Thread: Nerd Alert- New Member

Hello Java World:

I am trying to understand why there are not more Java developers than there are... I need Java developers and cannot find them. HELP! I have jobs and no candidates so please let me know if you are looking for work in the Nashville (TN) area. Good money- lots of work.

Holla back now: 615.293.9718

Claudia

Welcome to the forum

Wishes Ada xx

Many thanks! Great to be here. I am new to the recruiting world and am finding a shortage of Java developers and thought that by joining a users group I may be able to understand why or help find some talented developers some work. Please pass the message along if you hear of anyone looking.

Claudia
615.293.9718

Nashville, Tennessee

This forum is generally for novice programmers looking for help with their homework, and more experienced programmers offering help. I'm not sure a forum like this is a great place to look for new hires, especially for a local position.

You might try talking to your local colleges or even high schools and getting into contact with their computer science departments.

I realize that, and thank you for your reply. I just want you all to see that a need does exist and if anyone is interested in relocating there are great opportunities here.

I came from the core infrastructure world and I am trying to understand why there is such a demand and such a shortage trying to help fill open position too.

Claudia

Originally Posted by Claudia

I just want you all to see that a need does exist and if anyone is interested in relocating there are great opportunities here.

What's the job? How much does it offer? Is the company willing to pay for relocation? Most of the more experienced users here already have jobs, so you might not get many bites without providing that kind of information up front. Just my two cents!

Originally Posted by Claudia

I came from the core infrastructure world and I am trying to understand why there is such a demand and such a shortage trying to help fill open position too.

This is actually an interesting question. After the "tech bubble" popped in the late 90s, Computer Science enrollment dropped pretty significantly. Even as more and more people used technology, students just didn't see Computer Science as a lucrative career- it was too nerdy, or too risky, or too difficult. Getting enrollment numbers up was a pretty big deal for universities in the 2000s- I attended a few conferences where a bunch of smart people sat around talking about how to get students to enroll in computer science, and then how to keep them enrolled once they were there.

This is especially true for girls, minorities, and other under-represented groups in Computer Science. There are quite a few movements devoted to getting more of them involved in programming (code.org, Black Girls Code, etc), which is really cool to see.

So the industry is at a weird place right now where programmers are desperately needed, but the low enrollment numbers of the 2000s haven't caught up to the demand yet.

Enrollment numbers have started to go up, partially thanks to the rise in smartphones and facebook and other more user-friendly applications used by a more diverse group of people, and partially thanks to more inclusive movements like the ones I mentioned above. But now you've got another problem: many computer science departments were made to be a little *too* friendly in order to keep up enrollment numbers. So you've got a lot of crappy programmers coming out of college who, well, don't know how to program. Companies don't just need programmers, they need *good* programmers, and those are still pretty hard to come by. It doesn't help that most of them are being snagged up by google, facebook, or startups who can offer all kinds of perks, which is why I said it was a good idea to include more information about the job offer up front.

Wow! Great feedback- thank you. I may reach out to some local universities and tech schools here in town to see if I can possibly help new graduates find work. It just amazes me that there are 6 figure jobs going unfilled and unemployment rates remain high... it's nuts!

The jobs are in Franklin, TN, an affluent community and suburb of Nashville, TN. It is a hub of great companies, especially healthcare, manufacturing and finance. Recent corp HQ's that have relocated to Franklin include Nissan North America, Verizon, MARS (includes Pedigree, Greenies, Nutro, Uncle Bens rice, Dove and M&M's etc) and is home to HCA, CHS and many fine healthcare companies. Nearby are GM and Nissan automotive plants, Deloitte, EMMA, ServePro, A.O. Smith, BathFitter, Vanderbilt University and Nashville is the capital of Tennessee so there are many state and federal agencies.

This particular job is in banking and they need 4 Java developers due to growth and expansion. The schools are the best in the entire Metro area and the "other" factors include sports teams (Titans- pro football, Commodores- Vandy U football; Predators Hockey) great concerts and shows (this is "Music City) and not all county music either(!); amazing hiking, cycling, vineyards, shopping, dining, and we have 4 beautiful seasons to enjoy. No state tax here either. Check out the NTC, or Nashville Technology Council, and you will see a lot of activity in IT, including users-groups and networking events to help IT pros and new business start ups.

I relocated from FL and LOVE it here!! I hope this helps. I cannot post too much or risk losing the opportunity but I will be happy to discuss particulars offline if you or anyone wants to learn more.

Claudia
(615) 293-9718

--- Update ---

By the way, Kevin, we work in D.C. a LOT so keep me in mind if you are looking for contract work there too!

