Ask Slashdot: Best Options For Ongoing Education? 149
An anonymous reader writes "Lately, with the volatility of the economy, I have been thinking of expanding my education to reach into other areas related to my career. I have a computer science degree from Purdue and have been employed as a firmware engineer for 10+ years writing C and C++. I like what I do, but to me it seems that most job opportunities are available for people with skills in higher level languages such as ASP, .NET, C#, PHP, Scripting, Web applications and so on. Is it worth going back to school to get this training? I was thinking that a computer information technology degree would fit the bill, but I am concerned that going back to college would require a lot of time wasted doing electives and taking courses that don't get to the 'meat' of the learning. What would you do?"
Don't go to school for languages... (Score:5, Insightful)
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I agree with your advice, but I'm compelled to point out that your assessment of school is specifically for tech schools. A good college is a bad choice for the submitter for the opposite reason: it'll teach how to solve problems, but usually without regard to whether the languages or platforms used look good on a resume. (Then again, I'm always wary of a tech person who automatically dismisses electives as a waste.)
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(Then again, I'm always wary of a tech person who automatically dismisses electives as a waste.)
Rings true... when I went to get my MSSE degree (funded by my employer), the most fun classes were actually the electives. One of the first classes I took as an ASS ("advanced special student" prior to getting on a degree track) was a signals analysis class where we learned about z-transforms and fourier transforms... stuff that I had already been familiar with after years of staring at Winamp / XMMS / Milkdrop spectrum analyzers and had assumed would be covered in my undergraduate engineering maths progr
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All that Fourier transform stuff is more of an EE thing... I just took the exam (theory of signals, I think it would be called in English) here in Germany and it was freakin brutal.
Getting a small taste of the subject in an elective would have been preferable ;)
And if you can't think of an application ... (Score:4, Insightful)
... or if you don't want to just write a toy program that you're going to throw away, then find some open source project that you can contribute to.
Or check Code For America [codeforamerica.org] (or whatever the equivalent is in your country) to help out on local projects ... then you're also networking in your area, if you're looking for a new job.
Go to school for learning the fundamentals of programming ('this is a variable', 'this is a function'), or maybe to get a deeper understanding of different styles of programming (procedural / functional / OO / event-driven, etc.) ... but for learning languages you're often better off working on a project you care about and maybe finding a support community (local users group for that language, or the support community behind that project) or a mentor (eg, someone else from that project)
If you're one of those people who learn better from structured education ... then maybe look into a MOOC [mooc-list.com] or community college. This is not one of those situations where shelling out university prices is appropriate.
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Also, +1 this answer.
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I thought school was supposed to teach a framework for solving problems, instead of the solutions to specific problems.
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Not at my school.
In my degree I take courses from multiple departments: engineering mechanics,electrical eng,mech eng, physics, computer science,writing courses, and a few liberal electives(I took two american history courses and first semester german) There were no classes, that I took at least, that didn't allow reasonable amounts of questioning, unless a student was just being ridiculous.
Re: Don't go to school for languages... (Score:2)
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Getting a Computer Science Degree is good, but it isn't about learning how to program in the newest hottest language. It is about Computer Science, Theory, Methodologies, Styles and Best Practices. Now this is good because it gives you a strong foundation to be a really good programmer, not sweat about learning new languages, and knowing where to focus your mental attention on (Meeting the requirements vs. Just getting it to work)
Now if you have years of experience and no degree, there could still be val
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I take issue with the idea that a CS degree at most schools would give you the foundation to be a good programmer.
There's far too much emphasis on math, and far too little emphasis on what really matters in software. I will never ask one of my employees to solve a partial differential equation. But I will ask them to write maintainable code (even simple shit like don't copy and paste big blocks of code seems to not be taught at all) and to consider usability and UI at every step.
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"Just learn them."
Further, I would say don't learn PHP, unless you are just studying the basic principles of how Web applications work.
I'm not saying any one language is perfect. But PHP is primitive and has a collection of built-in methods with woefully inconsistent syntax (parameters). Personally I consider it less of a "language", than a hodgepodge of inconsistent utility functions. You learn PHP not via the principles of its design, if any, but merely by memorizing the functions you need and the parameters they accept
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Learning to write good PHP code would be a huge benefit, since it seems to be a rare skill, and as you point out, the language gives you plenty of rope to hang yourself with.
