Mensan seeks work

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Author: Dr. Ghastly
Date:  
Subject: Mensan seeks work
I was JUST about to say something like that, tho I don't think he meant any
harm by the mocking. God knows I mock myself sometimes just because my exp
is so little.

But I agree that you can't really hold a 20-25yr old responsible for knowing
everything a 40-50 yr old programmer, who was there fromt he beginning,
does. Not really fair :)

And, if I DID, then you would't HAVE a job, because that would mean my
learning capacity and speed for learning are SO far ahead of yours, that you
would then be "vaporware" :)

So some clueless 20+ yr olds help keep that job for you. Otherwise they
would just give us morons the job for less $$ thereby saving the company
TONS of cash.


----- Original Message -----
From: "Matt Alexander" <>
To: <>
Sent: Sunday, February 10, 2002 8:47 PM
Subject: Re: Mensan seeks work


> George, expect the problem to get worse as time goes on. There's just too
> much information and it's growing more and more each day. A typical
> 4-year CS degree can no longer teach everything that a "programmer" should
> know, and most colleges just hit on the major themes, so these graduates
> are going to have to fill in a lot of the gaps as they go along in the
> workforce. You should feel fortunate that you started when things were
> more simple, but instead of mocking the younger generation for not knowing
> everything you feel they should know, try to educate them so by the time
> they're 40 they will know everything.
> ~M
>
> ------------
> The I Ching:
> "Before the beginning of great brilliance, there must be chaos. Before a
> brilliant person begins something great, they must look foolish to the
> crowd."
>
>
> On Sun, 10 Feb 2002, George Toft wrote:
>
> > Hi Doc,
> >
> > I've not seen your work. I don't know you. Do not be offended
> > by what follows.
> >
> > Here's an example of the 40+ crowd:
> > - An error manifests itself in the retrieval of data from the
> > mainframe. He picks up the PRINTOUT (you know - ink on paper)
> > of the code, and finds the error in about 15 minutes.
> >
> >
> > Here are some examples of the under 30 crowd:
> > - Write a java program that runs at 11:53pm via cron to process
> > the day's transactions. Unfortunately, a [well documented] bug
> > in the JDK (1.1.8) does not recognize Arizona's lack of Daylight
> > Savings shift, so six months of the year the java program thinks
> > it is 12:53am on the next day, and it cheefully tries to process
> > all of the transactions that have not yet occured. This makes me
> > wonder about the age of the programmer at Sun that didn't know
> > that Arizona is not always in the Mountain Time Zone.
> >
> > - Let's retrieve the CGI query string and search it for a "?".
> > Guess what happens if there isn't a query string: Null Pointer
> > Exception. Java does not respond well to searching a null string.
> > This 20-something never heard of the rule: Never trust anything
> > another program sends you and didn't bother to add one line
> > of code to see if the string was null.
> >
> > - Another 20-something violated a corollary of the above: Never,
> > under any circumstance, trust a user. We service a Spanish
> > speaking population. Guess what happens to LDAP when you feed it
> > non IA-5 data, like an "n" with a tilde. It chokes with really
> > geeky error message to the user. This guy never gave any thought
> > to the Unicode character set, either.
> >
> > - An pair of almost 30-somethings wrote a program to accept data
> > and pad it with spaces to fill the fields to form a fixed-length
> > request header to a mainframe database. They assumed the User ID
> > field was 10 characters. The program spec was 6-20 characters.
> > Guess what happened when the first 11 character user ID was entered:
> > It shifted all of the other fields right one space and the query
> > blew up. I know we can figure out the faults here (not
> > programming to the spec, not checking the data, improper
> > testing).
> >
> > - Yet another 20-something (with 8 years experience) had no clue
> > what the end of line terminator was for various operating systems.
> > This was a shame since he was writing code on a Unix platform
> > that wrote data for an NT system to process. Unix uses 0x0A and
> > NT/DOS uses 0x0A0D. The NT system saw only one line in the file
> > instead of the several hundred lines that the Unix program put in
> > it. I tried to discuss this with him, and he had no clue what
> > hexadecimal was. I had to send him references from the
> > introductory section of the Java documentation that explained
> > EOL terminators, and I had to send him hex dumps of good and bad
> > data.
> >
> > - Another 20-something wrote a program that retrieved information
> > from a database. If the query returned a null (data did not
> > exist), or there was no connectivity to the database, the exact
> > same error message was displayed. When she finally connected
> > to the database, she kept getting the same error. Oh wait,
> > there's no data in the database. That only took 4 days to isolate.
> > It would have only taken a few hours to fix if she actually took a
> > few minutes to create two different error messages.
> >
> > I taught networking for 4 semesters at the University of Hawaii.
> > The first class was always spent teaching Binary Math so they
> > could understand basic IP networking, like subnet masks. The
> > school's curriculum did not teach binary math. I had almost
> > 100 20-somethings go through my classes learn what a bit
> > was, and what a bitwise AND was only because I made them.
> > Otherwise, they would have graduated with a CIS degree without
> > having ever performed any binary math.