Another factor is that the term "Java developer" is deceptively vague- there are a bunch of different types of Java developers- frontend developers, Android developers, server developers, developers of a particular framework, developers of a particular tool, etc.

For example I would bet that what you're actually looking for are Java EE developers, specifically ones who know how to use Spring, and specifically senior developers who know how to start a Spring project from scratch. None of those things are particularly easy, and I doubt they're even taught in school- these are skills that most people have because they taught themselves outside of school. These are professional-level skills that take years to develop. That's why you're probably having trouble filling the role- I mentioned reaching out to local Computer Science departments, and that's a great way to fill entry-level positions, but you're going to have to look much harder for a good Java EE developer.

Even if you aren't looking for Java EE developers, there is still a big difference between experienced developers who can lead a team and start a project from scratch, and an entry-level developer who can program but has to be told what to do.

Anyway, good luck!

Details are: back-end developer with front-end interface exp.; JSP/Spring/Hibernate/JDBC/JavaScript; "great team player and communicator" and that is the hang up we are finding!; JBOS server config mgmt.

I hope this helps and I have found a local users group and have already joined. Thanks!!!

Kevin, I can assure you that things like Spring are not being taught in colleges. CS and engineering departments are too busy teaching things like Basic and Assembly to worry about anything that really matters these days...

Originally Posted by aussiemcgr

Kevin, I can assure you that things like Spring are not being taught in colleges. CS and engineering departments are too busy teaching things like Basic and Assembly to worry about anything that really matters these days...

Heh, yeah, I know. I'm not that old- I graduated in 2008 (wait is that old? nooooo), and when I started college back in 2004, they were still teaching in C++. They then switched over to Java in 2005, but most of the classes were still designed for C++, just done in Java- so no OOP, no Swing, etc.

I did have one web class, but that was just HTML and basic SQL. Enough to become familiar with some of the basics, but not enough to pursue a career in web development.

And I understand why they do that- they have to teach the fundamentals before they can teach huge concepts like Swing or Spring. And even then, any non-trivial project is going to be pretty impossible to set up in a single semester, let alone grade, so in some ways it's better for colleges to stay away from that kind of stuff. But a side-effect of that is that most programmers coming out of college don't actually know how to program, unless they've taught themselves outside of school. And part of that is "you get out of education what you put in" and I'm all for it, but from an employer's perspective, it makes it much harder to separate quality programmers from people who did the bare minimum through school just to get a diploma.

And I understand why they do that- they have to teach the fundamentals before they can teach huge concepts like Swing or Spring. And even then, any non-trivial project is going to be pretty impossible to set up in a single semester, let alone grade, so in some ways it's better for colleges to stay away from that kind of stuff.

While I understand where you are coming from, I feel like colleges should have covered the fundamentals by the 7th or 8th Semester.
I'm still in college right now, and I am amazed that my classes in my Senior year are covering pretty much the same topics as my classes in my Freshman and Sophomore years. The fact that I still have classes doing logic gates in my Senior year is nuts to me. I have had one class where we did a semester long project, where my team built an android game. That was a nice balance between non-trivial and trivial, which I wish more classes would do.
But I think this problem stems more from the accreditation boards than it does from the actual colleges.

I know how you feel. Back in college I issued a challenge to my fellow graduating seniors: could they show a window in Java that showed a random color in less than 15 minutes? They could even use google. These were graduating seniors who had "Java developer" on their resume, but not a single one of them could do it. Most of them didn't even know how to get an IDE running or how to compile a class. Yet "Java developer" was there on their resume.

And I'm currently in grad school, and I'm in two classes right now: a class on OOP and a class on 3D rendering.

The first lesson in the OOP class covered the very basics of what an Object was. Most of the students had no idea what generics were, the basic Java types, etc. If they were still novices that would be okay, but this is a graduate level class in a room full of people about to become doctors, so it really surprised me.

The first lesson in the 3D rendering class covered how to setup eclipse. One of the students had no idea what eclipse was. Another asked where he should put the .java files, on the C drive or on the desktop? Another asked if we would learn how to make Angry Birds. Another asked "how much programming will we have to do?" Again, this is a graduate level class, so I was pretty surprised.

And maybe some of these people are experienced C developers who just don't know their way around Java, and they're actually really great programmers. But in a room of 50 people in a graduate level class with a prerequisite of already knowing Java programming, you would expect the vast majority to be, well, Java programmers.

On the other hand, I've been in classes that were full of geniuses doing a bunch of really impressive and interesting things, so I try not to get too cocky. My only point is that it can be a roll of the dice trying to figure out the difference between a "real programmer" and just one who got by on the basics.