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Just learn them.
I am taking a "free online" course in programming Android for Mobile Handheld Systems. I can deal with passively listening to the lecture videos, I can deal with looking up the information required for the quizzes, but I have to draw the line at jumping the hoops required for the automated lab grading system. For the time invested in figuring out what hoops these guys want me to jump through, I can finish writing my own app, learn how to color outside their lines, and generally get a better education in A
Learn on your own, build something you can show (Score:1)
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The keys to getting a job in a bleak job environment is networking with ppl
in that field, and making an online portfolio that demonstrates real world
provable ability.
Social networks like linkedin and such that show other workers and bosses
that favor you highly lend credibility to your resume/cv.
Your degree will suffice. (Score:5, Insightful)
Just start learning the new languages. You'll be surprised at how easy they are to pick up when you already have programming background..
IMO: You'd waste time & money going back to school.
Re:Your degree will suffice. (Score:4, Informative)
There is another alternative. I went back to school because if I'm doing something on my own, life tends to get in the way. Taking a class forces me to do the work. That being said, that is the situation that applies to me. Perhaps you have more self-discipline and learn effectively on your own as other posters have suggested. However, you don't have to earn another degree. Just enroll as a non-degree student and cherry pick the courses you would find useful. Just because you a CS degree doesn't mean that you have to go to a 4 year college. I have an MS in Computing, but I'm taking some courses at technical college (2 year college). Go for the knowledge you think is useful for your goals and career. Good Luck!
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Pretty much anything requires a 4 year degree now. (yes, you can "get away" without one but you limit your options and make your life more difficult)
If your trying to jump into the programing field it depends what your current degree/job experaince are to the best approach.
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but a degree is a foot in the door... it's proof that you meet the minimum requirements of a programmer (that's the assumption anyway)
it's very difficult to prove your worth without one... i develop software professionally but (legally) i can't demonstrate that software to a new employer so i'm limited to verbally describing how awesome it is.
I suppose, but (Score:5, Insightful)
Chicken/egg (Score:3)
Yes, because there's apparently much more demand for them, so more people develop those skills. I'm currently doing .NET/web stuff specifically because I couldn't find work writing C. (And I'm entry-level, so it's not as if experience was a factor -- in fact, I wrote C & Fortran in my research assistant job while at school).
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Generalization == many jobs, much competition, low(er) pay
Specialization == fewer jobs, less competition, much higher pay
At a previous job, we had an in-house programmer who pulled the third-highest salary in the company because the in-house app was written in some little-known variant of an old version of Visual Basic. However, it got to the point where a total rewrite was on the drawing board because that language didn't work well well with the APIs of other software we were starting to use, and a web-bas
Re:I suppose, but (Score:4, Informative)
After looking into switching software fields to web/database I decided to stick with embedded. The fact is that there is still a demand for embedded software and I'd have to take a significant pay cut to switch out of it. I guess it boils down to if you want more *perceived* job security at lower pay or to take your chances at higher pay.
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You already have experience in something specialized. There may not be many jobs per se, but there aren't many people to fill those. Move into driver development or embedded system programming.
Metro Detroit and the auto industry have started to come back from the dead. Look for real estate bargains in Oakland or western Wayne County. Ann Arbor is nice too.
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If he wants to get into web development, it may not be popular, but learn Wt (http://webtoolkit.eu). It's a C++ library for web dev and the results are amazing. I think of everyone used Wt the web would suck 50% less. Its a joy to work in, and you don't have to know too much about all the web to get started. You start by coding an application, then the library takes care of rendering it to the web, using ajax whereever. Its quite amazing.
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Someone who knows PHP and Javascript really well is not a common thing. If you do go the web route, focus on the JS more than the server side, since that's where things are actually happening these days. Learn how to write JS that doesn't leak DOM nodes or memory (for god's sake, please). Half the JS libraries out there leak like a sieve.