> >
> > Doc, I sincerely hope you don't do this this level of work. When
> > I was studying Computer Science, these pitfalls were preached in
> > the 100 and 200 level classes. Maybe you and I came from a really
> > good school, or perhaps the programmers I deal with came from
> > bad schools. Maybe because I'm an old fart, that my school focused
> > on the basics because that's all we had - OOP hadn't been invented
> > yet. It seems that schools now are so focused on Web and OOP
> > technologies that they don't have time to teach the basics like
> > binary math, bit operations, and data checking. Maybe that's
> > why the 20-something programmers at Microsoft still write code
> > susceptable to buffer overflows - another pitfall that was
> > crammed into my head in 1979.
> >
> > Or maybe I just expect too much from someone who has a degree in
> > Computer Science (like knowing how a computer works), and I become
> > very disappointed when that doesn't happen.
> >
> > I would like to say these are isolated incidents, but this is what
> > I see every week. Different problem, different programmer, same
> > recurring theme. I won't even go into the 24 year olds from
> > [over]PriceWaterhouseCoopers with "5 years experience." OK, they
> > count funny - I didn't know college homework assignments counted
> > as experience.
> >
> > Even More Jaded and Searching for Some Alcohol,
> >
> > George
> >
> >
> > "Dr. Ghastly" wrote:
> > >
> > > I'm Under 30. I don't consider myself clueless.
> > >
> > > ******************************************************************
> > > Once you start down the dark path, forever will it
> > > dominate your destiny, consume you it will...
> > > ******************************************************************
> > > ----- Original Message -----
> > > From: "George Toft" <>
> > > To: <>
> > > Sent: Sunday, February 10, 2002 5:49 PM
> > > Subject: Re: Mensan seeks work
> > >
> > > > I'm 50-50 on that issue. Last job would hire based on ability,
regardless
> > > > of paper. Current one requires paper to set foot inside. From what
I've
> > > > seen of programmers, if they're under 30, they're still clueless,
degreed
> > > > or not (flame suit on).
> > > >
> > > > George
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > "Dr. Ghastly" wrote:
> > > > >
> > > > > Not to mention that most places, my company especially, consider
2-3
> > > years
> > > > > experience equivalent to a degree.
> > > > >
> > > > > ******************************************************************
> > > > > Once you start down the dark path, forever will it
> > > > > dominate your destiny, consume you it will...
> > > > > ******************************************************************
> > > > > ----- Original Message -----
> > > > > From: "George Toft" <>
> > > > > To: <>
> > > > > Sent: Sunday, February 10, 2002 12:11 PM
> > > > > Subject: Re: Mensan seeks work
> > > > >
> > > > > > I second that. We just lost a guy because he claimed to have a
> > > Bachelor's
> > > > > > Degree when he did not. It only took them a week to figure it
out.
> > > He
> > > > > > was a contractor for six months, so he knew his stuff. When
there is
> > > > > > an abundant supply of talent, you can be choosy. When there is
a
> > > scarcity
> > > > > > of talent, you take whatever comes your way. You know where we
are
> > > right
> > > > > now. .
> > > > > > .
> > > > > >
> > > > > > George
> > > > > >
> > > > > > "Dr. Ghastly" wrote:
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > Uh, considering the work your looking for, I wouldn't consider
> > > lying.
> > > > > The
> > > > > > > company I work for does EXENSIVE background checks.
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > >
******************************************************************
> > > > > > > Once you start down the dark path, forever will it
> > > > > > > dominate your destiny, consume you it will...
> > > > > > >
******************************************************************
> > > > > > > ----- Original Message -----
> > > > > > > From: "Trent Shipley" <>
> > > > > > > To: <>
> > > > > > > Sent: Wednesday, February 06, 2002 10:14 PM
> > > > > > > Subject: Re: Mensan seeks work
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > I've seen really high numbers about lying on resumes. I
suspect
> > > that
> > > > > > > people
> > > > > > > > usually get away with it. Of course, if you don't then it
can
> > > really
> > > > > bite
> > > > > > > > you in the ass--especially if you claim to be an experienced
> > > surgeon
> > > > > or
> > > > > > > > litigator.
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > > Actually, another alternative is to lie about your
> > > > > > > > > experience if you really know your stuff, but that usually
comes
> > > > > around
> > > > > > > to
> > > > > > > > > bite you in the ass.
> > > > > > > > > ~M
> > > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > ________________________________________________
> > > > > > > > See http://PLUG.phoenix.az.us/navigator-mail.shtml if your
mail
> > > > > doesn't
> > > > > > > post to the list quickly and you use Netscape to write mail.
> > > > > > > >
> > > > > > > > PLUG-discuss mailing list -
> > >
> > > > > > > >
http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > ________________________________________________
> > > > > > > See http://PLUG.phoenix.az.us/navigator-mail.shtml if your
mail
> > > doesn't
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> > > > > > >
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doesn't
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doesn't post to the list quickly and you use Netscape to write mail.
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