Reply to: WebSphere, what's happened?

[nomadd]

Are banks using Hadoop? Though that would be too cutting edge, mind you mostly experience is retail banking

None that I know of. I did have a look through a Hadoop book, the Manning one I think. Seems like it could be useful if you have a large set of data to reduce, but you don't really see that as a requirement in most banking systems I've come across. And most of the data is locked away inside DBs anyway.

In-memory caching is a big deal though, mostly in Investment Banking where you need very high scalability and low latency. Hence Coherence. If you wander over to one of the Coherence SIGs in London, I'd say 90% of the client base is investment banks.

[portseven]

Very smart move. What distributed grid / cache middleware are you using now, hadoop / coherence / memcache ?
Thanks

Are banks using Hadoop? Though that would be too cutting edge, mind you mostly experience is retail banking

[nomadd]

Very smart move. What distributed grid / cache middleware are you using now, hadoop / coherence / memcache ?
Thanks

As bold. Seems to be the weapon of choice in most banks, as most of them are Oracle clients already (DB, WebLogic, etc., etc.)

[contractor75]

Migrated away step-by-step, contract-by-contract. Got back into programming doing a lot of WebSphere automation in Jython, then started pluging bits of Java into it. Broke out the books and updated my Java skills in my spare time. Took a contract for a client who had a Portal, but it was very reliant on a flaky external system, so ended up putting in a caching tier. From there I got a job with a client who wanted distributed caching, but also distributed processing, hence the push towards Grid stuff and highly threaded systems. Again, broke out the books in my spare time to bone up.

The whole migrate away from WebSphere has taken me about 3 years and 3 contracts in total, I guess. I'd still happily do some WAS work for a client as part of a bigger project, but not as a stand-alone, and not at the expense of what I'm doing now.

I posted on a couple of other threads we've had about rates, as I've been offered my old WAS job back at Barclays many times - at anywhere from 20-60% less than I was earning there 4 years ago. Like I say, glad I got out of it.

Very smart move. What distributed grid / cache middleware are you using now, hadoop / coherence / memcache ?
Thanks

[nomadd]

Incidentally, i've had an agent contact me about Barclays this week - he says £450pd.. we shall see. Also have heard Aviva are looking again and paying upto £450pd. I guess there is only one way these rates are going though...

Yeah, the problem I have with a lot of these rates for WAS work is that they are "fixed daily rate" and you end up doing tons of out-of-hours overtime for which you never get paid. I'm a real 7:45 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. sort of guy, so the "support" aspect of most WebSphere roles doesn't appeal to me. Each to their own, I guess.

[doesNotCompute]

I've taken breaks off between contracts. Mostly 1-6 months. I usually spend at least half my "off time" re-skilling. Been doing it that way for years, as I like to "know my stuff" really well, so find I need a few weeks to read/practice and get myself fully familiar. And I get bored doing the same stuff contract after contract, so actually enjoy learning new technologies that I can apply on the next job.

And, of course, I try to be as flexible as possible on projects and learn new stuff on-the-job when the opportunity arises. Even if you only manage to get a "brief taste" of something, it's enough to get you started; then you take things a lot further in you spare time or bench-time.

Thanks for the advice nomadd. Seems like a sensible approach you've taken to re-skill over the years. I think i've just become too 'comfortable' in a technology stack I know inside out, collecting decent rates over the years without there being any real effort on my part.

Incidentally, i've had an agent contact me about Barclays this week - he says £450pd.. we shall see. Also have heard Aviva are looking again and paying upto £450pd. I guess there is only one way these rates are going though...

[ChimpMaster]

What are you going to do then?

I don't know, I really don't know. I've been working on this product for years and it doesn't have any generic coding language in it (Java etc).

I'm more product based with a hint of architecture.

My only option may be to go perm at another software vendor and learn a new product that way. I've had calls about permie jobs in banking software providers, so if I do that for a couple of years it'll give me a good grounding for contracting (the plan is to make sure that whatever product I learn is good for the contract market).

[doesNotCompute]

You've done really well to have re-skilled like this, whilst still earning too.

