How much should I charge for fixed-price software contract?

  • Thread starter Robert Maas, see http://tinyurl.com/uh3t
  • Start date
P

Phlip

Robert said:
Let me check it right now:
http://members.tripod.com/~MaasInfo/SeekJob/Resume.98B.txt
That's 60 lines of text. You're correct, it's too long too many lines.
How many lines is the maximum for a resume?

For a newb resume, one page one page only only only one page.

For a senior, drop a book on them. But make _certain_ they need to read only
the minum possible number of lines to make the pass-fail decision.

The Objective is where you pack into a few lines all the wisdom legitimately
grown from "20 years experience developing medium-level tools and
incorporating them into applications". After that, you have nothing to prove
about general mentality.

Then, list the acronyms, and let folks skip to the jobs with those acronyms
easily.

The decision "I refuse to work for anyone so stupid they only look at
acronyms" is closely related to the decision "I refuse to learn an acronym
and prepare my resume, so a hirer will know that I will hit the ground
running once hired." I'd jog before a marathon, so I'd learn an acronym
before getting the gig that asks for it.

Save up for and pay for .NET experience. (And GNU Mono counts.) The hirers
are sick and tired of only getting kiddies who know .NET but don't know how
to think to avoid debugging. They would be delighted to locate someone with
long-term experience with big bad projects, _and_ with .NET.

Replace ".NET" in my paragraph with any other peesashit new wave
vendor-lockin-oriented toolkit out there...
 
P

Phlip

Robert said:
Please give me advice: After I have already FAXed my resume to a given
employment agency, how long should I wait before I FAX them another
copy?

(Ooouy can't believe I'm _still_ taking the bait.) I'm a headhunter, and I
want to review technical competence.

People more technically competent than the average Pacific Treefrog know how
to use e-mail and HTML these days. If I seek reasons to reject, FAX abuse
(hence tree-killing) is fairly high on the list.

BTW I liked the first bit of the first resume I snipped. Then I dislike a
lack of employment history (that is _so_ conspicuous by its absense), and I
dislike your need to snow Ulrich by pasting in many more.
 
U

Ulrich Hobelmann

Robert said:
Please give me advice: After I have already FAXed my resume to a given
employment agency, how long should I wait before I FAX them another
copy?

Well, maybe they don't have an opening then...
OK, you be the judge. Here is a resume I sent in response to a job ad
on May 26:

Robert Elton Maas, Sunnyvale, CA
Voice: 408-749-0453
Internet electronic-mail: (e-mail address removed)

EDUCATION:
Mathematics major at University of Santa Clara, Bachelor of Science
degree

ACADEMIC/INTELLECTUAL HONORS, PROFESSIONAL LICENSES, AND PUBLISHED WORKS:
- Among top five (in whole United States) in William Lowell Putnam
undergraduate mathematics competition
- Report on nuclear magnetic resonance relaxation published
- Report on English-language programming for robot published

PROGRAMMED IN THESE LANGUAGES:
- Java (on 3 platforms)
- C (on 4 platforms) C++ (on 2 platforms)
- Visual Basic
- Fortran (on 5 platforms)
- Lisp (on 5 platforms)
- Assembly/machine language on 7 different CPUs

Platforms (programming environments) include: Macintosh, Unix+CGI, MS-Windows,
RedHat Linux

MAJOR PROGRAMMING PROJECTS:
- Computer-assisted instruction for Calculus
- Laying out text mixed with mathematical formulas for printing or
display
- Information retrieval and indexing, including linked-text frames
- Packet-based client/server telecommunications, including handling
interrupts from I/O devices
- Effective algorithm for flashcard drill

So far it doesn't sound too bad to me.
ADDITIONAL SPECIFIC ACCOMPLISHMENTS/ACTIVITIES/EXPERTISE/EXPERIENCE:
- Wrote software to use SAX parser in Java/J2EE to convert XML to SQL
for update to relational database.
- Wrote software to build&update tables in relational database using JDBC/SQL.
- Used ANT to maintain compiled versions of J2EE applications as source edited.
- Wrote white-box unit-testing at all levels of software modules from
single lines of code to full application use-cases.
- HTTP, HTML, CGI.
- Used JCreator to build Java projects.

