career-advice

[trail loom]

my company & most other companies to my knowledge hire off of skill instead of things like that i doubt it matters

[open ivy]

How do they assess "skill level"?

[smoky quest]

• algorithms type questions
• take home exercise
• portfolio
• Discussions about experience
• Presentations
• System design

[open ivy]

Thanks!

[summer roost]

and also, whether or not you have a degree related to the work.

[hushed mist]

This might be dumb, im transitioning over from working with PLCs on robotics and manufacturing equipment maintenance, both hardware, software, and electrical wise. Due to a fun car wreck, im no longer able to do that job as it requires a lot of physical labor. My cousin who works at CISCO doing network....something, recommended looking into CS as he understand I enjoy actual critical thinking problems and told me to look into data analytics and API. I was wondering if anyone could give me any input on career choices and more related to that. Sorry for the brick of text. Wanted to add, Ive spent a lil bit on google, and all I get is basic little 2 paragraph pages typically.

[trail loom]

qualifications and attitude

[open ivy]

Attitude?

[trail loom]

team culture is important

wait i didnt read your msg

[open ivy]

I hear that alot, but what does "culture" actually mean? Probably not about liking a certain sports team lol. But exactly what is in this culture "black box"?

[smoky quest]

Hi!
It sounds like there is quite a bit of overlap, but that remains quite vague.
What type of work are you doing or can't do anymore?

Because in terms of options that could go pretty wide:

• Datacenter people who rack servers and network devices
• Network admin people who administer network devices (ie. cisco)
• Admin people who administer servers
• Developers. But that's a whole segment in itself

[trail loom]

mostly behavior and attitude

[smoky quest]

Culture can be defined as shared values and behaviors.
That's actually an anti-pattern of hiring.

Companies would most likely validate specific behaviors and experiences

[open ivy]

Lol "hiring anti-pattern". You mean that the companies aren't accepting a wide enough range of people?

[spark cobalt]

Also a kind of behavioral part of the technical interview that's there too. Moreover getting the "correct answer", how you effectively communicate, your temper, how you approach the problem, etc. is also something to keep in mind when someone's looking for a good fit to their team.

I've heard of companies giving problems to candidates they know they can't solve to see how they react to it

[hushed mist]

So I worked repairing the electrical/hardware components on robotics whether its replacing some basic stuff with electrical off, or having to take a $500,000 robot half apart and reset the whole thing to get it working properly within parameters. I also worked on making sure the software and ladder logic was properly working. I suffered 8 herniated discs in my back and had spine surgery this year to replace 2, so heavy lifting and such isnt my thing anymore. And honestly, i'm not too sure. I guess my thing I like is trying to identify problems when given all, or at least half, the variables and see how it can be fixed properly and work optimally. I would sometimes look over our maintenance logs on the robots and the data we would get from them, and try to find ways to eliminate downtime or just improve performance anyway possible.

[open ivy]

It's starting to make sense. But like an asteroids game one black box is now many lol. Getting all these right feels almost impossible.

[smoky quest]

it means that people will tend to look for people similar to them. That's an anti-pattern because it does not add any value to the contributions of the candidates. If anything, it just add people who think the same and thus provide a lower diversity of ideas and experiences.
That is also associated with the bro culture but can be generalized

[open ivy]

I see. The whole point of coding is that each person is doing different things. Otherwise duplicate code.

[spark cobalt]

You're likely interviewing with someone developing day by day. Your goal is to be the candidate that they would love to work with everyday.

[smoky quest]

Data science / ML might be a lot more demanding on the math and degrees side.

But I would recommend to look at the network/sysadmin/SRE side.
I am sure @ darkwind will have something to contribute when they are around 😉

[spark cobalt]

Which of course means: you can do the job, you're quick to communicate among other soft skills, etc.

[smoky quest]

And also bring different potential solutions!
If the culture is all about 20s something single dudes or 50s old woman only, or just a bunch of Indian folks that will severely limit the way in which they will look at a problem and the possible solutions they will look at.
So assessing for a "similar culture" only brings problems and won't add value.

[hushed mist]

I have a degree in industrial automation, associates at least rn. and im working on my A.S. in CS then going for my B.S. in CS starting this fall

[smoky quest]

oh nice! That does open more doors! Albeit that's more long term than right now

[open ivy]

My salesperson skills are rock-bottom. Like I say something and people get upset so easily. It seems to be the one skill I cannot learn.

[spark cobalt]

Well the entire interview is a sales pitch technically. Something to definitely work on.

[trail loom]

maybe im reading it wrong, but you're both misunderstanding. companies aren't allowed to factor race or gender or anything like that

[smoky quest]

you don't need to become a full fledged sales person. You need to develop some empathy. Why would they want to hire you? What's unique about you?

It's no different than dating. People don't want to date people who beat on themselves and don't make them feel great

[spark cobalt]

Talking about diversity of ideas. Similarity in ideas/thought processes are generally caused through same experiences, meaning culture, gender, etc. can have a massive influence.

The root is bringing new ideas to the team.

[hushed mist]

lol yeah, im tired of college at this point. Just trying to figure out more SPECIFICS of what the heck I am even trying to look towards for a job at this point lol

[smoky quest]

culture has also been used as a code word to discriminate without being limited by the law

[smoky quest]

with a BSc in CS and a sufficient time horizon, anything is open to you tbh

[trail loom]

the job in general is more about talking than programming, especially in larger companies. everyone is in their 20s and relies on stack overflow. dont have high hopes

[hushed mist]

Yeah, just a bit stressful waiting and being 27 already. luckily the lawsuit should be able to pay for the B.S. , Looking to go to Rutgers hopefully this fall.

[smoky quest]

I have some friends who went back to college for a Bsc in CS at 26 and did great!
You still have plenty of time

[open ivy]

Putting all that into practice is very hard. And I am single, previous dates always ended up with my boyfriend leaving before much happened lol.

Maybe those who think they can "never learn math" can actually learn and I can learn too. But getting feedback is hard. "You aren't hired, sorry". OK what went wrong?
Ironically, my sociology knowledge is relatively good.

[smoky quest]

that was supposed to be a lighthearted comparison. Sorry about that!

[spark cobalt]

Almost everyone in my workplace is way 2x older than me . Nonetheless, when discussing how to move a project forward, or how to work with clients, among other things that might not be directly associated with writing code are also crucial.

Moreover than just writing code, you're writing some software meant to be actually used somewhere.

[open ivy]

No worries.

[smoky quest]

And yes, getting difficult feedback can be tough!
But there is some growth associated with it as well. If anything, one should be grateful for honest feedback as it allows them to understand better how they are seen, what has prompted that and how to improve next time

[spark cobalt]

Meeting some hiring managers in local dev meetups and talking for literally 30 mins to hours has personally helped me a lot 🙂

[open ivy]

Hmmm, online communities may be better. There is a disinhibition to expressing emotions, especially negative ones. So you say something offensive, etc and they will jump on you. Feels very bad (and don't do it on purpose!) but feedback is feedback.

[smoky quest]

Multiple factors at play too:

• Face to face, people may sugar coat it to make you feel better
• People are asshole and may care less online

That said, I like to remain anonymous here because it helps me be honest without involving any tie to my employer, even if it's tough feedback (especially around resume or hiring practices)

[open ivy]

A chance to meet hirers is a good idea. Also, my writing skills are much better than my speaking skills so maybe that can help me?

But the gender balance is working against me, 50:50 would be best and either extreme is bad.

[open ivy]

I come from a place that seemed to attract people who are extremally good at sugar-coating. Like down to the subtle body language! Also, if they say "I am busy" that is often genuine: people are actually really busy there, often more than a full time job!

Or maybe I am bad at reading body language?

[smoky quest]

I lack enough data to comment on any of that.
I like to take it the naive way: if people are too coward to not be honest, then that's their problem.

If I recall correctly, you are self taught. And without stellar projects, that will be your main hinderance

[spark cobalt]

Maybe you're not asking the right questions?

[open ivy]

A little harsh? After all, all those good sugar-coaters have jobs and I don't. So they are on to something?

[open ivy]

That's a good point. It feels like building a computer, but if anything is wrong its a brick. So it's hard to figure out which one of the 12 or so things that could be going wrong is.

[smoky quest]

nah. Sugar coating leads to sub-optimal decisions due to imprecise input.
One can be honest and truthful without being an asshole.

[spark cobalt]

If you are trying to get advice from someone, if you're asking someone "how can I improve?" that's something easy to sugarcoat. But if you frame it more as "I felt like I wasn't selling myself that well, is there something specific in terms of my dialect I can improve upon?"

Might be easier for those more self conscious than those that aren't.

[open ivy]

I have lost friends that way. Many times. Sustained anger at me. An emotion I never felt toward another (non-famous) person. But if a little lying could prevent this, is that so bad? External anger-management of a sort.

[smoky quest]

If someone is unable to take feedback, then true, there is no need to waste your time giving them feedback.
But at the same time, if a friend's actions or behavior is making you feel bad and you let them know, then it's better to let them know or part ways. The alternative means someone is having to suffer from it and a divide grow wider.

Sugar coating may only reinforce their bad behavior or unreal expectations.

[spark cobalt]

I think age matters a lot. Finding people that we can cut the sugarcoating with my age has been tough. Friendships shouldn't need sugarcoating.

[open ivy]

I have occasionally done so. In fact, I only had to full-out ghost a single person in my 12 years of undergrad+gradschool.

And also blunt feedback to me has helped a lot! But when people were blunt to me it usually meant they were rejecting me, so it was a one-time boost before they leave my social circle.

[smoky quest]

asking questions can also be an effective way to deal with people having a hard time conciliating it

[smoky quest]

if someone is parting way with you at the same time than giving you feedback. I would also take it with a grain of salt. They wouldn't be in the most honest of the mood

but if that's the cost of the friendship, then it wasn't that strong to start with

[open ivy]

Generally I did. It was rare to meet friends who stayed friends long enough to be willing to share feedback. The amount of feedback was so little, that "feedback-on-rejection" was often the best I got. I only really remember 1 or 2 overtly blunt people, but neither wanted to form a friendship.

[smoky quest]

yeah it's tough

[spark cobalt]

Some people are addicted to escape Went to UCSB last week and phew 🙂 But yeah not an issue with my criticizing others. It's kind of people find it hard to cut the sugarcoating cuz they're too nice .

[smoky quest]

I have a few friends who graduated from UCSB 😉

[open ivy]

Yes it almost seems like there are two tribes. We would do better in the "blunt" tribe, even if it would take getting used to.

[spark cobalt]

Engineering tribe not party people there apparently.

[smoky quest]

Note that these people who are too nice have also to realize how it's making it more difficult for themselves and their friends

[spark cobalt]

But the others, went down DP (is it even these 2 letters idk), and man it was crazy

[smoky quest]

Dynamic Programming?

[spark cobalt]

nah just this name they have for the street of apartments where all the parties happen

[smoky quest]

ah. Would have worked either way in that sentence

[open ivy]

Individually thier behavior makes sense because bluntness means a loss of social status. But in terms of the group, you seem to be accurate with your assessment. It's a tragedy of commons much like climate change.

But that bieng said, couldn't I find communication problems with myself? So I am not "better" than them just because I am more direct.

[spark cobalt]

It's kinda seen the other way. Criticizing and hurting other people's feelings is seen as making things more difficult here and risking your friendship. Granted this is high school teenager dumb bullshit so :/

If your friend was gaining weight from overly stress eating, man if you said something

Younger people are more sensitive. Or maybe it's a generational thing not an age thing.

[smoky quest]

Quality is a process, not a state.
What matters is you improve over time. No one is perfect 😉

[spark cobalt]

People would rather uphold their fake societal idealization of a friendship than work on lifting each others up. People meaning like, the people my age.

[smoky quest]

that's the point though. Trying to sugar coat it is a way to appease and run away from the problems. But the problems are still there

[spark cobalt]

Yep.

Just trying to give a bit of perspective. But won't have to deal with this for 4 years so

I'm just glad I made good high school friends

[smoky quest]

There is also a grand canyon in the approaches to your friend between "you fat! lol!" and "Are you okay? It looks like you have been gaining quite a lot of weight recently. I am here if you need me"

[spark cobalt]

That made me laugh ngl

[open ivy]

There is a related problem: People are sensitive about thier creative projects, and often not divulge them for fear of criticism. But that prevents getting feedback on thier own projects and makes them feel isolated.

I try my best to not do that with my own projects.

[spark cobalt]

I know some people close to me, like even my sister, a comment on her weight remotely negative she just instantly thinks you're calling her fat. No matter how nicely you put it. Lots of these end up being taboo stuff in our generation.

[smoky quest]

That's something interviewers face frequently!
That's why a lot is put in terms of demonstrated skills

[smoky quest]

yeah, too easy to go save the whale on your sister.
But a proper context and caring will go a long way

[spark cobalt]

Like, exactly how you said it (the nice way ofc) but it's just sometimes it's super hard. Modern generation has too many tools to escape problems and it's being overused.

[open ivy]

Maybe framing the question as a way to reduce the cause (stress) of the obesity rather than the obesity itself?

The smokers know quitting is best so telling them that doesn't help them.

[smoky quest]

agreed!
It can be quite delicate

[smoky quest]

It's part of their growth to learn how to deal with it 😉

[spark cobalt]

More back to the original topic:

Under pressure, you're likely doing a lot of things you're not noticing unless someone points it out.

Which comes to the solution of... Recording yourself! My dad used to be a radio host and he worked a lot on recording himself in order to improve. Finding ways to improve how to say things, his tone, etc.

[smoky quest]

recording yourself is a great idea too!

[open ivy]

Communication skills are important on the job. Do you think interviews help assess these skills or is it more about charm and charisma rather than information transfer?

[spark cobalt]

Yes. You have an idea you want to express, and you want to express it in a concise and clear manner to a stranger that doesn't know you.

Whether that's from your elevator pitch, or any other standard behavioral question, to even the technical interview where you express how you plan to solve the problem they give, being able to express this range of stuff effectively will be super helpful for your future.