I wish I had the motivation to do the same. I know I need to re-skill, as my technology stack is fast dying a death and being offshored at the same time.

After my current contract ends (in 6 months), I'll be forced to work in Europe for 400 Euros a day, which is just not worth it given the flight/hotel costs and staying away from the family.

I've only ever worked on this one product as a contractor. Previous permie lives saw me move from Cobol to SAP ABAP.

How can I re-skill? I'm not an OO coder, and I find it very hard to get home after 12 hours out to try and learn something new. Any advice appreciated!

What are you going to do then?

[doesNotCompute]

Migrated away step-by-step, contract-by-contract. Got back into programming doing a lot of WebSphere automation in Jython, then started pluging bits of Java into it. Broke out the books and updated my Java skills in my spare time. Took a contract for a client who had a Portal, but it was very reliant on a flaky external system, so ended up putting in a caching tier. From there I got a job with a client who wanted distributed caching, but also distributed processing, hence the push towards Grid stuff and highly threaded systems. Again, broke out the books in my spare time to bone up.

The whole migrate away from WebSphere has taken me about 3 years and 3 contracts in total, I guess. I'd still happily do some WAS work for a client as part of a bigger project, but not as a stand-alone, and not at the expense of what I'm doing now.

I posted on a couple of other threads we've had about rates, as I've been offered my old WAS job back at Barclays many times - at anywhere from 20-60% less than I was earning there 4 years ago. Like I say, glad I got out of it.

The steps seem logical, afterall any WAS guy worth his salt can write automation scripts with Jython/JACL so how bigger a leap is Java really?

My backgound was Java iniatially, then J2EE which directed nicely onto WebSphere - as IBM's AppServer was the AppServer of choice at the time, and still is except that;

a) it's not that difficult really is it? (Portal slightly more complex but even then, it's not rocket science).
b) and as we've allulded to, the market is becomming increasing outsourced, due to a).

So I think the overriding message I take away from this is 're-skill or die'.

With rates at £400 and below, my old permie job (Banking - huge global player) on 60k + bens (not in London) seems rather more appealing than it did at the time!

[nomadd]

How can I re-skill? I'm not an OO coder, and I find it very hard to get home after 12 hours out to try and learn something new. Any advice appreciated!

I've taken breaks off between contracts. Mostly 1-6 months. I usually spend at least half my "off time" re-skilling. Been doing it that way for years, as I like to "know my stuff" really well, so find I need a few weeks to read/practice and get myself fully familiar. And I get bored doing the same stuff contract after contract, so actually enjoy learning new technologies that I can apply on the next job.

And, of course, I try to be as flexible as possible on projects and learn new stuff on-the-job when the opportunity arises. Even if you only manage to get a "brief taste" of something, it's enough to get you started; then you take things a lot further in you spare time or bench-time.

[mooshld]

You've done really well to have re-skilled like this, whilst still earning too.

I wish I had the motivation to do the same. I know I need to re-skill, as my technology stack is fast dying a death and being offshored at the same time.

After my current contract ends (in 6 months), I'll be forced to work in Europe for 400 Euros a day, which is just not worth it given the flight/hotel costs and staying away from the family.

I've only ever worked on this one product as a contractor. Previous permie lives saw me move from Cobol to SAP ABAP.

How can I re-skill? I'm not an OO coder, and I find it very hard to get home after 12 hours out to try and learn something new. Any advice appreciated!

Here is my advice, on the plains in prehistoric times if you only knew how to hunt buffalo and all the buffalo dissapeared you starved.

Time may have moved on but nothing has changed. You either find the time to do it, or pray the buffalo keep running. I personally am not much for praying.

Mooshld.

[ChimpMaster]

Migrated away step-by-step, contract-by-contract.<snip>

You've done really well to have re-skilled like this, whilst still earning too.

I wish I had the motivation to do the same. I know I need to re-skill, as my technology stack is fast dying a death and being offshored at the same time.

After my current contract ends (in 6 months), I'll be forced to work in Europe for 400 Euros a day, which is just not worth it given the flight/hotel costs and staying away from the family.

I've only ever worked on this one product as a contractor. Previous permie lives saw me move from Cobol to SAP ABAP.