These above are IMHO too detailed. People simply *assume* that you
could do that.

Maybe a concrete bigger project wouldn't hurt, or an indication in what
way your presence at a project helped it.

[...]
OTHER SKILLS/EXPERIENCE/EXPERTISE:
- HTML, SQL/databases (MicroSoft Access, CloudScape), WebServer applications

ONLINE (Web-accessible) DEMOS:
- Unix+CGI: http://www.rawbw.com/~rem/demos.html
- Applet: http://www.rawbw.com/~rem/Lab7a.class
- JavaDoc: http://www.rawbw.com/~rem/JavaDoc/Blab2/index-all.html
- JavaScript: http://www.geocities.com/rem642b/JavaScript/js1.html
- Multi-CGI-language education: http://www.rawbw.com/~rem/HelloPlus/hellos.html
- XML parsing (SAX): http://members.tripod.com/~MaasInfo/New/2005.6.12a.zip

Leave out these small demos. Well, that is, I don't know what jobs you
were applying to, but I assume that small demos are a given. If you
need to, mention that you can code Javascript or work with XML, but I
don't think anybody needs to know specifics. If they need to, they'll
probably ask you.
Notice how they're all based on that same starting resume but I removed
different items in each and put in special stuff in each to better fit
the job from among the experience I have but which is relevant to only
a few jobs?

Yep, but it's hard for me to know what's appropriate for what job
application. (esp. since I'm still a student...)

It wouldn't hurt to indicate why you're THE MAN for the job. (well, I
assume you actually did write an introductory letter/email to accompany
those resumes)
I don't have any money to pay for MicroSoft Word for Macintosh, so
that's not an option for me here.

Yep. Maybe running TeX on you Unix account and just sending them a PDF
works. I think most modern employers wouldn't mind that format, though
I've also heard some insist on doc.

ASCII text in an email looks too cheap, IMHO.
I have only 17 megabytes of unused space on my Macintosh hard disk.
How much space does the Macintosh version of OpenOffice need?

AFAIK it only runs on Mac OS X, and needs a lot of space. Maybe you can
find some room on that Redhat machine? Or maybe someone at the library
or some university/school lets you use Office.
 
T

Tim X

Let me check it right now:
http://members.tripod.com/~MaasInfo/SeekJob/Resume.98B.txt
That's 60 lines of text. You're correct, it's too long too many lines.
How many lines is the maximum for a resume?

If you have a lot of "meat", you can possibly go as long as 3 pages -
but thats not 3 pages of plain ascii, thats 3 pages correctly
formatted in an "accepted" format - MS Word Doc or PDF. Normally,
about 2 pages of formatted text (with headings, columns, tables,
bold/italic/unerline etc.

It looks formatted pretty well given the one-page restriction and plain
ASCII text, but perhaps you have some specific changes you'd like?

Plan ascii text won't do it. People like to see something which is
presented well - it shows effort, ability to use a word processor and
possibly some style. Your resume needs to be eye catching and it needs
to be presented in such a way that the person reading it can identify
the key bits immediately and not have to read the whole thing. You
have to remember in larger organisations, the initial culling of
applications is usually done by some junior staff member from the HR
department - they know nothing about programming, computer or IT. They
have a list of key words or criteria which they look for - those that
have it get to the next stage, those that don't get filed in the round
filing cabinet under the desk!
What specifically? I'd be glad to cut out parts that the majority of
people in this newsgroup consider so grossly worthless that I shouldn't
include them even though I spent a lot of time doing those things and
it would really be dishonest to exclude them, but if dishonesty by
omission is necessary to get a job I'm willing to bend. So which items
specifically should I delete?