[smoky quest]

charm/charisma are like bonuses. But at the end of the day, the interviewer wants to assess you have the skills and/or experience. So if you are unable to demonstrate that, charm/charisma won't help

[spark cobalt]

Especially as someone who only graduated high school, some things that really was a struggle was this communication barrier. Talking to a lot of developers about variety of things, seeing how they communicate to each other and immersing in that environment really helped me grow a lot.

There would be some developer discussions happening and while I understand the individual words, sometimes it just felt like Greek 😅. Trying to grow out of that and learn to communicate like them helped a lot I think.

[open ivy]

I see. I feel the bro culture hurts here a bit. The way I talk isn't what they are used to so that can cause problems.

[summer roost]

Charm and charisma are communication skills, for what it's worth. They're not the only communication skills, or even the most important, but you'll get further in your career if people like you and want to help you.

[open ivy]

For all the amount of time trying to learn these it went basically nowhere. Instead I boosted the other skills, writing in particular.

[summer roost]

clear writing about technical topics is definitely an incredibly important skill. And it's one that interviews do a poor job of assessing, unfortunately

interviews tend to do much better at assessing verbal and non-verbal communication skills than written communication skills.

[open ivy]

That's disappointing. Writing didn't come naturally to me but I improved a lot on it. Unfortunately, speaking skills are hard because it is so fast. No "let me change that sentence".

[summer roost]

yeah - but there are things you can do. Getting used to not just blurting out the first thought you have, repeating the question back to an interviewer in your own words, asking questions to confirm your understanding of a problem, etc are all things that you can just make a habit of.

[smoky quest]

also slow down!

it not only gives you more time to think but it also gives the impression you are thinking more

Being silent is also a tactic to get the other person to speak or blurt out, but that's another topic 😉

[summer roost]

for what it's worth, clear writing probably doesn't help much in landing a job, but it absolutely can help you advance at a job. People who can't write clearly are unlikely to be promoted into leadership positions or given responsibility over running large projects.

[open ivy]

This! Even just a few seconds could help! But in a 1/2 hour interview be careful not much time!

[smoky quest]

30min is super short for an interview

[open ivy]

Has happened to me

[summer roost]

I've never been an interviewer at a place where a real interview is that short, but I have conducted screening interviews that short. Though a screening interview is a different beast - they're basically just checking whether your resume is a complete fabrication or not, and they're designed to be quite easy to pass. They're only judging your technical skills, and they're not giving hard problems - the screening interview is just a filter to decide whether it's even worth interviewing someone.

[open ivy]

I see

[summer roost]

which isn't to say that your communication skills are utterly irrelevant to that stage, but the bar for passing a real interview is usually unanimous consensus among a panel of interviewers, while the bar for passing a screening interview is usually just that one person thinks there's a chance that you could pass a real interview.

[open ivy]

Makes sense.

[summer roost]

also, at the places where I've been involved in interviewing, that screening interview is pass/fail. There's no feedback passed along from the screening stage to the real interview panel - if you pass the screening interview, you have a clean slate for the full interview.

(that may not be the case everywhere, so take that with a grain of salt)

[open ivy]

I didn't know that. So maybe hold back the time-delay tactics until the BIG interview?

[smoky quest]

What's your status since last time? Any progress? Any blocker?
Last I recall, you were starting down the path of a conversion

[summer roost]

if an interview is only half an hour, I wouldn't try to slow it down. Obviously you should still think through a problem before you answer, but I wouldn't think about it for more than maybe 30 seconds before starting to bounce ideas off the interviewer - if you say "I see that this can be done with method X, but I suspect there's a more efficient way that I don't see yet" or something like that, the interviewer can give you feedback that directs you whether to keep thinking or whether to write the version you have come up with

[open ivy]

These improvs are excellent. It will take a fair amount of practice to learn them. Ideas for me come stochastically, like it can take 2-3 min and then flood. Getting used to a library of fast-paced responses is like learning Spanish i.e. it should be doable eventually.

[smoky quest]

Also to be clear, by slowing down, I don't mean to slow down the interview. That will be quite apparent to the interviewer.
I meant to slow down yourself and to not jump straight to an answer. Some people try to think or speak too fast and it only end up hurting them

[open ivy]

I see. Also be ware of time-delay lag: that can cause misjudging the timing of who's turn to speak.

[summer roost]

interviewers are people too, and most interviewers don't enjoy watching someone fail. You should pay attention to what your interviewer is saying and the suggestions they're making, because they're likely trying to guide you towards a solution that's good enough. That's one of the reasons why thinking out loud is a really good idea in an interview - the interviewer will likely try to tell you if you're pursuing the wrong path. If you think in silence, they'll feel awkward sitting in silence, and you don't get the benefit of them steering your thought process.

[smoky quest]

literally https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrier-sense_multiple_access_with_collision_detection 😉

[open ivy]

Good point. The real challenge is internalization. Passing ground school is one thing. Flying through a pitch-black cloud at night and not crashing is another thing. The gap between "knowing what to do" and "doing it on the fly" is pretty big, and I am going to have to bridge it.

[summer roost]

don't underestimate the amount that practice helps with that. Mock interviews can be really helpful for drilling in those habits, and so can just doing lots of real interviews.

[open ivy]

Yes! Indeed!

[tacit prism]

anyone wanna repl.it

[open ivy]

Hmm, can I add a lag plugin to my voice chat and experiment with different settings? lol. Fortunately, the time-delay itself for most voice-chat is stable. This means that I can learn to handle conversations at different lag values. Am I considering international jobs? "Oh I am only certified to have smooth conversations up to 256 ms, and across the Atlantic we are facing 512 ms". What an excuse that would be!

[smoky quest]

lol don't worry about it. I talk to people in EU, Asia, US and everyone has lag, even people pretty much next door to me

[open ivy]

Really? I notice a big difference between "same general area" and west-coast to east-coast. But I agree that this is over-thinking things, and a small delay in answering is enough to cover the lag even to Austrailia.

[smoky quest]

australia doesn't count

[open ivy]

Yes the odds of landing a remote job there are, well, remote lol.

[smoky quest]

last time I went there, the market seemed quite active though

[open ivy]

Long plane flight...

[smoky quest]

and lots of related opportunities with east asia too

[open ivy]

For English speakers? I guess the privilege in having that as the first language is nice.

[smoky quest]

Given that Australia is an english speaking, it's a prime location for English speaking related jobs 😉

[open ivy]

I thought you said "East Asia"

[smoky quest]

yeah

For international companies, having a hub in Australia means they can have some each into east asia

[open ivy]

I see. It was a nice discussion. Still will have to think about the "internalization" and practice of interview tips.

[smoky quest]

likewise! Good luck!

[vapid jay]

Hi guys! I’m looking for some resources to improve my python skills. I have an advanced level, python is my main programming language and I work with python since 2017. I’m a data engineer and in my job python is used but less than I would like to use it, so I hope in future to switch more on a software engineering job. Can you suggest some books, courses, certifications useful to become a python software engineer (backend or full stack is fine as well tbh). I did some interviews but my knowledge is more on a de/data science/ml level.

[void forge]

how about freeCodeCamp ?

[cobalt walrus]

this is the best for beginners in my opinion
https://scrimba.com/learn/python

[spark cobalt]

freeCodeCamp is way too simple.

Some of their like "300 hour certificates" took me 2 hours at most and I'm not close to have been programming as long as this dude.

It's very vague, lack of depth, tutorials and certificates in general in my experience.

[true harness]

fluent python

[spark cobalt]

@vapid jay A guide someone else made that does contain books, etc.

[vapid jay]

Thanks guys !! I’ll take a look 🙏

[meager bane]

Can anybody suggest a best source to master datastructures and algorithms for python?

[near ocean]

Not really a career question, ask in #python-discussion

[spice linden]

I know python enough to code we apps in django, what else do I need to learn to get a good job??

[true harness]

see job requirements of jobs you want. they would know

[vapid jay]

hm

[idle sleet]

Does anyone have idea on a career/job (preferably tech) for INFJ (INTJ) personality type?

[near ocean]

Personality types are a scam
Youre in a python server so the obvious answer is software dev

[true harness]

this channel is for discussing careers wrt python

[idle sleet]

What do you mean by scam?

[idle sleet]

This is #career-advice channel. Isn't it made for discussing career?

Okay 🤷

[near ocean]

Personality types arent real, they only exist to sell you the tests

[idle sleet]

Ok. That's why I've done plenty of FREE tests 🤷

[near ocean]

Believe what you want to believe, fact is there is not such thing as a personality type
And there certainly arent careers specifically for these things

I bet you havent done the official test, cause it cost 50 dollars lol
For nothing

[idle sleet]

There is personality type, but you it doesn't have to determine your career, that's right. Though it can help you orient

[lost trench]

i totally agree

[near ocean]

It does nothing but separate you from your money, if you want to discuss their validity you can try in offtopic channels

[idle sleet]

As far as I'm concerned, there's no such thing as "official test"

[near ocean]

INTJ and other silly letter sets are literally the myers brigs indicator
I suggest you move to offtopic

[idle sleet]

Literally, psychology is based on personalities and their types.

[near ocean]

!ot

[inner wren]

Off-topic channel: #ot2-never-nester’s-nightmare

Please read our off-topic etiquette before participating in conversations.

[idle sleet]

What do you mean 😂
I have talked about career and jobs, you're the one who changed the topic...

[near ocean]

I suggested software dev
Youre in a python server, what else do you want lol
I suggested the thing i do for work

[idle sleet]

Who th ever mentioned here that channel named "career discussion" isn't about career discussion, but more likely "tech career discussion" or to be more accurate "programing career discussion"

[near ocean]

The channel description says "Python and the world of work"
Youre in a python server, we do python here
What kind of suggestion are you even looking for?

Maybe you should have been clear about your expectations in your original post

[idle sleet]

Yeah "Python AND THE WORLD OF WORK"

[mortal wedge]

Instead of saying you're X personality type, why don't you describe what traits you have that seem to fit and then maybe we can suggest something tech/software/python related?

[near ocean]

In the context of python! Why would we talk about unrelated stuff here lol, i wouldnt ask about being an accountant in this chat would I? Jesus

[vapid jay]

u seem very angry

[mortal wedge]

Think of it as we're in the Python Discord -> Career-discussion. It's a subset of python, not meant to be an offtopic chat.

Anyway, why don't you describe yourself/situation and maybe we can suggest something?

[idle sleet]

Yeah ok then.

[near ocean]

I've never been angry in my life.

[idle sleet]

Thanks. Now everyone here knows, you're a liar 👏

[smoky quest]

No need to call names or be discourteous

[near ocean]

I suggested something which you dismissed because of your own misunderstanding of the channel's purpose

Whats wrong with software dev anyway, youre in a python server packed with aspiring devs and working professionals

[mortal wedge]

Front end/UI development maybe? Based on my short read

I would say user experience/user interface design.

[pulsar panther]

I want learn how to programme with python does anyone know what i can use to become an expert at coding

[lyric nymph]

Youtube and Leet Code!

[spark cobalt]

Lol I wish

[spark cobalt]

Projects. And not projects you can just copy or "follow along" on YouTube.

[mortal wedge]

I suggest learning the basics first, then once you know the basics start working on projects

[spark cobalt]

And with everything, if you do more Leetcode, you'll be more of an "expert" in just Leetcode typed stuff. If you do projects relating to web development, you'll grow your expertise in web dev stuff.

There's lots of things you can do, start being a master of one before trying to be a master of all. Which is what I assume an expert is? Idk..

The more you learn about the industry and how wide it is, you'd probably give up being a master of everything. Technology grows faster than you can learn.

[mortal wedge]

Seek to be a master of your domain.

[hearty island]

time to leetcode boys and girls

[spark cobalt]

[hearty island]

they said they'd get back to me by the 5th, i had no idea it would be this

this probably means i didn't get the pm internship one 😦

[spark cobalt]

Definitely a lot of competition you'll have

[spark cobalt]

Nah you got this! Lot of interview processes really take a long time!

[hearty island]

have competition, you will

https://tenor.com/view/yoda-star-wars-gif-8063259

[crisp stream]

great censoring 🗿
we can see your name and the recruiter's name
might wanna delete it, if needed

[hearty island]

deleted

[mortal wedge]

Either way, much 'gratulations 🙂

[hearty island]

thank you, thank you

[hearty island]

i have a copy of that book, it's great

better read it again since i'll have interviews coming

[mortal wedge]

Maybe I'll check it out. Looks interesting and I hope to have interview coming

[vapid jay]

I wanna start learning python to become an python developer, where can i start learning?

[hearty island]

!resources

[inner wren]

Resources

The Resources page on our website contains a list of hand-selected learning resources that we regularly recommend to both beginners and experts.

[vapid jay]

Thanks

[tawny matrix]

Hi 👋

I like Game development, but I'm afraid that there is a better job out there for me, one that suits me more.
I've also heard that Game development is hard to get into, might end up with really low salary,...

But game dev is the only thing I was able to do for more than month (not like some other tech jobs I've tried) and keep coming back to it. I do game dev for years now I would say.

[mortal wedge]

Game dev has some pitfalls, with extra pitfalls for Python.

Let's start with the pitfalls of game dev. The industry as a whole has several issues. 1) Because of how products are marketed and launched, you often have tight timelines and are not always able (or companies are not willing) to offer support for a product after it is released. 2) People are passionate about gaming! This means most game devs are easy to replace, so they can get away with lower wages. 3) There's rampant sexism, but that may be in tech as a whole, but especially in game dev.

Now let's move on to pitfalls of gamedev with Python. Python is an excellent language that can do many things, it's best for when the bottleneck is development time (which is the case for most jobs). Game dev can be an exception. Games often have speed and memory constraints. These are not domains that Python excels at.

If you are passionate and are willing to ignore these drawbacks, then pursue it by all means. But I'm hard pressed to recommend it as a career to all but the most passionate and definitely want to warn them of the pitfalls ahead of time in case they are dealbreakers

[tawny matrix]

Uff, I don't know what to do.

[tawny matrix]

If you want, I'll continue here ---> #ot1-perplexing-regexing

[lunar prism]

I want a junior python position 😦

[mortal wedge]

A lot of comp sci stuff is math intensive, especially stuff like AI or research

[mortal wedge]

Go for it! Just be prepared to apply a lot

[lunar prism]

I submitted about 40 apps this weekend, just playing the waiting game

[mortal wedge]

Do I want to work at Tesla?

