which I really wouldn't recommend.  Stick with ECMAScript, or Java, or even VB/VBScript, if you know them.

Errn.

Saying "it does more than ASP" is idiotic.  ASP is a fucking object model, not a language.  No, ASP can't generate pictures, or flash movies, or PDFs, or do *anything* other than maintain some session state and a provide access to HTTP headers and so on.  This is a Good Thing.  Rather than doing what PHP does -- for instance, re-invent database access APIs (many times over) -- it uses existing components.  If you can manipulate a database in VB, you can manipulate a database in ASP (and vice versa).  This dramatically reduces the learning required.

That remains to be seen. I'll take a look at PHP and decide for myself. chrisale might be right. It might be better...for me.

Quote: ???? ASP is a wrapper for scripting. I said VBS in ASP. Please don't put words in my mouth and leave the psychic mind-reading bullshit at home.
If you agree that it's not a language, why are you saying crap like "it's complicated"?

It is complicated.

Quote: ASP *is* complicated.
No, it isn't.  It's incredibly simple.  It's a handful of objects, with a handful of methods and properties.  It's desperately simple.  You could sit down and learn the objects, their properties, and their methods in an afternoon.

Handful? HANDFUL? No. And actually programming in VBS is a pain in the ass if you're a non programmer. All the programmers say "it's easy". Yes, easy. Easy for someone who already understands OOP or methods and classes.  Not easy from scratch.

Quote: Even some ASP forum MS ppl I've met don't exactly know when to include VBS on the page or set it on another page.
What on earth are you talking about?  That question looks to have nothing to do with ASP.

Quote: It's overly complicated. Six lines when I can finish the same job in CFMX in two-three? No fucking excuse for that.
Lines of code is not a good means of determining complexity, as anyone who programs knows.

I never said making lines of interminable code. It takes *less* code to run a CFMX app than an ASP one.
Obviously, CFML has....limitations. It is slower than ASP and more expensive. But it is *much* much easier. It's HTML. And no, you can't compare learning VBS or Ecma with HTML.

M.

Thu Apr 18 18:42:01 2002

I don't know anything about it. Is it easier or harder than VBS/Jscript to learn?

That remains to be seen.

It is complicated.

Handful? HANDFUL? No.

There are 7 objects.

The Application object has two collections, four methods, two events.

The ASPError object has 9 properties.  You will rarely if ever need this object.

The ObjectContext object has two methods, two events.  You will rarely if ever need this object.

The Request object has five collections, one property, and one method.

The Response object has one collection, 9 properties, and 8 methods.

The Server object has one property, and seven methods.

The Session object has two collections, four properties, three methods, and two events.

That's it.  That's all ASP has.  Most applications won't use anything other than the Response, Request, Server, and Session objects, and only a handful of their methods.

ASP is extremely thin.  It has just what you need for maintaining session and application state, and for reading from and writing to the browser.  It doesn't do anything more.  And if you find it complicated, you might as well give up now, because it's the leasy complicated system there is.

And actually programming in VBS is a pain in the ass if you're a non programmer.

All the programmers say "it's easy". Yes, easy. Easy for someone who already understands OOP or methods and classes.  Not easy from scratch.

As programming languages go, VB/VBScript *is* easy.  Its syntax is simple, it is high level.

I never said making lines of interminable code. It takes *less* code to run a CFMX app than an ASP one.

Obviously, CFML has....limitations. It is slower than ASP and more expensive. But it is *much* much easier. It's HTML. And no, you can't compare learning VBS or Ecma with HTML.

And, yes, you can compare them.  The skills of learning a proper language are a lot more versatile and a lot more generic.  The cost of this is that simple tasks may be simpler with CFML.

Thu Apr 18 19:25:00 2002

from Madan posted at 9:49 am on April 18, 2002


It is complicated.

Honest question, because if you can show me parts of it that are badly documented or hard to understand, I could write a little introductory article.

Thu Apr 18 20:07:59 2002

However, that does not, by any means, make PHP hard.

If you can do Javascript or VBScript you can do PHP.  The great thing about PHP is that you can get so many things for free...

want a forum?  www.phpbb.com
it's free... you download it, stick it in your web directory and your done.

there are so many really cool things that you can do with PHP that, if you were using ASP you'd have to rely on 3rd party and MS specific libraries that are likely expensive.