What would be nice is if some (accredited) college offered a Software Engineering Degree (or something) where the degree program was just basically 4 years of programming boot-camp, where they could cover several different languages and show how you can build a system consisting of several different languages (since these are the real-world systems). It would probably be a rigorous program (due to the number of topics to cover in the 4 years) with highish grades (since the majority of the classes would have programming assignments, which usually yield higher grades), but those graduating from it would effectively be programming swiss army knives, which many employers would absolutely love.

I think that's probably what the more prestigious computer science universities (CMU, Stanford, etc) are like. That's why degrees from places like that are worth so much more than smaller universities. The problem is that most universities can't afford to be that rigorous, since they'd lose 90% of their students that way.

Originally Posted by Cornix

The idea was that actual programming is so easy, you should not have a problem teaching yourself. The lectures were all about theory.

Out of curiosity, do you agree with that? I'm not trying to argue, I'm just curious!

Originally Posted by Cornix

On the other hand, if you wanted to just learn programming you could take an apprenticeship as software developer / programmer.

There is a compelling argument that programming should be taught as a craft (like, uh, glassblowing) through an apprenticeship rather than as an academic class (like a math class) through a school. The idea is that you can only learn so much through theory, and the only way to learn how to program is by actually programming.

That's interesting, but it doesn't scale well to the sheer number of students going through schools (which might be a problem in itself). Also, apprenticeships don't really happen in America. It might be interesting if Europe and America end up taking different approaches to computer science education.

Perhaps by "apprenticeship", he meant "internship", in which there are LOTS of opportunities for college students. Most colleges go as far as setting up business relationships with certain companies, to help their students get internships. Several people I know in college right now have internships with places like Lockheed, Siemens, Google, Microsoft, ect.
Personally, I've gotten my internship opportunities through sheer dumb luck, lol. I was at AirTran Airways for a year and a half, Southwest Airlines for about a year, and now I have worked for NCR for maybe 2 years. I sought out none of those companies; all the opportunities just randomly fell in my lap.

Originally Posted by aussiemcgr

Perhaps by "apprenticeship", he meant "internship"

I'm not sure. I'm just a dumb American, but I'm pretty sure internships are a pretty common thing in European countries.

Originally Posted by aussiemcgr

Most colleges go as far as setting up business relationships with certain companies, to help their students get internships. Several people I know in college right now have internships with places like Lockheed, Siemens, Google, Microsoft, ect.

True. I had an internship at the National Institute of Standards and Technology. It was pretty interesting, although it wasn't programming- so even an internship might not prove that you know how to program.

Originally Posted by aussiemcgr

Personally, I've gotten my internship opportunities through sheer dumb luck, lol. I was at AirTran Airways for a year and a half, Southwest Airlines for about a year, and now I have work for NCR for maybe 2 years.

I work for the FAA, so we work on opposite ends of the same industry, heh. I'm not sure what NCR is though.

Originally Posted by aussiemcgr

I sought out none of those companies; all the opportunities just randomly fell in my lap.

That's one of the perks of being a programmer. People like the OP will seek us out. In a few years we'll have to compete with the kids growing up with smartphones though, so enjoy it while it lasts!

NCR isn't airline related, it's a tech company that's been around since 1884. It used to be called the "National Cash Register" Corporation, but now I think it just goes by NCR since cash registers are only a portion of the company these days. I originally joined to be part of their Airline Team (developing kiosk and webapp solutions), but I now work in a different department.

Yeah, but the truth is the employers rarely expect candidates to have ALL of those skills. Or, they don't expect candidates to be experts at all of those fields. Don't let unfilled prereqs discourage you from applying. Just be honest with them when they ask about you having certain skills.

Originally Posted by KevinWorkman

Out of curiosity, do you agree with that? I'm not trying to argue, I'm just curious!

I have mixes feelings on this. 6 months in a course called 'Operating Systems' without ever opening a linux console or task manager? 1 year of database design without actually creating a database or writing some SQL?. Software engineering exam that is passable with wrote memorisation of Go4 design pattern definitions? A hand written XML exam? 3 years and wrote nothing more that a few unimaginative ticketing apps? To really rub it in my team mates for the final year group project couldn't create a website, configure a development environment, code, wrap their heads around source control or even adequately test the app I wrote yet are still formally qualified as a Computer Scientists.

Clearly university isn't the correct place to learn how to be a programmer.

However, university does reinforce a lot of skills; self learning, team work, personal responsibility, time management skills, communication skills, documentation, understating and analysing requirements, working under stress and recovering from failure.

All of these skills have proved critical in my own path to becoming a professional programmer.

I learnt how to code in my own time because it was my passion. I was learnt how to be a well rounded professional in my field of passion at University (although my former career as a chef made these lessons somewhat redundant).