I know I don't want to work at Twitter, wondering if Tesla will be similar job environment/job instability

[hearty island]

i applied to a project management intern role at tesla and never heard back, my app was probably lost in the millions that applied

i feel like for big bois like that it's always good to contact a recruiter and ask them to track your progress

[lunar prism]

Big companies (that aren't defense contractors) are terrible at processing apps in my experience

That's also from a cyber security perspective, so what do I know lol

[true harness]

defense companies are bad too!

[mortal wedge]

I... don't know

[vapid jay]

why would u want to know that many choices

[near ocean]

You cant, why are you asking?

[vapid jay]

When working remotely does the company pay you the same as if they had to hire someone on-sight ? ex. if i am in europe and i am working for a us based company, will they pay me as per my country standards or their us standards ?

[buoyant seal]

It depends on a company, and on your job role/skills/rank/experience

In general they will pay by your country standards, unless some very extra conditions are met

[vapid jay]

and where/how do i get taxed

[lapis wind]

that again depends on the company with what setup they have.

you'll be taxed according to your country of residence since it's income tax.

The company may or may not handle that for you, or leave that for you to sort out with your local authorities.

Places like the UK have the PAYE scheme which means all the tax and stuff is taken out of your pay before you get it and handled by the company. But not everyone does this.

[stable elbow]

you know, when i first read that

i read it as you deployed 40 apps this weekend, and i lost all hope thinking if someone like you was the competition, then how proficient would i need to be to find a position

[summer roost]

most US companies will not hire someone working in another country. It's just too hard to satisfy local labor laws and US tax laws to put in all that effort for just one employee.

[stable elbow]

what if you're canadian and can get a TN

[summer roost]

what's a TN?

[stable elbow]

(canadian who is very concerned about getting into the usa)

TN Nafta professionals. pretty much if you're in a skilled profession (including stem), you don't need a visa, and just need a letter from your employer saying you can come work for em

[summer roost]

still no, I'm sure.

most US companies will not hire a worker to work from another country. The only exception are large multinational companies with large legal departments, who likely already have offices or subsidiaries in many countries.

[stable elbow]

oh, i read it wrong. "working from another country". im trying to immigrate :p

[summer roost]

right, that's a whole different ball game. Companies are happy to hire immigrants, just not remote workers from other countries.

if the company already has a presence in the worker's country, they may hire the remote worker as an employee of that legal entity. If they don't already have a presence in the worker's country, they're really unlikely to take on the tax and regulatory burdens of having employees in some new country just for one person.

[stable elbow]

do you have any recs for the best way to network? I'm looking for an analyst position near DC since thats where my partner works. Currently grinding out a couple more projects for my portfolio before sending resumes out

[summer roost]

what educational experience and prior work experience do you have?

[stable elbow]

Yeah....I'm a bit lacking in that department. i have a masters in biostatistics, but it was mostly theory and we used obsolete statistical software. Work experience is only a short internship where I got pretty much no training and had to learn to code and stuff on my own. So I'm more or less building a portfolio from scratch from random projects that interest me or show that I can do things. So far I've built some dashboards, practiced pulling data from random APIs. Atm, I'm trying to finish a decently sized ETL project: prob gonna scrape tripadvisor and do a sent.analysis or something, and probably a project that requires machine learning.

my partner is an FDE and is supportive, but I'm pretty lacking atm imo.

[summer roost]

hm. Analyst positions are not my area of expertise, so I'm not sure what concrete advice I can offer beyond "apply to many, many positions". Someone else may be able to give you something more useful.

[stable elbow]

For local analyst positions, I'm fairly sure I would be competitive. But if its iin another country, I feel like I would need a bit extra something to be worth the investment. So I'm trying to add stuff that enters the more data science-y category

actually i lied about the competitive part. we have a severe lack of tech jobs where i live. so competition is probably high

[summer roost]

But if its iin another country, I feel like I would need a bit extra something to be worth the investment.
That's not necessarily true, honestly. If you don't require visa sponsorship and you're planning to move to be local to the company, I'm not sure that most employers would care very much.

[stable elbow]

yeah, well a dude who did recruiting for tech said something that hit me quite deeply. If you aren't a hell yes, its going to be a no

[summer roost]

did you mention to him that visa sponsorship isn't required for you?

[stable elbow]

oh no, this wasnt about me. this was about recruiting in general

[summer roost]

that's true for recruiting in general - bad hires are expensive, so hiring decisions often require unanimous approval from a bunch of different people, and are biased towards turning down a candidate who might have done well rather than hiring a candidate who might do poorly.

but that doesn't put an employee who would be immigrating in a worse position compared to any other candidate, I don't think - visa sponsorship is costly and annoying, but if they don't need to go through that process, I would expect that most companies wouldn't care that you're moving from Canada.

take that with a grain of salt, since I've absolutely never heard the phrase "TN Nafta Professionals" before this conversation 🙂

[stable elbow]

i think they just call it a TN-Visa

[delicate bane]

same.

[stable elbow]

or TN-1. Thats what some canadians i know who went to upenn said they did when they went to work for google and stripe afterwards

[pulsar kite]

Also

[delicate bane]

assuming youre targeting data analyst/data scientist positions, it would help if you could narrow down to a specific domain/industry if possible.

[stable elbow]

well i have the most experience in healthcare and with health data, but those positions typically require you to be a local citizen...

[dusky cedar]

Anyone know about Entry level AI internships, Don't mind if its unpaid I just want to learn

[delicate bane]

i know you probably dont want to limit your options, but you are competing with a lot of candidates who sometimes have that domain knowledge because they are moving from the non-technical side of things

[summer roost]

the DC area will also have lots of government contractor positions which likely will prefer citizens over immigrants. Probably avoid those when applying.

[stable elbow]

yeah. I pretty much already assumed i wont be getting many bites in government related positions.

[summer roost]

what country are you in? What degree are you pursuing? What year are you in?

[peak halo]

I already answered this in #data-science-and-ml 😛

[vapid jay]

so as a european living in europe, i shouldn't even consider applying for a job in us ?

[stable elbow]

if you arent canada or mexico, i think you wanna look at h1b visas

[summer roost]

if your goal is to work remotely from Europe, most likely not, unless the job post you're applying to says that it's not only fully remote but also open to people from other countries.

[vapid jay]

ive been applying for an entry-level/junior data analyst job in countries all over europe for the past 3 months ...no luck yet. So i considered us,canada

[summer roost]

why do you think you're not having luck with European companies?

[vapid jay]

not sure, out of the 200 applications sent i have received about 10 positive feedbacks - 8 of them were in my country

[stable elbow]

any interviews?

[vapid jay]

the 2 were from france and belgium - they wanted someone with more experience

[summer roost]

what's your level of experience? What's your education history?

[vapid jay]

regarding the other 8 in my country - hald of them never came back to me after the initial interview. some i just failed to deliver the test with top scores

[stable elbow]

can you speak french?

[vapid jay]

let me share my cv

this is the original one. I had a discussion earlier this week with some experienced in the field and said i should use latex form.

[stable elbow]

latex form is more ats friendly

i had a fancy resume before too. now its all black and densely packed

[vapid jay]

my bachelor's is top tier in my country btw

[summer roost]

for someone with only 5 months of professional experience in the field and a degree that seems to be non-technical as far as I can tell, 10 callbacks out of 200 applications is genuinely not that bad of a ratio.

[vapid jay]

the thing is , my degree is quite technical

[stable elbow]

its insanely good right? @summer roost

[vapid jay]

we had all sorts of projects regarding sql, java, unit testing, c, python, data analysis, graph theory,

[stable elbow]

i was like wow. 1/20

[summer roost]

I think that's quite good, yeah.

[vapid jay]

can i share my portfolio with you guys

[peak halo]

@vapid jay was this degree awarded in Greece? I've never heard of "Bachelors of Management Science" as an alternative to "Bachelors of {Science,Arts}"

[summer roost]

that doesn't come across from just the title of the degree. It may help you out to describe the course work in more detail - adding a few bullets to the CV about those projects, to make it clear that the degree was quite technical

[stable elbow]

I got some dudes who are genius at leetcoding with multiple projects. Still haven't gotten an interview from hundreds of apps

[summer roost]

I usually don't hear about someone applying to hundreds of jobs without a single callback unless they're self-taught and have no degree at all.

[vapid jay]

yes

[stable elbow]

That's the thing. They've had swe jobs before
So they have no idea what's going on

[summer roost]

wow. That seems like a surprisingly low ratio to me...

[true harness]

1/20 is amazing lol. I'm looking at like 1/50

[stable elbow]

Also go to Ivy's. Upenn and stanford

So they got the brand recognition too. Maybe it's cuz they're Asian

For some reason Asian males have a harder time than Asian females landing stuff. (They discussed this in a group apparently)

[summer roost]

probably half the coworkers I've had over the course of my career have been Asian. Well, maybe more like 25%. But they're by no means under-represented in tech

[stable elbow]

Maybe it's just that there's so many. That there's some affirmative action going on

[summer roost]

seems quite unlikely to me. Making hiring decisions based on race is illegal in the US

[stable elbow]

Maybe just unlucky then

[vapid jay]

They say that but there are special hiring events that heavily favor minorities in terms of admissions.

[peak halo]

or it could be that there are a lot more east Asians than there are Americans, and if some number of them want to move to the US, qualifying themselves for a tech job is one way of doing that.

[summer roost]

yes, but that's legal, and fair game. It's OK to encourage more of a certain group to apply, it's not OK to select someone to hire from the pool of applicants based on their membership in a certain group.

[vapid jay]

Yes but they're effectively excluding white heterosexual males of a middle class or greater social status from their exclusive hiring events

So they're getting around it.

[peak halo]

what? I'm a homosexual male, and no one ever asked before I attended a hiring event.

[vapid jay]

There are a few exclusive bootcamps or courses funded by large companies that heavily prefer non-male, non-white/asian applicants and have an easier time getting into the company than a normal application.

[summer roost]

Being a woman, for instance, might make it more likely to recruiters to reach out to you and suggest that you apply to positions at their company, but it shouldn't make it more likely you get the job compared to a man who applies for the same position.

[vapid jay]

There are paid internships that are specifically only for non-whites as well.

[stable elbow]

I saw some of those

I was like...why are you advertising this to me? This is not very cash money

[vapid jay]

I already have a job I just think it's horrible that they lie about it when they obviously do have preferences.

[summer roost]

I've never seen that, and based on my understanding of US employment law, that would not be legal. Do you have an example?

[vapid jay]

Sure, here's one example, it's funded by some large tech companies and you get set up with guaranteed interviews at the end. https://www.codepath.org/

I also saw another paid internship position that was specifically only for black or latinx applicants but I can't remember which company it was for at the moment.

[summer roost]

guaranteed interviews is totally fine and good under US employment law.

[vapid jay]

That's just a roundabout way to have a racial preference

[summer roost]

sure, I suppose. They're legally allowed to have a preference towards increased diversity. They're not legally allowed to discriminate against applicants based on their race.

both goals are satisfiable.

[vapid jay]

Right, increased diversity means a bias against white, heterosexual males

[summer roost]

sure?

like, yes - the way to solve the problem of an over-represented group is to hire fewer people from that over-represented group over time.

[vapid jay]

There's a bias in assuming it's even a problem

[summer roost]

they're not legally allowed to do that by refusing to hire people from that group, but they are legally allowed to encourage people from outside that group to apply. So they do.

[summer roost]

there's actually quite a lot of studies that address that

[brave matrix]

where are you from?

[smoky quest]

that's not the approach taken by a lot of companies

Increasing opportunities and outreach at the top of the funnel can help increase diversity without necessarily introducing a bias

[summer roost]

And again: it is illegal for a company to reject you for a job because you're white and heterosexual. They can encourage other groups of people to apply to that job, but they can't pick them over you just because they're from one of those other groups.

if one of them gets the job and you don't, it's because they were the better candidate, not because a recruiter encouraged them to apply.

[gilded valley]

You don't mention python anywhere on there - that's something that would mean you wouldn't even be considered for analyst roles at my company. If you know it at all, you should include it

[summer roost]

indeed, most resumes, especially at the entry level, include a list of tools and technologies that you're familiar with.

[stable elbow]

literally trying to make a scraper with python now to address that gap myself =p

[mortal wedge]

I'll second what @summer roost said. At entry level it's assumed nobody knows anything. But it will take less time to train you if you're familiar with certain technologies. I generally recommend the top part of a resume to be skills/technologies/modules/languages/etc.

[stable elbow]

my code is so ugly 🙂

[gilded valley]

Tbf, their skills section is fairly prominent - it just doesn't include python

[mortal wedge]

Oh, yeah... that needs to be there lmao

[mortal wedge]

If you know it's ugly, that means you know how it might be improved 🙂

[stable elbow]

my partner sent me a document on style

let's just say...it was bad

(i camelcased everything)

[mortal wedge]

Just make it better, then 🙂

[summer roost]

true, but they said

we had all sorts of projects regarding sql, java, unit testing, c, python, data analysis, graph theory,
and that skills section contains almost none of those - 1 or 2, I guess.

[delicate bane]

a common theme in this channel im finding is: 1) college education or not, 2) diversity issues

[mortal wedge]

Huh, I don't see diversity issues that commonly, but yeah college education or not seems to be the hot topic. I hate giving the answer, but people need to be informed.

[delicate bane]

its not as common, no, but when it happens in this channel...it happens

anyway better to move on then talk about meta-topics

[stable elbow]

realistically, are there any penalties from selling equity the moment its vested to you?

[smoky quest]

that happens frequently in public companies. You could sell some to cover taxes.
But if you sell right away, you would get hit by short term gains

[stable elbow]

it wouldnt be apart of income tax?

or are short term gains classified under income already

[summer roost]

Capital gains taxes are a type of income taxes that can have much higher rates than taxes on earned income

[gilded valley]

stock vesting triggers an income tax liability, the CGT liability would be the difference between the value at vesting and the value when you sell them

[mortal wedge]

This is probably a controversial question, but those of you working for defense contractors, what do you think of the work/atmosphere? Some of the jobs I'm coming across are things like being able to spot guns in real time or detecting a gunshot in a loud environment.