How can I re-skill? I'm not an OO coder, and I find it very hard to get home after 12 hours out to try and learn something new. Any advice appreciated!

[nomadd]

Thanks for the response nomadd.

If you dont mind me asking, how did you get into it?

Migrated away step-by-step, contract-by-contract. Got back into programming doing a lot of WebSphere automation in Jython, then started pluging bits of Java into it. Broke out the books and updated my Java skills in my spare time. Took a contract for a client who had a Portal, but it was very reliant on a flaky external system, so ended up putting in a caching tier. From there I got a job with a client who wanted distributed caching, but also distributed processing, hence the push towards Grid stuff and highly threaded systems. Again, broke out the books in my spare time to bone up.

The whole migrate away from WebSphere has taken me about 3 years and 3 contracts in total, I guess. I'd still happily do some WAS work for a client as part of a bigger project, but not as a stand-alone, and not at the expense of what I'm doing now.

I posted on a couple of other threads we've had about rates, as I've been offered my old WAS job back at Barclays many times - at anywhere from 20-60% less than I was earning there 4 years ago. Like I say, glad I got out of it.

[doesNotCompute]

Re-skill. Period.

I rode the WebSphere gravy-train for 7 years or more, from WebSphere 2 (rubbish, and 1 was never officially released outside IBM), through 3, 3.5 (better), 4 (better still) and 5 (finally caught up with WebLogic.) I did years of Portal, WebSphere MQ, yada, yada on top of that too. Cluster builds, Admin, Architecture, Programming, the whole lot.

Finally saw the downturn when I was at Barclays. WebSphere was just another commodity from their perspective and they were off-shoring fast. I found decent roles - £500+/day - were getting very difficult to achieve even 4 years ago. And now, well, let's just say I'm glad to be out of it. The only roles that do seem to be left are high-pressure, low pay support type jobbies.

Others may disagree. But, hey, I moved on (low-latency, Grid-based, Java Architecture & Programming, FWIW. EDIT: And that new line of work is "worth" about twice what agents are offering these days when they phone up about WebSphere roles.)

Thanks for the response nomadd.

Thats the feeling i've had for a while now (in my 4th year contracting) and is somewhat the reason for my OP. I guess the more difficult question is then, which direction do I go next?

I suppose the logical one is Java, but isnt that bobbed up to the eyeballs now? My current client co has thousands of em' in Hydrabad and Pune churning out the garbage I have to work with day in day out. The onsite Java bods are just really paper pushers, no real hands on coding but a bit of tuning and optimisation work when the bobs have really screwed up the code. I'm more than comfortable with Java EE from the nuts and bolts up... but the low-latency, grid-based stuff I havent had exposue to yet. Heck, current client only just moved onto JSR168 and is trumpeting the benefits of JNDI, which is only 15 ish years old now

If you dont mind me asking, how did you get into it?

[nomadd]

Currently on contract (18months to date) at a large financial services company undertaking general build and support work using WebSphere Application Server, Portal and MQ. Recently descovered i'll not be renewed post January so i've started to look around and i'm shocked, quite frankly, at the lack of decent (£400pd +) roles around. Is this just a blip or do I need to seriously think about reskilling?

Re-skill. Period.

I rode the WebSphere gravy-train for 7 years or more, from WebSphere 2 (rubbish, and 1 was never officially released outside IBM), through 3, 3.5 (better), 4 (better still) and 5 (finally caught up with WebLogic.) I did years of Portal, WebSphere MQ, yada, yada on top of that too. Cluster builds, Admin, Architecture, Programming, the whole lot.

Finally saw the downturn when I was at Barclays. WebSphere was just another commodity from their perspective and they were off-shoring fast. I found decent roles - £500+/day - were getting very difficult to achieve even 4 years ago. And now, well, let's just say I'm glad to be out of it. The only roles that do seem to be left are high-pressure, low pay support type jobbies.

Others may disagree. But, hey, I moved on (low-latency, Grid-based, Java Architecture & Programming, FWIW. EDIT: And that new line of work is "worth" about twice what agents are offering these days when they phone up about WebSphere roles.)