Well, as you have soooo many resumes at the web site, I couldn't be
bothered reading all of them (hint). The one I looked at had lots
about programming assembler on computers that haven't be around for
20+ years i.e. PDP-10. All of that could have been summarised as
something like x years assembler programming. this would show you have
that skill - the specifics is not that relevant unless the job had a
specific requirement. Again, the objective is to just peak interest,
not tell them all the detail.


You can use CV or resume - these days, the two are pretty
interchangable. Generally, a CV indicates you have a degree. However,
use what you feel most comfortable with and stop nit pickiing - you
know perfectly well what I was getting at.

It's already that. What are you complaining about??

The one I looked at was not clearly labelled and looked pretty bloody
awful.

My most recent employment is more than ten years ago. I've gotten good
advice *not* to make my lack of recent employment a major attraction in
my resume, or it'd be tossed before any of the good stuff would ever be
seen.

You don't have any "good stuff"! Normally, that advice would be pretty
good, but you need to show that you can hold down employment and if
you don't put it in, you have nothing. Besides, the resume I looked at
had stuff going all the way back to high school and all your
employment from the 70's. If your going to put it all in, put it in
reverse order.

I've also been advised very strongly not to include any employment more
than ten years ago, and to only summarize anything between five and ten
years ago, not list it individually.

Well, thats not what was in the resume I looked at.
I've never used any programming language commercially, except 2.5 weeks
of Think C 9n 1992.

then your stuffed.
Well there was one resume I wrote that didn't say any specifics at all,
no PDP-10 or 6502 or 8080 or 68000 or IBM-1620 or IBM-1130, only the
number/variety of different things I did to emphasize how I've learned
so many different languages/environments/applicationAreas that surely I
can easily learn five or ten more on a new job.
http://members.tripod.com/~MaasInfo/SeekJob/Resume.942.txt
It's only 57 lines, three lines shorter than the other. Maybe you'd
like it better?

No, it still looks like crap.

I agree. That's why for C and C++ I used Google to find a free set of
code to do the form-contents-decoding, not part of a large library, but
just a standalone piece of already-debugged (almost, I had to fix a few
bugs before they'd work on this system) that would be small enough that
I could show it as part of my demo of how to do CGI/C and CGI/C++
software. I made sure the C code was pure C, no cheating by using stuff
that the Gnu C/C++ compiler or Visual-C++ compiler could fake in C
program even though it wasn't valid ANSI C but was actually C++. Also I
made sure the C++ code was true C++ code in both standard and style,
not C code that got minimal transformation to run under C++
environment but which was actually C at heart and only sham of C++.

In 25 years involvement in IT, I've never once been asked to show a
demo. In the past 10 years, I cannot remember the number of selection
committees etc I've been on and not once have we ever asked to see a
demo.

think of it this way -

1. You send off an application which includes a 1 page covering
letting, your resume and possibly, if asked for in the ad,
demonstration (in words) of how you meet the selection criteria. If
they do list selection criteria, address each of them individually
with clear headings and don't use more than 1 or two paragraphs for
each. If they don't list or ask for you to demonstrate how you meet
each criteria, make your covering letter a bit longer (no more than
two pages) presenting a convincing argument why you should be
selected for interview and what you think you have of benefit to
them. The only goal at this point is to make them believe your
worth interviewing either because you meet all the selection
criteria or because you bring something new to the table which
peaks their interest.
I tried looking for regular employment for years, but lots of people
told me that was impossible, that I need to get some short-term
contract work, and then with that proven track record some company
might risk hiring me on the longer term, in fact one of the short-term
contracts might develop into a long-term job. So you see I get so much
contradictory advice that I really have to ignore most of it, and
accept only that which doesn't contract a lot of other advice I also
get.

That rarely works. You are almost never ever going to get contract
work or consulting work without a proven current track record. Nobody
is going to take the risk of getting fired for employing someone with
no proven ability or track record - even if they thought you were very
capable and possibly a good choice, they will go with the safer person
who has (or appears to have) a good track record.

My only technical commercial experience, except for 2.5 weeks in 1992,
is within the past 2.2 years. How can you say such recent experience is
outdated? Are Visual Basic, C, C++, and Java, all outdated, in your
opinion?