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Electives and minors are what makes US graduates less marketable that graduates who could focus on their core subject.
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Not needed. It's bloody obvious.
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Not that high on the list of concerns for the heartless corporations.
Half or more of the corporations that act like they have a heart are acting.
In the bottom line oriented world that is unfolding core knowledge
of your skillset is what they are looking for, that and teamwork.
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Definitely not . . . (Score:4, Insightful)
Appologies (Score:2)
Ok, that came out a little harsher than I'd intended. Let's blame it on passion.
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And yet, I put my name behind my words. Gives them some weight. You might try not running away from yours.
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Umm, yes I did. It is. It's on my tax forms and everything. I'm interested in knowing how the hell you thought that you could dis-authenticate my name simply by reading it here? How the hell would you know what my name is?!
In either case, it's irrelevant. There's no confusion that I'm the same person as I was moments ago. You, on the other hand, I have no way to know if you are the same poster or a different one.
you can lol all you like. I don't believe that you're actually laughing.
Re:Purdue is useless, Get a refund. (Score:5, Interesting)
I feel your pain. I actually went into, and then out of OO programming. The issue is that while it's a perfect technique for some very specific directions, it's horrible for solving real-world business problems.
You, specifically you, need to look at OO programming much differently. Then you'll find it quite easy to use. It's not actually any different than procedural programming. It's simply a collection of encapsulated procedural mini-programs. That's it. It's exactly the same code, it's just called differently. It's the same function/subroutine, it's just launched/triggered/executed with a different syntax.
The reason it's horrid for most business problems is simply because business problems are solved by figuring out how to sequence individual and often disparate tasks. Whereas OO is designed to solve problems where the same task needs to be solved countless times and the sequence is almost irrelevant.
If you've always tried to use OO for business tasks, then your struggle wasn't with the hammer, it was with how to use the hammer to turn a screw. But if I were to give you a nail, you'd suddenly understand how to use the hammer quite instinctively.
If you still/ever need someone to walk you through it, let me know. I'm happy to help.
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Mod Parent Up.
I'm a procedural programmer who has hammered my way into OO and Web programming. I find it easiest to start with a workflow chart, then model the real world workflow, rather than trying to fit everything into classes and patterns.
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"OO for business tasks" is just identifying the business entities and modeling them in classes. Just like database design is identifying the business entities and organizing them into tables.
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yeah, if they can be modelled that way. but most businesses, especially small businesses, have zero consistency because what you're modeling is the will of the will of the owner. It shifts too much to have any structure. So there are no business entities to class, because everything's a class of 1.
That's when OO falls apart, crashes, and burns. When no class gets used more than once, there's no point in having the class. When no method is used on more than one object, there's no reason to tie it to an
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Think of an object oriented language in this way: It is designed to stop code duplication and help to group similar functionality. It puts frequently used code in "containers" (i.e. "classes") that you can instantiate. Once the object (i.e. class) exists, you can just call its
Learn on your own. (Score:1)
community college (Score:4, Interesting)
I am concerned that going back to college would require a lot of time wasted doing electives and taking courses that don't get to the 'meat' of the learning
If you really want to get into teh web development side, I'd check out your local community colleges. All your gen ed stuff (english, math courses, history, etc) from your prior degree(s) should still count, so you'd just need to do the core classes for the AS degree you are interested in. You should be able to finish up in 3 or 4 semesters, if that.
Industry Problem (Score:5, Insightful)
The education industry, meaning colleges and universities, need a way to "add on" additional skill emphasis to degrees without requiring whole new degrees. I think, instead of detracting from current products (associates, bachelors, masters degrees), this will add revenue abilities from lifetime learning requirements that tech people have.
For Example: BSCS, Purdue University, 1990
CS Advanced Programming Topics, Coursera, 2013.
This would allow people to add the 2-3 courses that they need to refresh their skills, get students into the halls paying tuition (out of pocket, or company money), allow current students to brush up and work with more experienced folks IN CLASS, and show what HR is looking for, current accredited skills improvement.