[vapid jay]

is coding forensics a thing

[stable elbow]

would people working in those fields even be allowed to discuss about those things?

[dreamy shadow]

If I had to guess, all the Data science jobs that require clearance is more or less of:
Are you not a Russian/Chinese Spy?
Are you not going to instagram/tic toc your work secrets.

[mortal wedge]

Haha, no idea.

[white relic]

I worked in defense for years. Big advantages: high stability and good work-life balance. Major disadvantage: bureaucracy. Location can go in either category depending on your preference.

[dreamy shadow]

Big advantages: high stability and good work-life balance.
Yea, you can definitely see this in the job requirements. Feels like a H1b Visa tbh, not a lot of company wanting to sponsor you if you don't have one.

[white relic]

it's more like: are you an alcoholic, are you addicted to illegal drugs or gambling, do you have debts you can't pay, are you hiding things from your friends or family that someone could use to blackmail you

and list all your foreign contacts ofc

[dreamy shadow]

bruh

[true harness]

and where you've been for the last 7 years...

[stable elbow]

i feel like it would be tough to verify truthfulness in that kinda thing though

[dreamy shadow]

This is def under "are you a spy" lmao

[mortal wedge]

The problem is I love federally illegal drugs

[white relic]

I mean, yes, but that's only a small part of it

[dreamy shadow]

Rip your future career in gov

[dreamy shadow]

NSA read that and now in your files forever.

[mortal wedge]

😵

[white relic]

meh. the investigation is more about will you admit to it and is there anyone who could use it as leverage to make you do something.

[mortal wedge]

Yes and No, then. Well, if somebody offered me a high enough amount it might get me to do something >.>

[dreamy shadow]

I would have to say the questions & investigation depends on the level of clearance. At the minimum, you have to be honest & can't be easily compromised.

[white relic]

yep. the people who do your investigation aren't interested in prosecuting you, they only care about stuff to the extent it shows you are a liability to have access to state secrets

[stable elbow]

wouldn't you have a greater chance of being compromised, after you get into such a position? Like you're single, and some random bombshell starts throwing all the attention at your lonely ass

[mortal wedge]

Ah well, screw it. I'll apply to the gunshot detection job. Although one of the parts of the job posting says Must be enthusiastic about testing the live firing system

[stable elbow]

whoawhoawhoa. send me the link. i wanna apply to a job that lets me shoot guns

[dreamy shadow]

www.marines.com

[white relic]

as long as it doesn't say "... as a target" you're probably ok

[dreamy shadow]

Work accidents intensifies

[white relic]

if the position is actually a cleared position, which you didn't say it was but many/most are, you can look up the SF-86 form that you will have to fill out to get a clearance. It's the same for everybody.

this is all 🇺🇸 of course

[dreamy shadow]

Honestly only thing that matters to me is how's the pay.

Which I have the feeling falls in line with insurance companies, not that great.

[white relic]

Some people object to the nature of the work, for privacy or other reasons of conscience. I didn't have that problem, but I also didn't work on particularly controversial projects.

Pay is generally competitive but not at the top of the list no.

[dreamy shadow]

Yes, hence why I stated what matters for me. Without a doubt the data in these DS listings I"m seeing has to do with drone footage or w/e other legal/illegal data taps.

I personally prefer the private sector, as there's more money there overall compared to government jobs. Although, I know someone who's really into government jobs given that they come from a country where government jobs mean wealth and power.

[white relic]

To be clear, I was employed as an electronic engineer, not in data science or software development. So I'm not as dialed in on that end of things.

[dreamy shadow]

Yea, it's more of the new data surveillance era. Which is an entire topic I don't really want to get into here.

[white relic]

Defense is like a weird hybrid of private sector and actual government job. The money is linked to different sources. You might not have to worry about being laid off in an economic downturn, but there's other factors to consider.

[dreamy shadow]

My dude's typing the next constitution.

[white relic]

force of habit, I edit a lot

[dreamy shadow]

Clearance sounds too much of a pain to get in.

In other news, I'm not too sure how to prep for my 3x 30min interviews that spans 1.5hours.

[white relic]

maybe. It's not for everyone

wasn't really for me, but I put up with it for a decade or so

[dreamy shadow]

Looked 2/3 interviewers on linked in so I know their background, but one of them has a name that's not common and/or no linkedin at all.

[white relic]

are they all technical interviewers? do you have their titles?

[dreamy shadow]

1 is a functional manager, 1 is a "Data scientist" (more of an analyst), the third is a data scientist manager.

I'm expecting semi technical questions out of the third, and maybe the 2nd? But honestly a little hard to prep for functional manager & data science manager.

[grand stream]

I'm guessing they don't have a bounty system in here? Something of a job or project board that people can post a paying bounty for a solution?

[dreamy shadow]

Nothing paid of any sort is allowed here

[grand stream]

Well that just bites.

[white relic]

I'd expect career/behavioral questions from the functional manager, technical questions from the data scientist, and maybe some of both from the third.
But it's hard to prep in general. Every interviewer is different and the thing that works with one will sometimes utterly screw you with another

[dreamy shadow]

Yea, that's what I thought.

I guess I'll just prep my resume items & behavioral questions + some generic DS questions.

Glad I wrote down the definition of P-value is because the last interview they actually asked it. Stupid question IMO

[white relic]

What I found useful when I was first interviewing is making a list of things I did in school/personal projects, and looking for opportunities to talk about them in interviews.

[vapid jay]

that's why they only get cultists (mormons) and liars

[white relic]

Having a story ready like "I worked on X project in school and we used Y, but my teammate wanted to use Z instead" is something you can naturally inject into a conversation about X, Y, Z, teamwork, or conflict resolution

[dreamy shadow]

Yea, I have one of those.
My teammate wanted to use R so they can just copy and paste existing code from another course to be lazy. I forced python so they couldn't, and ended up doing the entire project myself.

[white relic]

sounds like you learned a valuable lesson or two 😆

[dreamy shadow]

Yea, the program's going to churn out a bunch of worthless "data scientists" who refuse to learn python.

[mortal wedge]

It's because the staff can't vet all the opportunities, so if something is a scam or breaks the law and the server gets in trouble... that would be bad

[grand stream]

Well, i guess that is a very good reason even though it doesn't really work for what i need. Can't blame the system i guess.

[modest lagoon]

Alright folks so now learn Julia and R and never use them because you’ll be making a website. Scrum

[grand stream]

@mortal wedge I have a solution could you message me please!

[vapid jay]

Hey!
My manager wants to do a one on one with every developer in our tech team. How should I prepare for it? What's the interaction gonna be like?

[brave bridge]

If asked if im interested in job offer X:
How do i say yes but i need time to think about accepting it without it sounding bad?

[grand stream]

@pulsar drum Thanks for the help. Donation to the discord channel on behalf of your help.

Single pledge, but thanks all the same

[pulsar drum]

You're welcome! I think you meant to post this in #community-meta though?

[mortal wedge]

I'd suggest DMing @severe widget I can't greenlight anything

[mortal wedge]

It's fairly standard to take a week to think over job offers. This won't raise any red flags. Just ask how long the offer is valid for and if you can have a week to think about it

[mortal wedge]

By relaxing 🙂 One on ones are supposed to be fairly informal and a way to connect and voice your thoughts/concerns. If you have to prepare a ton or if they are coming across really stressful, this shouldn't be the case

[brave bridge]

I feel whatever i say that is not: yes of course i want it, I already discredit myself as someone who is not interested idk why

[true harness]

ya. you shouldn't be scared of your manager, it'll probably be fairly chill

[vapid jay]

I see. Thanks man

[vapid jay]

Yeah not like scared I've interacted with him before. Just want to make a good impression.

[mortal wedge]

Generally when an offer is given it's valid for X amount of time. Sometimes there are laws around this for like minimum time periods. But yeah, it's totally expected and understandable to want some time to think an offer over. It's a big decision!

[summer roost]

Is this your boss? Or your boss's boss?

[vapid jay]

My boss' boss

[brave bridge]

ok thats good to know

[summer roost]

I see. Well, interesting stuff to talk about with a manager who you don't interact with on a daily basis is what projects you're working on, what sort of stuff you most enjoy working on, what other teams in the company are working on, what sorts of projects might come to your team down the line, how the manager thinks the team is doing overall, etc.

[mortal wedge]

Ah, didn't realize it was a skip level

[summer roost]

it's a good chance to pull yourself out of the details and chat about - and ask questions about - high level stuff - things happening around you that you might not see directly.

[brave bridge]

i had a similar meeting with boss of boss

and we ended up talking about alcoholism in our families instead of job related things, i dont recommend that path btw

[ancient pecan]

So, my LDR girlfriend and I intend on getting married and having her come over to the united states. She's a senior developer + supervisor for a cognizant group in India and is a full stack developer using JS for FE and Java for BE. Her core competencies are good but overall technologies are out of date. What are some ideas of the smoothest transition towards working doing product development and using a modern tech stack?

Like could do a project with new technologies as a starting point. What are some other ideas or more specific suggestions on improving her employability at a good company (doesn't need to be a big tech company)?

Any ideas appreciated, please ping me with your responses.

[vapid jay]

lmao okay.

[vapid jay]

Thanks man!

[dreamy shadow]

Biggest improvement, like it or not, would be a green card/us citizenship

Other than that, projects with stacks that are used in the US is a good start

[smoky quest]

what parts feel out of date to you? Where is the mismatch with what's in use in the US?

[ancient pecan]

nondockerized solutions, on prem, and java frameworks that are 10 - 14 years old

They have no development environment that isn't shared by several people. I think her core competencies for general development are good and she just needs some legitimate exposure to newer technologies that she can write on her resume.

[ancient pecan]

Yep, for sure 👍

[smoky quest]

What matters is the skills. As long as she can demonstrate she can pick up the more modern java/js frameworks and learn docker, that will be a non issue

[ancient pecan]

Sure, so you feel like she'll still get interviews and as long as she can demonstrate her general knowledge she has a good shot

I suppose I am thinking too many steps ahead.

[smoky quest]

Yeah, don't pigeon hole an engineer by the language or framework they currently use. That's something any engineer can pick up in days

[smoky quest]

Your main problem will be the visa, which will take months

[ancient pecan]

I agree, I was more so concerned about getting past filtering and initial resume reads

[ancient pecan]

Yep, definitely looking into it 🙂

[buoyant seal]

Best book to learn docker

[zealous parrot]

Does anyone have any recommendations for internship websites? I've been sending out applications for months and haven't had much luck.

[gilded valley]

LinkedIn

[zealous parrot]

I've been using that for a while! Thanks for the response tho

[near remnant]

Learning Python was one of the best decisions of my life so far. Got an amazing remote job and I can work in Python and learn everyday. Keep up boyz.

[mortal wedge]

!resources
Honestly, JS is not out of date for FE, still highly used. Java is also not THAT out of date, I'm sure there will still be positions for Java for BE, although ofc being part of a Python server would always suggest Python for its flexibility and ecosystem.

One thing she could do is definitely start applying/looking now, no need to wait until she reaches the states. What I recommend doing is looking at job postings for something equivalent to her current position and seeing if not knowing a more modern language is a deal breaker or not. Doing a project with Python would be a good way to pick up the lang if she decides to go that route. There are also a lot of Python related resources on the server, take a look.

As far as employability, to be honest in the states your ability to get a job is not necessarily that connected with your ability to do the job. It can be broken down into three overall steps:

1. Get an interview. This is more your resume than anything else. I'm sure she has the skills and the background, but she should take some time to update her resume and get it reviewed. Unless she has connections in the states at companies of interest, she'll likely need a good and up to date resume.

2. Nail the interview. Do some mock interviews, make sure you have answers to the most common interview questions, and it doesn't hurt to brush up on your DSA. (Google started a trend of asking coding "puzzles" and most of the tech world followed suit. This isn't always the case for more experienced positions, but why not be prepared?) Many companies will have a coding component where they will either ask for code samples or ask you to solve an algorithmic puzzle/problem. Make sure to practice beforehand and when you're in the coding part of the interview it's okay to think out loud. Generally an interviewer wants you to succeed and wants to see how you think, so talking through a problem is only to your benefit.

[inner wren]

Resources

The Resources page on our website contains a list of hand-selected learning resources that we regularly recommend to both beginners and experts.

[mortal wedge]

The third is keeping the job, but from the background you described she'll be fine. She should just focus on the first two (and if she decides to go the python route those above resources are great for learning

[mortal wedge]

I pretty much use linkedin, indeed, and company websites exclusively. If I get desperate I use google, lol

That's what I use for job search anyway, I've never looked around specifically for internships, but I have come across internships while applying

[ancient pecan]

Thank you 🙏

[static bronze]

Hi. I hope you are doing well!

I'm looking for a job platform for international positions. Would know any? I'm looking for a Jr. Data Analyst or Jr. Business Analyst position in English Speakers Countries. I'm also looking for tips to improve my CV and LinkedIn profile, I would be glad to receive your feedback about it

CV https://www.canva.com/design/DAFS2-2gwls/OaNB3bmVzht20bppkgriQQ/view?utm_content=DAFS2-2gwls&utm_campaign=designshare&utm_medium=link2&utm_source=sharebutton

**Linkedin Profile: ** https://www.linkedin.com/in/joseluizrochafilho/

Thanks a lot!

[shut slate]

Hi, I somehow convinced my 3-tire college's teachers that I can get into Google if I do self learning instead of sitting in their boring class, So they let me use computer lab all day and promised free attendance. Now where do I start? what do I do? I heard Google recruits through Codejam, but I couldn't even pass Codejam's round 2 in my last attempt, and in round 1 I was struggling with 1 question. Is there any shortcuts to get into Google? How long will it take to make it to Codejam's final round? Is my rank at Codejam alone enough to get me a job at google? How should I prepare to become the best competitive coder? Am I in the right track??

[torpid jungle]

If there was a shortcut to being the best, I don't think there would be anyone who wasn't in Google. You just need to practice a lot and solidify the basics.

What language do you use?

How long have you been coding?