ASP is easy... but it doesn't do much all by itself and if you want it to do cool things, you have to pay.  PHP may not be hugely scalable, but if you're just running small business sites it'll be fine and if you don't want to be tied to one platform, it's the only way to go.  And hey, I just noticed www.maccentral.com runs on PHP so it can't be that bad for busy sites.

Thu Apr 18 20:54:24 2002

What do you find complicated about ASP?

Honest question, because if you can show me parts of it that are badly documented or hard to understand, I could write a little introductory article.

I really can't explain it. Maybe Peter is right and I'm wrong. Maybe the books I bought just suck(ASP in 21 days anyone?). Maybe I'm just donkey, butt-stupid(probably).

But it's taken me a ridiculous amount of time to pick up the scraps of ASP. Yeah, I do spend more time talking about it than practicing it. But that's because it takes me forever to get the smallest apps to work.

*shrug*

M.

Thu Apr 18 20:59:40 2002

CFML is easy to pick up and do something with right away. It's kind of like BASIC that way.

Almost anything else seems harder by comparison because you need to know more before you can make things work and understand why they work.

It's not so much the height of the learning curves as it is the difference in the shapes.

Thu Apr 18 21:59:12 2002

I really can't explain it. Maybe Peter is right and I'm wrong. Maybe the books I bought just suck(ASP in 21 days anyone?). Maybe I'm just donkey, butt-stupid(probably).

Thu Apr 18 22:38:09 2002

from Madan posted at 1:54 pm on April 18, 2002


But it's taken me a ridiculous amount of time to pick up the scraps of ASP. Yeah, I do spend more time talking about it than practicing it. But that's because it takes me forever to get the smallest apps to work.

Fair enough. Maybe some examples of what you're trying to do? I know that sometimes there are different ways to approach the same problem, and maybe there's a better solution...

Fri Apr 19 11:45:06 2002

m.

Fri Apr 19 16:56:30 2002

Next time I'll make sure not to offer any help, given that you obviously don't want to get any advice whatsoever, being perfectly content of bitching about things you barely know.

Fri Apr 19 17:37:51 2002

Fri Apr 19 18:00:10 2002

Uhm, I have a friend. He's MS cert up the ying(and yang). ASP bada$$. He makes 150 bucks an hour. Granted, he knows every MS technology under the sun. .NET, Soap, and all the other crap that makes me cringe.

We've all heard of "friends" who make $100, $150, $200 an hour doing "computer consulting".  Yeah.  Sure.

The thing is, you can charge high hourly rates if you are doing short specialized contract jobs that only take you a few hours to do.  I charge $40/hour for any updates/assistance to the medical billing program that my dad wrote and I rewrote for this one client.  These billable hours happen RARELY.  It is extremely difficult to find regular paid contract work at that rate or higher unless you sign up with some kind of consulting company, and if you do that there's no way you're earning that kind of hourly rate any more.  It doesn't magically translate into $120,000 a year.  It just doesn't..

Otherwise, why the fuck wouldn't PeterB and myself and everyone in between be earning that kind of money?  Too lazy?  Yeah, right.  :rolleyes:

Maybe there was a brief window during the .com era where tech people got paid insane amounts of money, but that time is OVER, and for many of us, never even happened.  

It makes me angry when you can just casually say things like "oh, you guys could all be earning $120k, you must be lazy".  Sure, Madan.  Whatever.  If it's that easy, why don't you do it?

Fri Apr 19 19:21:28 2002

Paolo:

\Madan, it's the second time you complain about HTML/ASP and I offer you my help. And you come out with "I don't care anymore" or "it's ok, it just took me forever".

???? Uhm, I appreciate the offer Paolo but, I'm being honest now, I haven't have touched the ASP book at all. Most of my questions are fuzzy. I can go back(and now I will) and I'll bombard your ass with questions in by Monday. It's about time I picked it up again anyways. Just don't think I'm refusing to answer because I just want to bitch. I really didn't understand.

Next time I'll make sure not to offer any help, given that you obviously don't want to get any advice whatsoever, being perfectly content of bitching about things you barely know.

:(

Peter,

Then again, he never gives us genuine code examples of ASP generating HTML -- different HTML for different browsers, no less -- without explicit coding to that effect.