But we seem stuck in the past. So we have to suffer through $1,000 a day "boot camps" that still require you to do a lot of on-your-own learning. We NEED something better. Colleges, be they 4 year or community, need to have programs that carry through the whole career ladder for skills improvement. I think that will help all of us overcome the "no training dollars this year" dilemma we constantly find.
graduate certificates (Score:4, Informative)
The education industry, meaning colleges and universities, need a way to "add on" additional skill emphasis to degrees without requiring whole new degrees.
They are called graduate certificates. You take a couple of graduate level courses, and you get a graduate certificate. Often, you can get a certificate while you are on the path towards a masters.
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The University of Washington calls these kinds of programs Professional and Continuing Education, and it's an expanding area. I'm sure other universities have similar programs. As an example of what's available at UW, and to get a sense of what's out there, check out www.pce.uw.edu/computing-it.html. (Full disclosure: I work at UW, but not in PCE.)
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The education industry, meaning colleges and universities, need a way to "add on" additional skill emphasis to degrees without requiring whole new degrees.
They are called graduate certificates. You take a couple of graduate level courses, and you get a graduate certificate. Often, you can get a certificate while you are on the path towards a masters.
Or, if you don't need a piece of paper, you can just find classes that interest you, and take them.
Where I work, tuition reimbursement exists if you are enrolled in a degree or certificate program -- it's much harder to get the company to pay for a single class. For that reason alone, graduate certificates are great.
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The education industry, meaning colleges and universities, need a way to "add on" additional skill emphasis to degrees without requiring whole new degrees.
They are called graduate certificates. You take a couple of graduate level courses, and you get a graduate certificate. Often, you can get a certificate while you are on the path towards a masters.
Yes, absolutely. I live in Chicago so both Northwestern and U of Chicago have these programs. They are outstanding. And expensive. Generally, expect about $1000-1500 for a 3-4 month class that meets once a week. They are a large profit center for the universities, but that is a good thing - you are paying a lot for a good experience and they are delivering a good experience. Real professors that have received high marks for teaching ability. Books that are the standard for that subject matter. Quali
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Exactly what I did 20 years ago, at National Technological University (now Walden), using satellite feeds and mailed VHS tapes. I got the USAF to pay for it, during job time.
Colleges time tables are poor for ongoing educatio (Score:2)
Colleges time tables are poor for ongoing education and there needs to be a some kind of badges system that makes taking classes to refresh / learn new skills add up to some thing and not just that nice but it's not an degree from HR.
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While investigating options for going back to school I found that a university not far from me offers something like you describe. If you have a BS/BA from them they will allow adding majors to your degree after the fact. At least that is how I understand it. I assume other colleges and universities have similar policies. What it does is allow one to return to the university and take classes there after graduating, once one has satisfactorily met the requirements of the second major their transcript wou
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What problem (Score:1)
Hoax or Idiot? (Score:2)
WTF, sounds like you want to give up a job you like because ... there seem to be opportunities for people with other skills?
People with the skills needed to work as a teller in fast food joints are also in demand.
Got a job you like? Upgrade on your own time, take some courses, and use your industry network to let people know you've got the extra skills. THAT will get you variety and maybe move you up/around in your current company.
No. Learn on your own time for FREE (Score:2)
There are so many great online professional sites with tips, tools, tutorials, etc., plus great publishers like WROX press, O'Reilly etc if you want to go that route. I tend to do both
The bulk of my development skills were self-taught or learned on the job, I don't even have a CS degree (I changed career paths), and I work exactly in the areas you described; C#, ASP, .NET, SQL, etc.
Seriously, I don't think it makes sense, and for gawd's sake DO NOT, I repeat DO NOT, go to place like Phoenix or Capella, they
Emerging Technologies (Score:2)
A master's degree might open some doors closed to a 4 year degree.
I'd focus on emerging technologies if you want a big break.
The things that are about to disrupt the current paradigm.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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synergize his ROI... omg a buzzword troll.
The emerging technologies are real, your
acronym spam is a humor repeat that has
been use a few times...
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PHP (Score:2)
Your best option here is PHP. There is tons of PHP work out there to be had and it is cross-platform so you won't be locked into MS.
PHP has had a bit of a renaissance lately and being based on C you'll be right at home with lots of job opportunities.