[shut slate]

I'm currently fluent in python. but I'm willing to learn other languages if needed

[shut slate]

since 1 year

[torpid jungle]

I mean any language is fine as long as you want to pursue that in your career.

What do you do in python? Like just competitive coding or have you tried any specialised things that are careers at Google?

[shut slate]

just few backtracking questions on hackerearth. (still struggling with few questions)

apart from that, i did nothing

Just for your estimation: I've solved NQueens question on my own after solving few easier similar questions

[torpid jungle]

Okay then I would suggest learning and practicing data structures and algorithms questions and trying to implement various things on your own. During that, go through the help channels here and find which topic you like the most.

Like data science and ai, or game development, etc

[shut slate]

data structures consists of few stuff like linked lists, trees etc.. which we hardly use during competitive programming

[torpid jungle]

That's why I said don't just do competitive coding.

[shut slate]

then how will I get into google?

[near ocean]

By graduating, practicing, building real projects

[torpid jungle]

https://careers.google.com/how-we-hire/

Google doesn't hire from competitive coding sites only..

[near ocean]

It was foobar they hired from and they stopped doing that

[torpid jungle]

You can go see their YouTube channel and they explain what they expect from people, even those who don't have degrees.

[shut slate]

Okay, one last question: how long will I take for graduating, practicing, building real projects and getting a decent rank in codejam?

1 year? 2 years?

[torpid jungle]

Graduation time is fixed isn't it? Then during the duration of your degree practice and make projects.

[near ocean]

How far are you into your degree

[torpid jungle]

Oh I forgot to ask, what degree?

[shut slate]

I'm in 2nd year. total 4 years. so i have 2 years

[shut slate]

cse obviously

[hasty isle]

Guys I love programming ❤️

[torpid jungle]

It's not really obvious, there's lots of people who go into CS careers with degrees in bio, chem, finance, etc.

Okay, I would say, learn and practice basic DSA problems. Keep doing codejams. Find what track you want to pursue with Python and then maybe look into making a small project on the side to implement what you've learnt.

During this process you'll find more things to learn, like networking concepts, containerisation, etc etc

You can learn how to use GitHub and Git

[shut slate]

oohh these stuff sounds cooool. For now I'l defenitely "learn and practice basic DSA problems, Keep doing codejams". I'l be back when I find what track I want to pursue (though I may loose hope and become a call center employee by then)

[torpid jungle]

Are you Indian? I feel like only we would make a joke like that xD

[shut slate]

yea I'm an Indian. Happy to meet a fellow citizen lol

so you can guess the condition of 3 tire colleges in India lol

[torpid jungle]

I would suggest freecodecamp.org and their youtube tutorials if youre looking for easy tutorials later on

[scarlet dove]

ew theres indians here jk hello there fellow comrades

[shut slate]

cool. thanks for suggestion!

[torpid jungle]

@scarlet dove

[buoyant seal]

FE Javascript, and BE Java are technically the best possible combination for hirability in web dev.
Purely a matter of keeping up with their latest trends, and learning all the relavant other topics necessary for web dev

like Postgresql, Redis, Message Queues (RabbitMQ, SQS), Kafka, Mongo, Web sockets, Apache Cassandra,
Code Architecture, CDN, AWS, CI CD tools (Github Actions / Gitlab CI), Docker
and other stuff from here https://github.com/donnemartin/system-design-primer

Technically since she already knows FE + BE, she is not supposed to be asked for much of infra knowledge. Docker+CI tool, should be enough from the point of Infrastructure as a Code. Btw, cool language agnostic tool, to configure dev commands and reusing them for building docker / running CI: https://taskfile.dev/

If she is FE, i would be only interested, if she is well versed in React/Vue/Angular, and asked questioned how well she can write unit/integration tests for frontend in some Testing framework like Jest. With seeing normal OOP code, following SOLID stuff / testable / with ability applying Design Patterns within Javascript, i would be probably already satisfied with FE knowledge of hired person.

For BE, we need being well versed in at least one common SQL fully fledged database at her rank (Postgresql, MySQL, MariaDB). Knowing it throughly to the level of being fluent in optimizing SQL queries and building complex SQL requests, tuning at some level db from minor stuff. And the rest is just additional fluff with NoSQL, and distributed computations i guess.
her being well versed in some common Java framework like Spring Boot, is pretty much enough. All we need today is RestAPI, + more or less often encountered GraphQL? Good to learn GraphQL since she is frontender at least
Besides that important DB structure is Elastic Search to be known

[buoyant seal]

So Concluding
FE = Common framework like React (to less degree Angular/Vue) + Code Architecture + Testing + Web sockets + GraphQL + Whatever ecosystem of the chosen framework
BE = Spring Boot + Code Architecutre and testing is minimal must have + well versed in common SQL database + NoSQL fluff (Elastic Search, S3, Redis, MongoDB) + Distributed computations with RabbitMQ/SQS/Kafka/Lambdas/Step functions/SNS is also common asked
Then the only left is to press as much as possible Cloud provider knowledge after that (AWS/GCP/Azure), AWS is more marketable, but US can be having Azure more marketable too
monitoring/logging/tracing systems are a bit under question to which degree will be asked, she is FE after all
P.S. will be nice to have deploying web/workers at least with AWS beanstalk (it can through Docker and not Docker, through Docker is of course preferable)(Docker should be at the level of being not afraid building and deploying to Docker registry at public hub/AWS container registries, manually and from CI)

[buoyant seal]

Although since she is frontender again... She would be asked first only for backend related to Web sockets + GraphQL + (whatever is there the most BE related to FE stuff?) + Databases stuff.
Distributed computations i think would not be really sought from full stack dev

[buoyant seal]

!off off topic channels are below.

[inner wren]

Off-topic channels

There are three off-topic channels:
• #ot0-psvm’s-eternal-disapproval
• #ot1-perplexing-regexing
• #ot2-never-nester’s-nightmare

The channel names change every night at midnight UTC and are often fun meta references to jokes or conversations that happened on the server.

See our off-topic etiquette page for more guidance on how the channels should be used.

[delicate bane]

[stray axle]

how much knowledge of python is required to get a job?

[white relic]

depends on the job

the best way to get a Python job without knowing much Python is to have other relevant skills, like data science or system administration

[buoyant seal]

Or having software engineering education/degree in general

[remote bear]

Write a function age taking as parameter a variable x(age) and
returning major or minor.
What does the instruction age(15) return? please help

[frail gale]

Why?

Why do you love programming, if you do, guys?

[remote bear]

guys who help me please i have controle in maths

[hearty island]

i just talked to a cisco recruiter let's see what happens

[buoyant seal]

I loved in childhood playing with constructor.
And later I loved playing Minecraft with electro technical mods. Building base with automated crafting, resource acquiring, optimized in resource and performance spending.

Programming is like another constructor to me, except construction is made from mind bricks and abstractions. Programming is direct act for me of transforming fantasies info usable stuff. Imagination and skills are the limits.

[ancient pecan]

@buoyant seal thank you for your insight!

[buoyant seal]

😆 base automatically gathering thousands of resources, processing and crafting Quantum Solar Panels. Left server for few month, returned to get thousands of crafted panels, each one capable to produce ~3000 eu/tick eletro energy units per unit of time.

[buoyant seal]

a bit of memes on topic

[slate flame]

Hey

What jobs can I seek in coding?

[next rock]

i currently work in the film industry (camera department) and im looking to transition out of that into coding/data science. I'm wondering if anyone here has any insights to any potential overlap between the two fields (i can definitely provide more info on what exactly i do if anyone cares to respond)

[vapid jay]

is linked in premium worth it ?

[peak halo]

if it's worth it at all, it's only worth it while you're actively hunting. have you done the free month?

[vapid jay]

no not yet

[mortal wedge]

Hi @static bronze You can check out the job boards in the channel description, otherwise I'm not sure. Maybe linkedin/indeed? Most job boards I've seen you can specify where the role is.

[mortal wedge]

Google loves their puzzles/programming competition style questions. It's not the best way to gauge someone's performance at a job, but they do it.

I would recommend continually developing your skills instead of building to focus on a specific company.

Also, I've come across competitive programming puzzles where I needed linked lists 🙂

But definitely 1) Graduate 2) Decide which area you want to focus and work on building a project portfolio for that area 3) Continue to learn and develop your skills

[mortal wedge]

I know you're probably joking, but I made the mistake of doing a call center job before pursuing a full career as a developer. The change was PAINFUL, I had to convince people I was more than just a call center employee.

[mortal wedge]

As @white relic said highly job dependent. If I am hiring for a python related job, I want you to know the basics of python generally (I'm not going to geek out with you about how python's default sorting algorithm works or anything). But I view programming as a tool to help you do other tasks. IF you're a data scientist, I'm expecting familiarity with python tools related to data science. I expect you to be familiar with pandas, numpy, scipy, matplotlib, etc. I'll be impressed if you know the gnitty gritty about how those work but it's unnecessary.

[dark orchid]

guys i need help on my python homework it requires me to make a descending matrice

[mortal wedge]

This channel is for discussing Python and the world of work. Try #❓｜how-to-get-help or #python-discussion for general questions

[dark orchid]

oh ok srry

[mortal wedge]

So many! I encourage you to think of coding as a tool to do other things. Pretty much any field you work in, programming can help to make parts of your job easier!

[mortal wedge]

Hello! You definitely want to focus on the overlap whenever you change careers, as previous experience is one of the main qualifiers for a job and you need to convince people that your previous industry transfers over.

I'm not sure how much transfers here, but have you done any computer graphics work? That's the obvious link between the film industry and coding. You could say you have an eye for visual appeal or something if you were applying for that sort of work.

If you're interested in data science though.... I can't think off the top of my head where the overlap would be. Maybe if you expand upon what you do there may be something?

[mortal wedge]

Has some nifty features, but it's debatable. As @peak halo mentioned give the free trial a shot and that should give you all the information you need to know if it's worth it. I agree with them though, I wouldn't use linkedin premium unless I was actively seeking, at the very least.

[next rock]

the main function of my job revolved around wireless video transmission

basically getting the video from the cameras to everyone on set that needed to see it, from focus pullers to directors/producers

[mortal wedge]

Hey, that sounds like there could be some overlap! At least you can sell that. What sorts of tasks did you do to make that happen? You may have to be creative in how you spin this, lol, but I think you could do it.

[next rock]

sometimes i had to get it to people remotely as well

but that was rare (although i think thats happening more frequently lately)

[next rock]

so basically we used a wireless system by teradek that came with (usually) a transmitter that mounted on the camera and a receiver that either went directly on the monitor or was attached to an antennae of some sort that i could place far away and then run the feed to a central hub that could then send out all the individual lines to whoever

my job was pretty straight forward in that regard, the biggest complications came from rf interference that would drop the image so sometimes id have to use channel analyzers to pick different bandwidths

[mortal wedge]

You can easily sell that enough to get past HR. For a hiring manager you'll probably want some projects under your belt you can point to for why you're qualified for a coding/data science role.

Generally the steps are ATS-> HR -> Hiring Manager

[next rock]

honestly my biggest concern about the job switching is the whole sunken cost fallacy lol

[mortal wedge]

You mean dedicating time to become a coder and not getting the job?

[next rock]

ive been pretty convinced that theres like no overlap in the two fields so its been a challenge to go all in

well theres no job for me to have yet since im still learning

[mortal wedge]

Gotcha. If it helps you feel better, I'm in a developer role right now and I can from tech support answering phones. 🙂 All it took was some creative storytelling to get interviews from that, haha.

[next rock]

its more so like ive spent a bunch of time doing film stuff that its like concerning to swap to a new field if all my experiences is gonna be irrelevant in that field

[mortal wedge]

I get that

[next rock]

does that makes sense? its kinda hard for me to explain since im still very much in the weeds if you know what i mean

so im just hoping to get some idea from people in the field if theres anything to be salvaged from my film work lol

[mortal wedge]

It makes perfect sense. I do want to reassure you that while every career transition is difficult, software is kinder in that since there's a way to evaluate your knowledge (coding interviews) career changes are less detrimental

[next rock]

whats ATS by the way

[mortal wedge]

!resources:

Not sure if it covers cloud stuff, I think it does. But there's a book in there called Automate the Boring Stuff that helps you automate stuff and assumes you know nothing. Has lots of good projects and stuff

[next rock]

also here, what kind of projects are you referring to?

[mortal wedge]

Applicant Tracking System. Not all companies have this, but most do. Some of them are fully automated, but generally it's a machine that scans your resume and gives it a score. HR will often just nix all resumes below a certain score and just review the top ones and send the relevant ones to the hiring manager.

[next rock]

oh yikes that sounds tough

[mortal wedge]

It's a little scary, but it just means you need a good enough resume to pass and/or to tailor your resume for certain positions

[spark cobalt]

@sleek drum Some DevOps stuff here with resources attached.

[mortal wedge]

Sure. You want to choose projects in your domain, so projects that require use of numpy/scipy/pandas. You can either develop something yourself, volunteer for a nonprofit, or collaborate on something.

Bonus points if you choose to collaborate on an open source project, because working with other coders is something you'll likely do in any position and is a plus

[spark cobalt]

The entire flow chart isn't for DevOps only. It extends into non DevOps things. Just look at the DevOps branches.

[next rock]

what does f/m/d refer to? ive seen that on some data science job posts

[mortal wedge]

Google tells me it stands for female/male/diverse

Company is trying to say that they don't discriminate and they hire everybody

It's an affirmative defense against getting sued

[next rock]

thanks chaos

[mortal wedge]

👍🏿

[dense mesa]

I've seen it in french job postings, @smoky quest any idea?

[mortal wedge]

https://www.fgvw.de/en/news/archive-2019/the-third-sex-m-f-d-gender-neutral-job-advertisements-as-liability-risk

tl;dr, people who don't get jobs get frustrated and will often sue the companies, claiming discrimination. Companies structure their public facing communications during the hiring process to avoid these lawsuits.

[hasty isle]

Cause there's no limits to it. You can do whatever you'd like

[next rock]

if anyone else has any ideas on career overlap between film work (wireless video transmission) and coding/programming/data science/whatever please let me know

[tawny matrix]

Okay. I get it. To find my dream job/career, I have to try bunch of different things, gain experience and choose the job that I can do well, the one that's most entertaining or fascinating, the one that I'm passionate about and finally the one that can pay well (optional).

