Reply to: Updating software skills

[northernladuk]

You know, my old dad used to say, "You can be one of those people earning a fortune by having blagged his way into a juicy role, or you can be one of those people complaining about people earning a fortune by having blagged their way into a juicy role".

Which would you rather be?

Wise words indeed lol.

[billybiro]

Erm. Nope.

You know, my old dad used to say, "You can be one of those people earning a fortune by having blagged his way into a juicy role, or you can be one of those people complaining about people earning a fortune by having blagged their way into a juicy role".

Which would you rather be?

[SueEllen]

So you spending work (contractual) hours on you personal needs? It does look like misleading client.

You are aware that clients work out the number of hours you are likely to do productive work per day?

That includes smoking breaks if you are a smoker, going to the loo, moving your eyes of a screen every 10 mins to comply with H&S, getting drinks etc.

Also once you are more senior they pay on output not how many hours you sit there.

[northernladuk]

So you spending work (contractual) hours on you personal needs? It does look like misleading client.

Am glad you are so sure of that based on zero knowledge of my situation but if it makes you happy go with it.

[woohoo]

Did you put the time off to learn something on your cv or leave a gap?

I think that's more likely to work if it's something new. If it's something established agents/clients tend to ask "how many years experience do you have in X", and then aren't interested if you can't say you were doing it for 3 years. But I can only speak from my experience.

I put it down on my CV as founder of startup, with the time it took - treated it as I would a client. But good point, I was learning relatively new tech at the time, so unlikely that anyone would have asked for say 3 years experience. So I concede to your logic spock.

[oliverson]

That's exactly what is happening. People do WPF, just probably at a smaller scale. Plus WPF always was linked with RX, TDD, reactiveUI, MVVM....

Personally I'm longing for the day when WebAssembly goes mainstream and managed frameworks like .NET can compile to it. Then we won't be tied to the appalling mess that is JavaScript. Come back C#, come back XAML, come back all the stuff we've enjoyed for 20+ years such as world-class debugging and intellisense. Come back PRODUCTIVITY. What I would give for a folder called 'lib' that has a handful of 3rd party DLL's, compared to the mess that is 100Mb of node_modules or even Nuget packages. What I'd give for a nicely controlled and documented framework again compared to the mess of unsupported, undocumented npm packages. So much for progress eh?

[VectraMan]

Disagree about side projects, if you do them well. Or take time off and do it well, which is what I did. I got my next contract off the experience gained. Gotta put the effort in.

Did you put the time off to learn something on your cv or leave a gap?

I think that's more likely to work if it's something new. If it's something established agents/clients tend to ask "how many years experience do you have in X", and then aren't interested if you can't say you were doing it for 3 years. But I can only speak from my experience.

Previous client started a big project in WPF/C# but ultimately ditched it, complaining it was too slow, and then looked for someone to do it in C++/QT instead.

[AndrewK]

I specialised in WPF (with C#) between 2010 and 2014 and then gradually moved away and into the web stack because in my sector (London Finance) that's where they work was heading. Greenfield WPF was drying up and all that was left was bug fix/enhancements, i.e. very boring. There are still a few roles around and paying well but it is VERY competitive and you'd have to know more than just C# and WPF. You'd have to know the MVVM pattern, Rx, PRISM (maybe), along with the usual stuff (dependency injection, TDD, etc). I'm not sure there's much of a market for WPF outside of banking if I'm honest. I know there's some Formula 1 teams using it but it's pretty niche now. If you know any of the above stuff you'd be better off using it in a web context. Angular (v2 onwards) is very similar to WPF desktop development. Some might say they've 'borrowed' all the good parts of WPF, etc. TypeScript is similar to C#. RxJS is a port or Rx. All very familiar.

That's exactly what is happening. People do WPF, just probably at a smaller scale. Plus WPF always was linked with RX, TDD, reactiveUI, MVVM....

[AndrewK]

Erm. Nope.

So you spending work (contractual) hours on you personal needs? It does look like misleading client.

[oliverson]

Hi all,

I'm a Software Engineer contractor, currently in a role that requires C++ and Qt skills.

I'm well aware after a stint of unemployment last year that C++ isn't the most sought-after programming skill, and I'd like to be able to apply for contracts that are more up-to-date in terms of the technologies they're looking for.

I've learned a fair amount of C#/WPF in my own time, and would like to be able to apply for roles along those lines, but agents tend to dismiss me on the basis that I haven't done much work with C# or WPF in an actual working environment. The fact that I have about 10 years experience as a Software Engineer working across multiple languages (C, C++, Java) doesn't really seem to matter.

So my question is - how do I go about breaking into roles with these technologies? I'm starting to feel a bit boxed in.

I specialised in WPF (with C#) between 2010 and 2014 and then gradually moved away and into the web stack because in my sector (London Finance) that's where they work was heading. Greenfield WPF was drying up and all that was left was bug fix/enhancements, i.e. very boring. There are still a few roles around and paying well but it is VERY competitive and you'd have to know more than just C# and WPF. You'd have to know the MVVM pattern, Rx, PRISM (maybe), along with the usual stuff (dependency injection, TDD, etc). I'm not sure there's much of a market for WPF outside of banking if I'm honest. I know there's some Formula 1 teams using it but it's pretty niche now. If you know any of the above stuff you'd be better off using it in a web context. Angular (v2 onwards) is very similar to WPF desktop development. Some might say they've 'borrowed' all the good parts of WPF, etc. TypeScript is similar to C#. RxJS is a port or Rx. All very familiar.

[SueEllen]

I just wonder have you negotiated in your contract to spend 3 hours per days on contractorsUk? And is it listed on your CV?

The wonders of modern technology....

[woohoo]

Erm. Nope.

Yep same here, just trying to make the OP feel better *cough*.

[northernladuk]

I just wonder have you negotiated in your contract to spend 3 hours per days on contractorsUk? And is it listed on your CV?

Erm. Nope.

[AndrewK]

Erm. Nope.

I just wonder have you negotiated in your contract to spend 3 hours per days on contractorsUk? And is it listed on your CV?

[northernladuk]

We have all done this to some extent, adding some skill that perhaps we have used for 5 mins onto our CV.

Erm. Nope.