Just start taking PHP contracts. No need to go re-educate yourself to do something simpler than what you were doing.
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I got my BS in MIS and started with Cobol on a Mainframe at a big bank in Atlanta in the 90's.
I've since moved on to VB, C#, pretty much the whole MS stack.
Things got a little slow ten years ago and I got into the LAMP stack to make ends meet.
There is nothing wrong with it and it worked quite great for everything I did at the time.
What did I do at the time? Small projects.
A lot of big corporations are "locked into MS".
I've got a couple of sweet corporate projects going with the MS stack, I just don't see t
Udacity (Score:1)
My situation is slightly different (Score:1)
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Yep, lazy. At the age of 46 I decided to try college. My boss let me take two days a week off and I had night classes two other days after work. I still got in almost 40 hours at work with long days and working Saturdays. I only did it for one semester but I did get a raise and put on salary.
My 29 year old son in law needs one more semester to complete his AA. He could move up to management then but he wont make the effort.
Two important thoughts (Score:2)
First, if you want to learn new programming languages, just do so. Your education in CS should have given you the necessary skills to do so. In the end there are only a few paradigms and concepts present in all the languages you mentioned. Nothing you did not already have in some way in university or school.
Second, it is true that there are more openings in those areas. However, there are also much more competitors for those jobs. Most students learn Java or at some strange universities C# and .Net. Further
No. (Score:2)
You can pick these skills up from online courses and self-study. College would through you in with a bunch of software engineering newbs and cost you way more than you need to spend.
All Programmers Need Continuing Education (Score:1)
My rule of thumb is that most everything you know now will be useful, but mostly obsolete in ten years or less. That makes extracurricular learning a constant and ongoing process. There are a multiple ways to accomplish this. The best way will depend on your learning style. The areas you study will depend on both your interests and available opportunities.
You already have a Bachelor's from a good school. An additional degree in computer technology isn't going to deliver a lot of value. You've been working
Write better firmware! (Score:3)
Just post your resume (Score:2)
And in case you wondered - Yes, you do have it harder than the rest of the coding world. Shit, I could sleep through my 9-to-5 and still outperform most of my peers at writing user-s
Learn Network Load Balances and a Web Framework (Score:1)
Just languages (Score:2)
You've got a CS degree from a good school. If you can claim a language on your resume and back it up with code, then I don't see a reason that you'd need to go
C++ puts you at an advantage (Score:2)
If you know C++, you have the fundamentals and then some. Picking up Java, C#, etc. will be something you can do in your spare time over a couple of weeks. I know, because I was hired as a Java programmer on the strength of my C++ experience, in spite of having written only one tiny Java class. I read an ebook and was productive immediately. Granted, it took a lot longer to learn all the rest of the ecosystem, like HTTP and all the godzillions of available libraries, but it wasn't hard.
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You may need to make a job transition to get real experience that expands your breadth. From what I have seen, if you stay
college needs to change and HR needs to drop the (Score:2)
college needs to change and HR needs to drop the need it to get a job part.
I would view it as a red flag on your resume. (Score:3)
In my experience, the best programmers all have one (among others) critical skill: They have the ability to pick up new languages, APIs, technologies, etc., quickly and on their own. The fact that, after 10+ years as a programmer, you see ASP, .NET, C#, etc. as so formidable that you feel (apparently) that you might learn them more efficiently by sitting in a classroom and being spoon-fed would give me pause if I were considering hiring you for any developer position.
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I'm afraid I deal with the debris of those "best programmers" on a weekly basis. They sometimes write brilliant, insightful, paradigm shifting core projects. Unfortunately, they then abandon supporting them or get switched to another task.
It's up to the rest of us to unfurl the unnecessary recursion which is throttling performance, spot the hidden assumptions about data formats, reduce the unnecessary footprint due to writing custom subroutines to perform tasks built into the language as standard library ca
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In my own defense, I wouldn't have any problems picking up a new language. The issue is that employeers word job postings so that they can find the perfect candidate. I doubt they would consider an engineer that dosnt have experience in the 12 languages they were looking for, even though I would be completely capable of doing the work. This is why I would consider formal education, rather then learn-it-on your own.