But now comes the question, how do I try that bunch of things?

Like I can try a LOT of things via computer (graphics, tech, programming,..)
But I cannot try some manual jobs. I can for example never try Police, Ambulance or Firefighter job (Well technically I can, but you get the idea. It's not so approachable as like the tech jobs, which I can access with my computer, laptop or even phone.)

So how can I choose my dream job, if I'm only limited to the small area of things that I've already tried in the past?

I would love to spend 1 day in every interesting job (for me). I could make a record of what I liked and didn't like about each of the jobs. If I have talent or deposits for the particular job, if I'm good at it. It would be so easier to choose and decide 🙁

[gritty rivet]

To me it sounds like you might want to try letting go of the goal of the "dream job" and focus on what "a good enough job" means for you... Satisfice, don't maximize https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/science-choice/201506/satisficing-vs-maximizing

[tawny matrix]

I didn't exactly mean "dream" job. That was bad expression.
Uhm, more something like making a great choice of a job/career.

[tawny matrix]

Thanks, though. 'll go take a look.

[dreamy shadow]

First time writing my self evaluation. Any suggestions?
I'm thinking: Strengths, goals met, accomplishments, improvements?

[gritty rivet]

Also if you're that completely lost that you don't know if you'd rather be an EMT or a software engineer, it might be helpful to try a Holland inventory like this: https://www.truity.com/test/holland-code-career-test. If your gut reaction is that one job would interest you more then another, there's a good chance your gut is pointing you in a good direction. This was one factor that helped me decide to persue this field personally

[gritty rivet]

they haven't given you any guidelines? I would ask them what they're looking for

[dreamy shadow]

Trying is good. I thought I would love computer engineering (Love computers + was good at math/science) Learned I hate breadboards and wires.

[dreamy shadow]

Rather generic:
"Provide a summary of overall performance for the year. Reflect on progress against goals, responsibilities, behaviors, and self development.. In addition, take time to comment on key str/opportunities for the year ahead and discuss these in your year end conversation. "

[tawny matrix]

Thanks a lot 🙏 I'll also check that out.

[dreamy shadow]

I'm wondering if I should structure just as bullet points, or paragraphs.

[gritty rivet]

I keep mine pretty brief, more like bullet points but with full sentences. I know some people who go crazy and write long paragraphs but I doubt managers have time to read all that

And I try to be concrete as I can with numbers and details

[dreamy shadow]

Yea, that's why I think bullet points. Keeping the reader in mind.

Not much numbers, but I"ll include details for sure. I guess I'll structure off how they list.

[tawny matrix]

@gritty rivet Oh my god! 😲
That's some really really interesting article!
Where did you find this? Is it on the psychologytoday website?

This is the best explanation to my problem that I've found yet:

Exactly!!! I feel anxious about missing something out. It's because the large amount of jobs out there (12,000 careers approximately).

I'm terrified to make a decision because I want to find the best possible job out there (that's the "maximizing")

[gritty rivet]

I learned about the concept of satisficing as a univeristy student and just found that article explaining it with a web search

[tawny matrix]

I'm afraid that after not choosing the best job, I will start rethinking my decision

[gritty rivet]

I heard the statistic many years ago that the average person changes careers three times. I found that shocking when I heard it but I'm on my third career at least

[dreamy shadow]

Reality: You don't pick your career, life picks your career for you.

[tawny matrix]

Thanks a lot, that's really an awesome article! ❤️
(maybe I look crazy that I go crazy about some regular article, but that's not just a regular article at least for me)

[mortal wedge]

I always felt that self evals were such a crock. But I definitely be specific and provide examples of your accomplishments. Try to back it up with metrics/numbers as much as you can. Frame any weaknesses as opportunities for growth. But most importatntly it's probably best to keep track of your accomplishments over the year so you can refer back to them during self evals, lol. Remembering your contributions was the hardest part for me.

[dreamy shadow]

Source: Me who never wanted to be in insurance, YET HERE I AM

[dreamy shadow]

Well, I have a list of what I have done in thanks to my boss leaving couple months back. That and job hunting. But, metrics is harder to solidify internally.

[gritty rivet]

are you in high school? If so I would focus on getting in to the best university you can before you worry about committing to a career.

anyway, glad you found it helpful 🙂

[dreamy shadow]

Unfortunately I wasn't included in a lot of the meetings that is the "why we doing this project" at the start so I had to pick up pieces during the transition.

[mortal wedge]

Yeah, that's often the case. Like I know my work was pivotal to getting a massive grant, but I don't want to ask what the amount of the grant was, lol.

I guestimated for my resume but you can't get away with that on an internal self eval

[dreamy shadow]

Yes, that's why metrics in terms of numbers is harder to solidify in my case.

[tawny matrix]

yeah, I'm in a high school

[dreamy shadow]

There's a certain amount of bs you can get away with in a resume that you really can't internally lmao

[mortal wedge]

University is great at exposing you to multiple careers/fields. Even if you go in as computer science, good colleges will still give you a breadth of education so you may find out that journalism is your passion or something.

[tawny matrix]

thanks for your tip!

[dreamy shadow]

I guess my metrics on skills would be something like: Turned academic SQL knowledge into working proficiency.

[smoky quest]

yeah, by law companies don't discriminate against a lot of things. Many job posts will have a large blurb about that.

[smoky quest]

There are two cases:

• This is really about helping you grow
• This is about your comp. update

These would lead to different type of answer

[mortal wedge]

Recursive is right. It's highly dependent on company culture what they're supposed to be. I still think they're BS, but I would say just sell yourself on it.

[delicate bane]

another perspective on this is Cal Newport's famous book. highly recommend. https://www.amazon.com/Good-They-Cant-Ignore-You/dp/1455509124

[mortal wedge]

I think I agree with this. I was very passionate about writing when I was younger. But I was only able to write when I was in a good mood and it wouldn't have given me a good income. Decided to go with what I could do even half asleep and glad I did

[delicate bane]

if you listen to audiobooks, its very bingeable.

[mortal wedge]

I should definitely listen to audiobooks more. But I have 18,000 hours on Steam and that number isn't going to keep rising on its own

[gritty rivet]

Both French and German have gendered nouns, so it at least kind-of-sort-of makes sense to add m/f/d instead of listing titles like "ingénieur/ingénieure". But I guess the law doesn't exclude job listings in English, or companies are just to lazy to leave it out even though it's not so relevant in English

[tawny matrix]

Thank you for your tip!

[tawny matrix]

My top two interest areas are: BUILDING & CREATING
(partly, not that much THINKING and also PERSUADING)

Yeah, that explains my interest in building/creating something. Interesting test btw, I would say that I did tens of "personality" or "career" tests, but this one was quite unique from them.

Thank you once again, really appreciate so helpful community 😍

[near remnant]

i'm reading posts on reddit from devs, who got low salary for their first dev job then quit and moved to their second dev job after 10-12 months for double the salary.

how is this possible? you become so much better after 10 months of on the job, that companies will pay much more for you?

[mortal wedge]

Short answer? Yes. Long answer? Companies often have more money in their hiring budget than for employee retention, so companies often find themselves in positions where someone leaves for low pay and to replace them at their skill level they have to pay more. So it's a well known paradigm that if you want a raise you have to switch companies.

[true harness]

I wouldn't know exactly, but I would bet there's tons of factors. maybe they were hired on the low end of the salary range. maybe they moved to a bigger company that could pay more. maybe a company is willing to pay more for a bit more experience

[mortal wedge]

First job as a dev is usually pretty cursed. THere's so many new devs and everyone is desperate for any work.

[near remnant]

Ah okay, so basically, someone should be looking for a new job if they been in their first dev job for a year already.

[true harness]

not necessarily, there are also reasons to not leave a company

[mortal wedge]

Unless your company is awesome, probably. I'm sure there are some companies that appreciate go getters and have their head on straight and realize that paying people more is cheaper than hiring, but... unless you've found an awesome company, then probably.

[near remnant]

Aight, thank you.

[hazy dawn]

So im a 2nd year IT/software-engineer student with good basic knowledge in many languages. However i havent yet had a coding job and im a little curious how the market is for programmers in general and how hard it is to find a trainee / junior dev position on average?

[smoky quest]

It's very competitive as there are a lot of applicants. But if you are good, then you should be fine.
Note also it's difficult to predict future recessions or market environment years in advance.

[dreamy shadow]

It's the end of year review. So more of comp I guess. I didn't get a performance review last year since I joined late in the cycle and < 6 months.

[hazy dawn]

Oh it is? Didnt know it was THAT competitive but hey, nobody said it would be easy either.. and yeah the market is what it is

[dreamy shadow]

Either way, year end performance max increase is like 3%? Even with a title change, I doubt > 10%.

[smoky quest]

that could could go much higher!

Either way, if it's about the comp, then it's about giving reasons to get a higher comp. So that means being careful about describing the things you want to improve on and your weaknesses.
I would recommend to describe your achievements, what you have brought, changes you have helped with, critical times you jumped in to help (ex: middle of the night or week ends), mentorship you gave, etc.

[dreamy shadow]

I don't think so, especially internally. The whole song and dance of "you stay long enough and we'll promote you" has been sung before. It took me leaving for that to happen, so I'm not holding my breath on that one.

Yea, sounds like my resume all over again lol. I'll put some effort behind it then. Good practice either way for future reviews.

[stable elbow]

Yeah. I tell my partner to always look for new opportunities, even though she wants to be loyal to her company

between 2 offers, always take the better once. even if you like your old team, cause you dont know if your old team would stick around either

[smoky quest]

I don't know about your company and can't speak about your policies. But 3% was the minimum where I have worked

[dreamy shadow]

What's your max %?

[smoky quest]

That's the whole point of that song and dance. It's to serve as a demonstration you are operating beyond your level.
And since all the parties involved are at your company, you can go into more details and link them to relevant skills

[dreamy shadow]

I got a 3% increase at a start up yearly review (<50 people), which turned into 21% + title change after they got wind I was leaving. I still left either way since the new tools I am exposed to is more valuable then the 10% net difference.

[smoky quest]

Given the instructions given to you for your comp review are so anemic, I would probably encourage you to have a separate discussion with your manager about how to reach the next goals and to make a plan together for that.
Promotions are planned, they shouldn't be a surprise

fyi, I fixed a wrong negation in my message above ^

[dreamy shadow]

Yea, I assumed it was a mistake.

Promotions are planned, they shouldn't be a surprise
I agree 100%. In our discussions, I've already been told they have plans to try to promote me next year. But again, nothing's in writing. So most of that is empty if anything.

Either way, I'll be putting effort into the review just as practice. But my loyalty doesn't lie with any company in the end, that's a one way street not in my favor.

[smoky quest]

You still want to derisk and disarm any potential objection.
So it's still worth checking in with your manager in terms of where you are at and how to make sure your promo will be a slam dunk

[smoky quest]

nothing in this discussion has involved any loyalty though

[mortal wedge]

Sadly highly dependent on company and company culture. Could be trivial, could be massive.

[dreamy shadow]

I'm in insurance, from what I"ve heard from others it's roughly 3-5% for annual. Title change is solely based on my experience.

[smoky quest]

ah if they are old school, then yeah

I am gonna sound like a broken clock but when you apply to your next job, modern companies may not consider you mid/senior/lead just because you have X years of experience. You will have to demonstrate it through actual skills, impact, scope and responsibilities.
So do make sure you have that type of conversation with your manager about what it means to be at the next role, expected outcomes and having a plan for you to be able to demonstrate these

[dreamy shadow]

Yes, I agree. I had asked the hiring manager what the scope is and what they expect at 6 months, etc.

[mortal wedge]

The reverse is also true, however. Just because you have a mid/senior/lead role doesn't mean other companies will treat you as such if you don't have many years of experience.

[smoky quest]

yeah. My point is you will need both.
Some of the skills do require experience. And while some of it can be compressed in time (ex: startup vs old school large corp), there is a limit to it.

[mortal wedge]

Agree on needing both

[dreamy shadow]

This is what I'm seeing personally. Lack of YoE is sandbagging me.

[mortal wedge]

Unfortunately, it happens. Even if you have YoE AND the title, sometimes you get sandbagged by other things like lack of PhD or lack of publications. Is life.

[dreamy shadow]

I understand why they always look for PhD, as the degree is a short cut at teaching someone how to formulate a project and complete it.

Doesn't mean I agree with that way of hiring.

[mortal wedge]

It's an easy way for large companies to cut down on the number of applicants.

It's convenient, I get it.

[smoky quest]

The companies looking for phds will rarely do so for basic frontend/backend jobs.
However it's a lot more frequent when the required theory is heavier as the chances of someone being familiar with markov processes or wavelets or fancy error correcting code theory while being self taught are nil.

[dreamy shadow]

For DS, feels like more of just being able to complete projects independently. Especially when PHd is in psychology or unrelated.

[pseudo spade]

How the hell do we know how to pay water bill and who to pay it to

Help please

I am in NYC and idk if my landlord is going to tell me where my water provider is from and how I can pay

[true harness]

this is wildly off topic, but...if you have a landlord, why are you paying for water 🤔

[pseudo spade]

Where u live

Country or state

[mortal wedge]

Some companies just want to make sure you have the background info. For instance, if my company is hiring for a statistician, we favor PhD candidates who worked with neuroscience and is able to do statistics. The PhD doesn't have to be in stats.

[dreamy shadow]

Yea, those job descriptions normally are more specific though from what I've seen.

[mortal wedge]

There is a huge company in my area that just has a blanket policy of only hiring PhD candidates. Companies like that exist. They're a titan of the industry though so they can do whatever they want.

[buoyant seal]

competion online courses graduates think Vs competion in reality xD

[delicate bane]

just switch to DE/MLE

[dreamy shadow]

But I don't want to learn computer science

[brave bridge]

dont do it then

[delicate bane]

so you would rather be OP in this viral article making the rounds https://ryxcommar.com/2022/11/27/goodbye-data-science/

Managers will say they want to make data-driven decisions, but they really want decision-driven data. If you strayed from this role– e.g. by warning people not to pursue stupid ideas– your reward was their disdain, then they’d do it anyway, then it wouldn’t work (what a shocker). The only way to win is to become a stooge.

jk. but only half-kidding. ok time to run

[vapid jay]

In practice, do backend engineers need to use Calculus for day to day work? Or is it simply something academia requires

[buoyant seal]

not really. i haven't encountered need in math since my graduation the most math thing i need usually is calculating /understanding / reading current complexity of algorithms.