??? When did I say that this thread?
I didn't. I simply said my code wasn't working. My simple book example crap.

Reimer,

Uhm, I have a friend. He's MS cert up the ying(and yang). ASP bada$$. He makes 150 bucks an hour. Granted, he knows every MS technology under the sun. .NET, Soap, and all the other crap that makes me cringe.

We've all heard of "friends" who make $100, $150, $200 an hour doing "computer consulting".  Yeah.  Sure.

???? What the fuck? Uhm, believe whatever you fucking want. He's the guy that built the store I maintain and, yes, he makes assfulls of cash. If you want to think I'm lying, please, by all fucking means, do so. I also know a Java programmer for AOL that makes almost 150k a year. But yeah, he must also be imaginary too.

The thing is, you can charge high hourly rates if you are doing short specialized contract jobs that only take you a few hours to do.  I charge $40/hour for any updates/assistance to the medical billing program that my dad wrote and I rewrote for this one client.  These billable hours happen RARELY.  It is extremely difficult to find regular paid contract work at that rate or higher unless you sign up with some kind of consulting company, and if you do that there's no way you're earning that kind of hourly rate any more.  It doesn't magically translate into $120,000 a year.  It just doesn't..

Uhm, yes, he *does* work as a consultant but *no* he doesn't work for only a coulple of hours/days on a project. Our store took 4 months to build from scratch and he's got mutiple clients/contracts so, yes, he does make lots of cash. Just because you don't doesn't mean he doesn't.

Otherwise, why the fuck wouldn't PeterB and myself and everyone in between be earning that kind of money?  Too lazy?  Yeah, right.  

A. I wouldn't put you in Peter's league either.
B. I don't think $ is a huge deal with him.
C. Your circumstances don't define the industry.

It makes me angry when you can just casually say things like "oh, you guys could all be earning $120k, you must be lazy".  Sure, Madan.  Whatever.  If it's that easy, why don't you do it?

I think that's quite obvious.

I'm not as technically proficient as you are.

M.

Sat Apr 20 00:32:54 2002

??? When did I say that this thread?

And despite people explaining countless times why you were wrong, you persisted in making the claim.

You can't help those that don't want to be helped, and on more than one occasion I've got the distinct impression that you don't want to be helped.  You're determined that ASP is complicated, and you're damned if you're going to let anyone get in the way of that perception.

???? What the fuck? Uhm, believe whatever you fucking want. He's the guy that built the store I maintain and, yes, he makes assfulls of cash. If you want to think I'm lying, please, by all fucking means, do so. I also know a Java programmer for AOL that makes almost 150k a year. But yeah, he must also be imaginary too.

A. I wouldn't put you in Peter's league either.
B. I don't think $ is a huge deal with him.
C. Your circumstances don't define the industry.

Sat Apr 20 01:13:48 2002

And despite people explaining countless times why you were wrong, you persisted in making the claim.

Actually, it's been more along the lines of me presenting some very unexplainable differences. Like the alignment issue that you couldn't explain...or anyone else, for that matter, but whatever.

You can't help those that don't want to be helped, and on more than one occasion I've got the distinct impression that you don't want to be helped.  You're determined that ASP is complicated, and you're damned if you're going to let anyone get in the way of that perception.

It's not that at all. So maybe you should adjust your perceptions. I have three different ASP books and I've started each one twice. And each one has eventually thrown my ass.

Maybe I'm dense. Maybe it's the platform. Whichever the case, I'm not getting it.

M.

Sat Apr 20 01:27:42 2002

Actually, it's been more along the lines of me presenting some very unexplainable differences.

That wasn't so hard, was it?

Like the alignment issue that you couldn't explain...or anyone else, for that matter, but whatever.

It's not that at all. So maybe you should adjust your perceptions.

I have three different ASP books and I've started each one twice. And each one has eventually thrown my ass.

Maybe I'm dense. Maybe it's the platform. Whichever the case, I'm not getting it.

Sat Apr 20 21:32:49 2002

Then I assume that everyone in Vancouver is living on the street

No, they are living in apartments, basement suites, and condos.

My wife and I are looking at condos right now.  ONE BEDROOM starts at $175,000.  House?  Don't make me fucking laugh.

Sat Apr 20 21:43:37 2002