You must not have much experience hiring developers. The "perfect candidate" is something you *might* encounter once or twice in your career. (By "perfect", however, I don't mean bullet points on a resume. They're barely better than useless.) And if you had extensive hiring experience, you'd know that the competition you're facing as a candidate is not all that fierce.
I've always used a "hardware vs. software" analogy, both when I pitched myself to prospective employers for a job that my background may not
online courses (Score:1)
Your degrees & credits are meaningless here. (Score:2)
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From the summary: " I have a computer science degree from Purdue and have been employed as a firmware engineer for 10+ years writing C and C++."
Also from the summary: " I was thinking that a computer information technology degree would fit the bill..."
As a person who also has a BS in computer science I ask, "Do you know how to make coffee?" If so, make yourself a pot and pretend you already have a degree in making coffee for the programmers.
Just write code (Score:1)
If you prefer more structured learning then online courses are probably best as they tend to be more current. However most of the good coders I know would just grab a reference and start writing code. There are countless programmers out there whose only experience is in a high level language, and don't properly understand how things work at a lower level. If you are good in C and C++, you can better understand what the higher level languages are doing under the covers. C++ is far more complex than these oth
Check out O'Reilly School of Technology (Score:1)
We have courses in all those areas, along with real world projects that you work on to build your portfolio.
This is what you need. (Score:2)
A good tutorial book. A. GOOD. TUTORIAL. BOOK. Or even a good online tutorial. But a tutorial is what is necessary, not a reference.
You can't just pick up a reference book and start coding or solving problems from that. That's not what references are for. You need a good tutorial. A good tutorial is worth its weight in gold in my opinion.
Some recommendations:
For LAMP + Javascript development? Try "Learning PHP, MySQL and JavaScript" by Robin Nixon (O'Reilly).
For Java? The Java Tutorial by Zakhour et. al. (
Save Your Money (Score:2)
Love Education, Do Not Love The Education System. (Score:2)
I've managed to fit my post into the subject, so here I'll paste my Open Letter to Wacom instead. Enjoy, and please don't moderate off-topic since the Comment Subject is the entire post and is on topic, but I've got to put something meaningful here to get through the filter.
From https://www.facebook.com/john.... [facebook.com]
(hint: copy and paste into a fixed width editor and reformat to taste, taking care to make my signature look like John.)
An Open Letter to Wacom,
Re: Drivers that don't drive properly, and are welded
Proof or paper (Score:2)
But if I were hiring someone I would just say, "Prove it." by basically having the person show me something interesting they built using the technologies claimed.
Beyond that the key is families of knowledge. C# probably shows you know
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About Lisp --- yes, ancient academics still use it. But the cutting edge of Lisping seems to be Scheme these days, and its very much alive indeed, with implementations like Racket (with excellent educational resources), Gambit (which gets along well with C), guile (the FSF's scripting language), and many others, In the user communities around Racket, for example, you see an eagerness to try new things and redesign the language for future generations.
-- hendrik
Re Best Options For Ongoing Education? (Score:2)
Have you forgotten what is a public library? There are also very affordable courses on the internet, from zero to what you are willing to pay.
I have self taught myself C, C++, assembly (multiple), pascal, and a few other languages. My expenses thus far, are two manuals for around $70/ea.
Am I too cheap? No, I am anxious to learn and I have bills to pay. If I can't borrow the books or follow the courses online, I do without. I just take an alternate language course.
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If you already have your BS why would you go back for another? If you want to further your education you go back for a MS. What you want from the content of your question however, sounds like you need a couple hundred dollars worth of reference books and some free weekends.
The problem with learning this way is that you need the motivation. Either because you need the new skill/language to complete some part of a paying job or project, or because it scratches a particular itch or fills some need you have.
Ta
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Well if he wants to move from code/developer to software engineer on some project
that has government ties that requires higher level degrees to higher level pay
then its viable.
The area that is seeing the most growth is the emerging tech list I posted earlier.
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After all, Dover reprints those old relics of math books precisely because they *are* still relevant.
-- hendrik