• linear algebra is cool for 3D graphics xD

[buoyant seal]

more math can be required if u a doing game development on your own though / or if u mix data science into your backend

[vapid jay]

Yeah I have a hard time right now in school learning Algebra 2, its very rote and mechanical, perhaps it will be better once I am in college math (more motivating)

[spark cobalt]

I know ML deals with some calculus for optimization end stuff, but far from being involved in day to day work (the computer will do all the calculus for you, mostly just you know where to use it). But other than that haven't seen it.

[dreamy shadow]

Heavy math (and Calculus) isn't really needed unless it's a more research style role from what I've seen.

[summer roost]

They can come up in some embedded roles as well. Signal processing requires things like the Fourier transform, maintaining a stable temperature in something like a thermostat requires a PID controller, which is based (at least theoretically) in calculus

[smoky quest]

The more advanced jobs could require it.
For instance being able to characterize loads, processes, either through complexity or statistical methods.
Beyond that, it can also be domain dependent where the domain does leverage math for computations or some features

Note that beyond the obvious direct usage, working through the math also helps giving you a good base, and better abstract thinking. That makes it easier to work through abstract, not well defined problems or to quickly pick up papers or new domains.

[summer roost]

in short, it depends entirely on the particular job you're doing. Many won't absolutely require anything beyond arithmetic and logic, though statistics can be very helpful in terms of analyzing performance and scalability

backend engineers also need to use things that aren't immediately obviously recognizable as math, but are. Graph theory, relational algebra, and queueing theory, for instance

[mortal wedge]

I'll chime in that I do signal processing and Calc is essentially required.

My old boss wanted me to train the junior and I kept running into roadblocks because he doesn't have the math fundamentals

[mortal wedge]

I'll also respond in the affirmative here that research style roles often rely on heavy math/calculus. On a typical day of me just coding whatever for utility it's not really needed.

[karmic grail]

I'm currently learning Python fundamentals but have been told by almost everyone that I should pick where I want to go and learn those basics, then start applying for jobs.

I'm not really sure where I'd like to go yet, so are there any recommendations on fields of work that are good for someone like me to get into just to get their foot in the door, or any better advice on how to pick a field I'd like to go into. There seems like quite a few and It becomes pretty overwhelming.

Any advice is appreciated.

[summer roost]

what education experience do you have? What work experience do you have?

And, what country are you in?

[karmic grail]

I'm from England but have no work experience and no education

[summer roost]

how old are you?

[karmic grail]

23

[summer roost]

so what have you been doing since finishing your secondary education?

[karmic grail]

I failed highschool education, been dealing with family issues for a while but need to do something with my life of course so decided to try and get into the programming world.

Since i can do it from home

I know it's going to be a struggle but i'm willing to put in the work i just want to know which direction is best for someone in my position

[summer roost]

the honest truth is that you will have a very, very difficult time landing a job with no degree, especially if you have no good answer for why you failed high school and what you've been doing with the last ~7 years since. If you really want to pursue this path without getting a degree, looking into boot camps might be your best option. They tend to focus on web development, which is one of the easiest types of development to break into, and good boot camps should have relationships with local businesses to help place their graduates into entry level roles.

[smoky quest]

Here is also a link to https://roadmap.sh/frontend that shows a list of skills one may need to acquire and demonstrate for a frontend position.

[spark cobalt]

Irrespective of bootcamps, you should still work to expand your network by going to local dev meetups, conferences, etc. Connections are a pretty effective break into the industry for non degrees (and degree people too.)

Bootcamps will give you more selective connections, targeted to your "type of people", but you don't want that to be the only thing you're hanging on.

[summer roost]

You said that you were self-taught with no degree, right @spark cobalt? Did you wind up going down the boot camp route? And, what sort of job did you eventually land?

[spark cobalt]

No bootcamp.

Right now in an internship kind of thing? I have no clue. My title isn't intern, but I'm pretty much treated as one, although I get like no mentorship or anything anyways, I just do tickets but at a lesser volume. They're letting me take on different kinds of projects, previous project was some full stack kind of thing regarding an MCN project, now I'm working on CICD, they planned to put me on more backend centered role with Go and other automation stuff in the future.

It's a networking company. At least everyone here just has that Member of Technical Team role that network companies seem to do. Not specialized

Super fun opportunity for me at least. I get to try things out at the expense of someone else . Get to try things before I settle down on something specific. Really glad the company does a wide range of things. Hopefully can work on operating systems and other stuff too

[karmic grail]

been asking around a few other people, they said aslong as i can prove i'm able to do the thing the employer needs they'll hire me. That not true no?

[spark cobalt]

Hopefully can get up to pace as one of the more experienced engineers as time moves on. I think I have a pretty good pace with some of the tickets I have, but yeah.

[spark cobalt]

Sure. But there's also tens of thousands of other people with a degree that, on paper, appear much more qualified than you which eliminates your chance to actually prove your worth in the context of an interview.

How can you prove them in an interview, if you don't get interviews?

[summer roost]

you need to convince the employer that you're a better choice for filling that position than any of the other applicants. If those other applicants have university degrees and you have to struggle to explain what you've been up to since high school, it's gonna be tough to convince them that you're their best option.

that's not to say that it's impossible, and it is true that having the skills is what matters most. But getting someone to believe that you have those skills isn't going to be easy for you, based on what you've told us of your CV.

[spark cobalt]

Do realize it does cost quite a bit of money to actually interview you as time spent interviewing you is time a developer is not developing. Companies simply can't interview everyone

As self taught, landing the interviews in the first place has been the hardest thing for me. The interviews themselves hasn't been much of a problem.

It's easier if it's more front end stuff since, they can actually see front end work you've done and make a non-developer assessment on it. But yeah when it gets beyond that, pretty hard to break in.

But that's also assuming a lot of HR actually bothers to look at your stuff though. Which with such a high volume of applicants you can expect the entry level market to have, that probability might not be that high.

[summer roost]

in terms of absolutely nothing but the employee hours spent on an interview, we're talking hundreds of GBP per interview, easily.

[spark cobalt]

[vapid jay]

seems to suggest that when lacking the documentation or still working on degree or certificate that social networking becomes the lever if u need one. hr be hecked if a recruiter is impressed with you face to face

[summer roost]

well, yeah - the hard part is definitely getting your foot in the door, and getting a human being to like you and want to give you a chance definitely helps with that.

it's possible to succeed self-taught, but it's a ton of work, much more work than getting a degree

[dreamy shadow]

Depends on the company

[summer roost]

with no other details? I'd lean towards the one with the internship.

[vapid jay]

i always wonder if self-taught is more work or just different work that is difficult to compare.

[spark cobalt]

One with internship 100% imo. Considering the 3.2 GPA probably wouldn't put his GPA on his resume to begin with.

[dreamy shadow]

I've seen job postings require GPA lmao

[spark cobalt]

[true harness]

i mean fundamentally it is the same work. you could get the same exact textbooks that uni/colleges use and study from them

[dreamy shadow]

And not even entry level ones

[spark cobalt]

What I'm fucked

[dreamy shadow]

More like red flag companies

[near ocean]

Doesnt tell you much, i've seen senior positions ask for a-levels, its just HR doing HR things

[spark cobalt]

It's less efficient in some areas, more efficient in others. I know some friends in UCSB forced to take some liberal art stuff as part of engineering. I mean granted sure, a more well rounded education is good, and that's kind of what I'm catching up on now (doing economics and stats right now, moving onto world history and physics afterwards)

[vapid jay]

y is more rounded good, in ur mind? economics and stats i can understand together but world history and physics are very different in depth

[smoky quest]

What is outdated? Not sure to followOh I re-read the original question. Nevermind

[near ocean]

A wider breadth of general knowledge usually makes for more adjusted, well rounded people that are interesting themselves and interested in more than what they do for a living

[spark cobalt]

Physics - A literal understanding of the world I live in. A lot of it is trying to develop a kind of perspective I want to attain.

World History - Same boat with physics. But also works really well with economics.

[near ocean]

The idea is good, the execution not so good, they shouldnt be required subjects or have exams attached to them imho

[spark cobalt]

If you think I'm just going to learn about coding for the next 30 years, you're out of your damned mind.

[vapid jay]

did not suggest as such. was curious about the mindset behind a more well rounded education is all. thankee

[spark cobalt]

A lot of the reason to why I did the self taught route was to gain 4 years to be reinvested into travelling the world and discovering various culture's musics by actually being within that culture, learning how they think and approach problems, how they express themselves etc.

Coding just happens to be another one of my fascinations that I really enjoyed doing and helps fund my other dreams.

[smoky quest]

Some degrees can also be geared more toward entrepreneurship and thus include classes about communication, sales, economics, etc.

[spark cobalt]

Entrepreneurship is another thing that I had in mind. Where the world history and economics become important imo, but dunno that feels secondary in my life atm.

[vapid jay]

ye, i happen to agree completely with the statements said. i like to know why others choose what they might. it is how i learn more and helps me help my housemates as they come and go

[spark cobalt]

So many things to do, so little time

[near ocean]

I dont think you get to choose some courses, do you?

[smoky quest]

In the USA you do to some extent. Which has led to some interesting choices for some

This has led to some candidates having had classes only about a single topic at the expense of others (ex: knows nothing about network or OSes because they didn't take any classes about that). Not that I agree with that approach

[spark cobalt]

I need that class

[smoky quest]

That's pretty shortsighted imo

[true harness]

in the US you have "major requirements" which are required to get a degree for that major, then you have some other "general education" (in a lot of schools) meant to give you breadth then you have free electives where you can basically take what you want, then you have "in major electives" where you have a choice of classes that count for your major

[spark cobalt]

[mortal wedge]

You need to get your GED so you can reset the clock so to speak. That way you can say “hey I graduated/got ged this year and now I’m applying for jobs” instead of having to explain a 7 year gap which you probably won’t get the chance to explain

[smoky quest]

that hyper specialization is unnecessary and will prevent them to do anything else

[spark cobalt]

Yeah definitely.

[mortal wedge]

I took dance classes and bowling classes to fill out my electives lol. And an ASM class

[karmic grail]

i think because i'm from the UK it's different here. I didn't technically "not graduate" that's impossible here, i just got grades just below a "pass" (we leave highschool at 16 then move onto college) i went to college for just under a year for IT then dropped out since i was failing anyway, ADHD stopped me from keeping up with assignments.

[summer roost]

has the ADHD been treated since then?

if not, that is the place to start.

[karmic grail]

it's about to be medicated for

[near ocean]

So you stopped right before your a-levels?

[mortal wedge]

Gotcha. I would try to get your adhd under control (I have it too and untreated almost made me fail out) but going back to school is honestly your best bet

[karmic grail]

i didn't get good enough GCSE's to take A level

[karmic grail]

it was a BTEC to then move onto A level

[mortal wedge]

The good thing is that on job applications you don’t have to tell them your age. Just the year you graduated (generally). I graduated college really late but it’s nobody’s business tbh

[summer roost]

for what it's worth, this is a thing that could be helpful to say in an interview or cover letter, if you're comfortable talking about it. Like I said, not being able to account for what went wrong or how you've spent your time since college would be a red flag for an employer. This explanation - undiagnosed and untreated ADHD left me unable to study effectively - goes a long way towards giving employers a satisfying answer.

[karmic grail]

okay thanks for the help

[mortal wedge]

You may have to network though to help you get to the stage where you’re able to offer that explanation

[summer roost]

Yeah, that's still definitely true. But for someone who dropped out of high school and never went to uni, from an employer's point of view, the biggest question is whether you're just going to drop out of the job. Anything you can point to that shows ways that "now" is different from "then" will help to set their minds at ease. Once you get to that stage.

[karmic grail]

surely the fact i self taught for years is a good sign to them that i'm dedicated no?

[true harness]

anyone can say they "self taught for years", though

[near ocean]

Do you have a portfolio

[karmic grail]

well that's what i'd be planning to buildafter self teaching

[smoky quest]

the problem is it doesn't mean anything. No different than people saying "I have been freelancing". Someone could have been very or poorly effective
What matters is the outcome, the projects and skills demonstrated

[spark cobalt]

They don't know if those are self taught years where you half assed it or actually grinded. Where they know the years college students studied CS is at least a certain level of rigor.

[karmic grail]

if i put projects in my portfolio. they can see the product

[near ocean]

How long have you been programming? You say you've self taught for years, shouldnt you already be at the level of personal projects?

[smoky quest]

Yes and no.
Yes, they may look at them after the initial stages and that may be part of the questions you get in the interviews.
But the first stage will be able to show a resume/CV that convince them to call you back. And they will only spend less than a minute on it. So your resume/cv need to demonstrate your skills by describing these projects.

[karmic grail]

Okay thanks

[hearty island]

i'll know what happens with oracle by friday i think

god knows what'll happen really

😭😭😭

[fast fog]

what can you get with a mastery in those subjects?

[spark cobalt]

It's smart to learn from your mistakes, it's smarter to learn from other people's mistakes.

[fast fog]

im guessing nothing

[smoky quest]

you don't feel that could you learn anything from economics, sales or communication classes?

[fast fog]

no just world history

whats the best life you can live in as a world history major?

im guessing a professor

[summer roost]

they weren't talking about it as a major.

[spark cobalt]

Was not talking as a major. I already work as a software engineer, just learning outside my day to day work.

[spark cobalt]

Being an entrepreneur/manager/CEO/etc. is about making good decisions. If you're telling me you're unable to make wiser decisions with a fluent understanding of how kings made decisions, how Presidents made decisions, how CEOs made decisions throughout history, etc. (with also understanding the consequences of their decisions) then honestly I think you're crazy.

There's so much to learn from our history.

Super stoked to start.

