Shortage of ASP.NET developers in Ja ?

[crosswire]

There is a shortage of software engineers in general around the world. Most programmers don't know how to write well structured and maintainable systems. Companies are looking for engineers with experience in SOA/n-tier architecture, very well established OOP principles and patterns, when to use them and why. Also Build, Release, Test automation, good teamworking skills and using code-review tools, agile/scrum tools, bug tracking systems, etc. I'm just rolling these things out of my head from what I've heard from recruiters, management and myself when looking for software engineers...in jamaica. Look at all tools provided by companies like Atlassian, Microsoft ALM and Jetbrains, learn what they do, the problems they solve and choose that or a similar tool to gain some experience with.

In regards to .NET engineers, there is a high demand out there for them. Especially in the Enterprise Systems area. Startups in Jamaica are also using .NET, since the BizSpark program by Microsoft. I know both Enterprise and Startup companies with problems finding good software engineers much less .NET engineers. (Both general .NET and ASP.NET) I also know freelance .NET engineers who has so much work to do that they are stretched thin, people are fighting to hire these people out here.

Re PHP VS .NET, this is an argument that is held among high school and university students and should be done away with. When recruiters see a resume or title of someone that says PHP or C# developer, we get turned off. It gives off the impression that you are just a regular person who only writes code. A well seasoned software engineer uses the right tools/languages for the job and should be able to adapt.

Love what you said here and agree with the need for OOP principles and all that, but that last statement stings a bit

[Satanforce]

Perhaps I should have had put a big SARCASM tag by my first post? Even the job sections on this forum ask for .NET developers mostly. When companies develop, in order to save money and maintain uniformity they (unfortunately) use OOP patterns and RAD techniques, and (fortunately)proper software development techniques. This means that rinky-dink, chaka-chaka software is out, especially when you are dong over 10,000 LoCs. This is not say that one cannot use the inferior LAMP stack, but if you can use a SIMA stack, then you already have learnt the universal skill set necessary for most modern "Enterprise Development"

The bottom line is, there is a skill set that one needs in order to function , (and is not properly taught in Jamaica.) These include:

- Setting up classes and objects from a simple CRC card, or use case
- Proper static analysis so that security flaws can be easily found (the big problem with PHP)
- All that funky big team RAD, Extreme Programming, Agile crap
- Program Maintenance - during and after release. Development is not complete after software is released

.and so on.

[recursion]

The bottom line is, there is a skill set that one needs in order to function , (and is not properly taught in Jamaica.) These include:

- Setting up classes and objects from a simple CRC card, or use case
- Proper static analysis so that security flaws can be easily found (the big problem with PHP)
- All that funky big team RAD, Extreme Programming, Agile crap
- Program Maintenance - during and after release. Development is not complete after software is released

.and so on.

While a structured training program is good and tends to come at a cost, there are many avenues out there for individuals willing to dedicate time and bandwidth to consuming free content out there.

Job Hunting? Why not spend some time getting some free training from Udacity, Edx, Coursera?

Need to learn a few tips, use twitter to follow groups like @AgileWhatever @PhpSomeShizzle, subscribe to youtube channels, hook up to rss feeds.

Anyways, a few guys in Australia have taken the time to provide free resources to those in need. They are primarily Microsoft so you will find asp.net mvc, Azure, visual studio, Team Foundation Service etc.

Check them out at http://tv.ssw.com/
They also have some rules that you could read and filter if necessary. http://www.ssw.com.au/ssw/Standards/Default.aspx

I'm not saying they have the answers, but if what you're doing isn't working, y'know.

[Satanforce]

While a structured training program is good and tends to come at a cost, there are many avenues out there for individuals willing to dedicate time and bandwidth to consuming free content out there.

Job Hunting? Why not spend some time getting some free training from Udacity, Edx, Coursera?

You are quite correct of course. It's just that one should focus on the technique - not the tools.

[RobyG]

There is a shortage of software engineers in general around the world. Most programmers don't know how to write well structured and maintainable systems. Companies are looking for engineers with experience in SOA/n-tier architecture, very well established OOP principles and patterns, when to use them and why. Also Build, Release, Test automation, good teamworking skills and using code-review tools, agile/scrum tools, bug tracking systems, etc. I'm just rolling these things out of my head from what I've heard from recruiters, management and myself when looking for software engineers...in jamaica. Look at all tools provided by companies like Atlassian, Microsoft ALM and Jetbrains, learn what they do, the problems they solve and choose that or a similar tool to gain some experience with.

In regards to .NET engineers, there is a high demand out there for them. Especially in the Enterprise Systems area. Startups in Jamaica are also using .NET, since the BizSpark program by Microsoft. I know both Enterprise and Startup companies with problems finding good software engineers much less .NET engineers. (Both general .NET and ASP.NET) I also know freelance .NET engineers who has so much work to do that they are stretched thin, people are fighting to hire these people out here.

Re PHP VS .NET, this is an argument that is held among high school and university students and should be done away with. When recruiters see a resume or title of someone that says PHP or C# developer, we get turned off. It gives off the impression that you are just a regular person who only writes code. A well seasoned software engineer uses the right tools/languages for the job and should be able to adapt.

Makes alot of sense what you are saying Mixmasterxp ! I am in total agreement. Sounds like you know what is happening.
It is inline with my experiences as well.

[owen]

Bumping a old thread eh RobyG. A well structured and maintainable system is not about what platform you use or established OOP principles and patterns, or how many programmers you hire. Its about being able to maintain direction in a changing environment. IF you want more programmers you are going to have to hire them as juniors and train them up.

[Crome]

Good programmers who can think and solve problems tend to be loners and don't work well in a structured environment. There codes are messy but works. So to solve that problem I think hire them then get others with the team and structure mentality refactor the codes.

[crosswire]

Good programmers who can think and solve problems tend to be loners and don't work well in a structured environment. There codes are messy but works. So to solve that problem I think hire them then get others with the team and structure mentality refactor the codes.

Interesting experience.

I can agree a bit. When a programmer is doing a small amount of code in a very short time, then the code is Ad-hoc and messy without structure.

But even good programmers need to follow structure and design principles when working on larger apps. Most definitely.

Good programmers can work well in a team, just as much as alone. It is the lead engineers who are responsible in breaking down the app to team members. Thus team members just focus on smaller amounts of code.

Programming is evolving. New design principles for apps keeps on emerging. In order to keep apps up to the time, all team members needs to be trained in whatever new design principle that is being used by the lead engineers, so that they can better appreciate the code that they are asked to produced. Take as example, the design with message passing in apps has changed and improved. However, some principles remain more or less the same, just enhanced, for example, OO principle is still being used. Thus it is essential that team members know this. Yes, you can solve a problem that could be solved with OO, without using OO, but in the long run, maintaining the app would be easier with proper OO implementation. Yes, the refactoring from structure-less to structure, can be someone else's headache. But good programmers should be trained with basic structural design principles, because they may write messy code out of ignorance rather than bad habit. Further more, at minimum, the lead engineers, need to be up to date with the trends in the software industry. What features are in demand. What tools are present. What platform the market is using. What design principle is trending, because that maybe more suitable than what is currently being used, especially when the platform being used, has been upgraded a lot.

Unfortunately, I commented with little ASP experience and more desktop and mobile, experience.