[low scaffold]

has anyone worked at lockheed martin before or still do

[summer roost]

One of my college school roommates worked there for a few years

[frail gale]

Except of those who could make wise decisions according to the personal experience. Sometimes it is also about genes

Oh, you wrote "wiser"

My bad

[smoky quest]

Genes have nothing to do with decision making

[spark cobalt]

Well either way, I don't expect to be making wise decisions from my grand personal experience of 20 years old lol

And it's not even 20 yet baha. Lived for only so little.

[hushed viper]

If wanted to program cars would I have to major in compsci or software engineering

[spark cobalt]

You mean computer engineering vs computer science?

[smoky quest]

IF it's on the software side, then computer science. If it's closer to the electronic side, then either

[near remnant]

i love learning by reading books, its just so good

[vapid jay]

@narrow sleet

[narrow sleet]

hi

[near remnant]

How valuable is doing migration from Python 2 to Python 3+ at work on a big project (app)? if it is valuable at all.

[serene kindle]

it means being able to use new library stuff

[serene kindle]

i mean if you meant it career wise then sure it guess it's a useful experience for getting a job

[near remnant]

Yeah

[serene kindle]

why wouldn't it be valuable ? i don't get it

[near remnant]

I'm a Python Backend Developer and I hope the future is bright for python devs. Its my first job.

[mortal wedge]

Quite valuable! It was a little different but I got hired at my current position and my first task was to convert C to Python

[serene kindle]

most of these career corporate jobs is dealing with really old spaghetti code some person who hasn't worked in the company for years wrote a long time ago

[serene kindle]

i did a lot of 'migration' type of work before migrating giant apps to newer technologies (i think most work is that tbh)

seems really good that you're getting that skill because in the end most of the work i ended up doing in my career was massive migrations of code

so i did really huge code migrations of several types
-migrating to newer versions of programs (like the pip version updated so it needs some compatibility fix)
-migrating to newer sets of languages (like the move from php to javascript)
-migrating to more modern technologies
-migrating to better languages
all sorts of migrations

[river cloak]

help

[white relic]

See #❓｜how-to-get-help

[vapid jay]

hello mates! does anyone have a long long list of packages useful for python? i want to spend a day just installing every single package thatl be useful to me so i never get a module error in the future?

[radiant moon]

sort of an odd plan
why not just wait until you need package X, and then install package X?

[vapid jay]

well, yknow i have a day free..

[gritty rivet]

a) you're in the wrong channel b) it's not feasible, there are too many

[vapid jay]

so better off just install literally everything yknow? and plus itl save me time! ill be more efficient!

[radiant moon]

well I personally am a fan of more_itertools
and of course nobody can live without requests
But those are the only two I always want

[vapid jay]

what about 100 most popular packages. i made multiple google searches yet i cant find a good list

[radiant moon]

no idea

[vapid jay]

ok what about OS and keyboard

[vapid jay]

what is the right channel for this?

[radiant moon]

what about them? Do you want a list of the 100 most-popular keyboards? Can't help ya there

[vapid jay]

huh? no i mean the keyboard module. i use it alot for detecting keypresses

[radiant moon]

why not just install it, and quit wondering? That will save time

[vapid jay]

?? install what

[gritty rivet]

maybe try #python-discussion... but really, you don't want to do that. Here's a top 20 list and most of these things are highly specialized packages you probably don't need https://pypistats.org/top

[frail gale]

Person can be genetically nervous, for example

But this chat is not about genes

We can discuss it in dms

[true harness]

Weekly base salary of $4,800 in addition to company-paid housing, meals, and other perks.
for an internship . i'm assuming they meant monthly..

[inner wren]

:incoming_envelope: :ok_hand: applied mute to @humble crescent until <t:1669824413:f> (10 minutes) (reason: duplicates rule: sent 4 duplicated messages in 10s).

The <@&831776746206265384> have been alerted for review.

[sudden yacht]

We do not allow advertising or recruitment here.

@torn fern please remove your message.

[delicate bane]

bruh im literally sitting in a meeting atm where a coworker is being a "stooge". bonus points for pointing out the calculation mistakes of someone in product

i think the lesson im learning here is you really have to pick and choose your battles carefully

[true harness]

To be eligible for the Start Internship, students must self-identify as a member of either traditionally underrepresented racial and ethnic minority groups within the professional services industry (Black or African-American, Hispanic or Latino, American Indian or Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander, or two or more races), a Protected Veteran, and/or an individual with a disability.
is this allowed?

[gentle shale]

Project

[near ocean]

This does not seem relevant to the channel
Please move it to the appropriate channel or #python-discussion

[smoky quest]

It's complicated and depend on the state you are in. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affirmative_action_in_the_United_States

[near ocean]

Play their game and self identify as all those things
(Dont actually)

[true harness]

I know things like "encouraged to apply" is fine, but "must"?

[mortal wedge]

Yes, it's allowed. What's not allowed is discriminating AGAINST a protected class, legally it's fine to require someone to be a protected class to apply.

I take this back. I'm doing some more research and it looks more complicated. I was speaking from California standpoint

[hearty island]

my boss just told me if i wasn’t an intern i’d be fired for making a typo on a powerpoint

[mortal wedge]

Unless the typo was for a powerpoint that was highly visible and highly offensive I don't see why it's that big of an issue

[dense mesa]

🚩

[delicate bane]

you should run far away and not look back

[graceful mason]

seems like an aggressive Grammarly advert

[mortal wedge]

I think I'm going to dive deeper into this and get back to you. BEcause now I'm super curious

[true harness]

isn't that the same though? if you require x, the people without x are discriminated against because they are y

[mortal wedge]

So, discrimination happens all the time in life, society, and the job market. People who are lazy are discriminated against, people who are poor are discriminated against, etc. It's not illegal to discriminate, it's just illegal to discriminate certain protected classes of people. For example, race and gender are protected classes.

I'm just not sure about the inverse, obviously you can't pay women/minorities lower or not hire them, but I'm not sure about someone saying they are only hiring women/minorities.

[true harness]

but it's literally the same lol. always hiring x means always not hiring people that are not x

[mortal wedge]

I have anecdotal data, but it's just from California and may not apply across the board.

I'm not confident enough to make an assertion in either direction at this point until I find more information. Although... there are scholarships that are for minorities/disabled people/women.

I assume that's perfectly fine and legal

[true harness]

yeah. I'm not a lawyer but it would make sense you can give your money to who you want to. but that isn't the same for employment

[delicate bane]

and you said we dont talk about diversity issues in this channel often huh? jk.

[mortal wedge]

It seems like it's wildly different by country and by state/region. It's incredibly controversial. I'm assuming any major company has a large enough legal team where they know they're not on shaky legal ground.

[mortal wedge]

You got me there!

[true harness]

I would hope so 😔. I thought there were federal laws about EEO stuff though

[mortal wedge]

As far as I can tell legally, some companies are under obligation to affirmatively work towards having a more diverse workplace. (Federal government/contractors?) If their plan is to only hire minorities/women for a specific internship, I could see an argument being made that that is just their plan to do so.

For the US, here's the 1965 EO on the subject:

1965 – U.S. Executive Order 11246 and Executive Order 11375
The Johnson administration embraced affirmative action in 1965, by issuing U.S Executive order 11246, later amended by Executive order 11375. The original order mandated that federal contractors cannot discriminate against employees on the basis of race, religion and national origin. It also mandated that these federal contractors ensure equal employment opportunity in their hiring practices.[49] The order was amended to include sex.[50] It prohibits federal contractors and subcontractors from discriminating against any employee or applicant for employment because of race, skin color, religion, gender, or national origin. The order requires that contractors take affirmative action to ensure that "protected class, underutilized applicants" are employed when available, and that employees are treated without negative discriminatory regard to their protected-class status.
The order specifically requires certain organizations accepting federal funds to take affirmative action to increase employment of members of preferred racial or ethnic groups and women. Any organization with fifty or more employees and an aggregate revenue exceeding $50,000 from a single federal contract during a twelve-month period must have a written affirmative action plan. This plan must include goals and timetables for achieving full utilization of women and members of racial minorities, in quotas based on an analysis of the current workforce compared to the availability in the general labor pool of women and members of racial minorities.
The order is enforced by the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs of the U. S. Department of Labor and by the Office of Civil Rights of the U.S. Department of Justice.[51]
``` IT's interesting they say women and minorities as opposed to both men and women and all races.

[mortal wedge]

I give up. My official answer is I don't know.

[true harness]

ig I'll just not apply 😔

[near ocean]

Theoretically, what would happen if you did apply and just self identified as x

Would they just suck it up and process your application or would they outright decline it

[true harness]

honestly, I don't know. like, I assume I would just be rejected for "reasons". like, my name is not very minority

[mortal wedge]

I'm Asian and my last name is German.

[true harness]

idk. even if I got an interview, if they only want minorities it would just be a waste of time

[prisma pasture]

what would be a good idea to learn if cyber security interests you?

[fast fog]

Congratulations brother

[prisma pasture]

i was thinking something like ethical hacking will check out the links ty

[proven valve]

Yo, I just finished highschool (today), and I am wondering what im supposed to do from now on, any tips?

[true harness]

have you thought about applying to universities. that's the standard path in most countries

[proven valve]

I thought of working with something programming related but im not sure which area to go to (web, game, data science and other), nor how would I begin getting money with it

[proven valve]

I am already applied to one

[prisma pasture]

is it ever too late to start learning to program?

[true harness]

not really

[proven valve]

Its a software engineering course which also includes english communication classes and acts as a bootcamp

[prisma pasture]

youre a lifesaver

[true harness]

is that an accredited university?

[proven valve]

But well, I really want to begin getting money through internet (and specifically, through programming) but im not sure how to do so

[proven valve]

Like? I am not sure what you mean

[true harness]

you apply for a job, then the company pays you

[proven valve]

Yes... I am asking how to get to that point specifically in the programming area

[true harness]

get to what point?

[proven valve]

Oh well it is

[proven valve]

Applying for a job so the company can pay me....

[true harness]

a university won't be like a bootcamp. it will be 4 years (or something like that) and at the end you'll get a document certifying that you met the minimum requirements to pass

[proven valve]

It is accredited though

[true harness]

you just go to their website and apply?

[true harness]

i was just wondering. you said it was like a bootcamp, and university programs typically aren't

[vapid jay]

i think they called it a university course, not a program

[proven valve]

Theres more to it than just that and THATS what im asking about, how do I manage to gather experience (aka which projects and what type of projects I should do), where do I find companies that are willing to hire programmers (as I dont have any experience with the job market), and which areas I should look forward as a beginner (like web dev, game dev and others)

[true harness]

those could be interpreted to mean the same thing

[vapid jay]

okay, but they are not necessarily the same thing. where i went to uni, a course can be like 1-4 months, whereas a program is a multi-year thing consisting of many courses.

[true harness]

where do I find companies that are willing to hire programmers
job boards list companies that are looking for applicants.
aka which projects and what type of projects I should do
do projects that you're interested in
and which areas I should look forward as a beginner (like web dev, game dev and others)
the ones you're interested in

[vapid jay]

(and courses can be taken without enrolling in a full program, but that can probably also vary from place to place)

[proven valve]

Where do I find these job boards?

[true harness]

google? linkedin is a pretty big one. i don't know what country you're in though

[proven valve]

Also, I am asking about projects and areas cause I am not sure which of them would be better for a beginner to begin working on, I am really sure that I am not supposed to do a the witchers 3 as a beginner, so I want to know what are the beginner friendly projects and areas..

[proven valve]

Oh yeah linkedin, where would I find the boards in it though?

I looked at it once and it all looked so confusing for some reason

[true harness]

have you looked? it's literally right at the top

[proven valve]

Idk never noticed it, it looked confusing

[vapid jay]

The one im applying to, WGU, is accredited and you get industry certificates alongside your degree

[spark cobalt]

Btw bootcamps from a university, are still the same as a bootcamp by some company.

[vocal locust]

I've always heard when applying to jobs to also email the hiring manager and give a little blurb or so, but how do you find the hiring manager? for example I've been applying via linkedin jobs and there's no information besides the company

[vapid jay]

did you check the company website?

[vocal locust]

I did not. I suppose they're usually on there?

[vapid jay]

dunno about usually, but some staff info is often available

[mortal wedge]

Huh. That advice seems a little surprising but I guess it couldn’t hurt? Tbh my boss and I often get emails like that but we just ignore them

[mortal wedge]

There should be a button that says “jobs” on the sidebar along the top of the screen. If you find it confusing, most job boards are that way and you should do what it takes for it to be less confusing 😛

[proven valve]

Yeah.. Its probably cause im using my primary language on linkedin and for some reason the words used there are more confusing

[mortal wedge]

Ah gotcha

[proven valve]

I switched to english and it looks better

[vapid jay]

Hi I'm beginner programmer I'm interested in cyber security and I wanna know if it is worth learning and making it my career or is AI or Game development batter?

[lapis wind]

So this may be a hot take, but Game developmenet is probably the worst field in tech to really make your career in.

[mortal wedge]

And python is worse than most other languages for game dev. I don't want to dissuade someone from their passion, but if you're considering other fields better to go with other fields.

[proven valve]

Agreed

[mortal wedge]

I'd say call center employee doing tech support is worse.

[lapis wind]

I mean thats kind of in a different section i'd say

[plush wedge]

The last job I would want in this industry is to be a elementary, middle, or high school IT guy. I'd hate it

[dreamy shadow]

Who doesn't love greasy ipads to clean.

[plush wedge]

And I would love getting called to multiple rooms every day just to unplug and replug the HDMI cord into a computer. Something that the students probably told the teacher to do in the first place

[rough garden]

That screams toddlers or young children

[rough helm]

hello

what is the best way to find job as a fat boomer with a smidge of excel knowleadge? preferably FAANG

[true harness]

you'll need to market yourself better than that. what actual skills do you have? surely you've got some experience working in some field. do you have a resume?

[rough helm]

I worked at the cleaners for 20 years

socks mostly, they would send them crusty and I learned how to fix that one

[tepid hare]

i have an honest question.

[rough helm]

thanks mr peach

[tepid hare]

rn i work in QA, was actually easy to get this job in a good company here

[rough helm]

QA is quailty assurance? I was in charge of that for the sock department

[tepid hare]

is this a global thing?
do you believe that the market lacks good testers?