No, they are not outdated, but you do not have any real commercial
experience in any of those - stuff you have done on your own does not
count for anything - its only commercial experience they are
interested in and since by your own admission you have not had a job
in ove 10 years, I can't see how you could claim Java experience (nor
C/C++ for that matter).
I have a lot of good talent and skills, valuable to an employer, that
most others don't have. Maybe you can help me convince an employer to
recognize that?

No, you are the one who has to convince them. However, your
argumentative attitude, constant blaming of your situation on external
forces and (unfairly) your age are all against you. I do not see you
getting a job as a Java, C or C++ programmer in this lifetime.
Your question is based on a false premise. I **have** been trying to
get programming jobs in areas where I have expertise (educational
software, information retrieval/access, etc.), but I've never been able
to find anyone interested in my skills in those areas. The closest I
ever came was when my former boss referred me to a company that did
educational software for children, and took me on a tour of what they
were doing, but none of it was actually educational where it actually
makes sure a child learns something, it was all play-explore stuff
which is fine for spending idle time getting familiar with some stuff
that looks interesting but is totally insufficient at making sure the
child ever really learned anything. It's like a computer version of the
child watching Sesame Street all day. Yeah, the child eventually picks
up a few things here and there, but there's no competance at anything.
So anyway I was told they aren't interested in any software that
actually teaches the child anything, only in making sure the child
enjoys the experience of playing with the computer games, so none of my
experience is of any value there.

I must have missed the part in your resume which outlined your
commercial experience in writing educational software. All I saw was
work at Santa Cruz and Stanford - but I could easily have missed it as
the resume was not very well formatted and very boring. I have to
admit, I lost interest about half way through (which should tell you
something).
I have no experience in the kind of modeling you're talking about, nor
in any signal processing whatsoever. The only communications jobs I've
seen required specific experience managing/configuring TCP/IP stacks,
which I've never done.

I suggested this because your degree was in mathematics, your awards
at school were in mathematics and you obviously (I thought) had an
aptitude in this area. Finding programmers with really good solid
backgrounds in maths is actually qite difficult - thre seems to be a
lot of programmers out there which have mastered programming, but are
very poor in maths. I know of quite a lot of companies who have had a
very difficult time finding good programmers which are also talented
at maths. Some of the most interesting programming jobs I've seen fall
into this catagory. Lets face it, web application programming can be
extremely dull and there are lots of people willing to do it. However,
programming in areas relating to things like modelling of complex
systems, stock breeding/genetics, processing signals from various
sensors, application of technology in new areas etc, can be extremely
rewarding. Personally, I find this sort of work far more interesting
than web apps or basic information storage and retrieval. While there
may not be as many jobs in these areas, there is also a lot less
competition. Also, in these types of jobs, they tend to be less
interested in your knowledge of the "hot" language technology and mroe
interested in your abilities to solve problems etc.
Because Java is my second-best language, my best being Lisp, and there
are no jobs whatsoever in Lisp, whereas 2.5 years ago I actually saw a
job ad for Java that I would have qualified for a year later. So I'm
only one year away from a chance at a Java job, whereas twenty years
away from any other kind of job.

If thats the case, I would *strongly* suggest you give up looking for
a programming job - apart from not ahving any experience, I'm now
skeptical about your ability to program.

The reason I make such an outrageous statement is that I beleive the
language is, in the main, irrelevant. What is more important is your
understanding of the underlying concepts (data structurers,
algorithms, analytical skill and the ability to apply these skills).
etc). The language is just syntax and less important. I've often
employed people who did not have much experience in the specific
language being used, but had excellent understanding of data
structures, algorithms and their analysis and the ability to take a
problem, analyse it and design a robust and maintainable solution. In
fact, nearly every time I've changed jobs, I've ended up having to
learn a new language. Like the book titles say "Learn XXX in 21 Days"
- you only need that long to learn the syntax - it takes a lot longer
to learn how to analyse a problem, identify the correct data
abstractions and algorithms and then implement the solution - the
implementation is the easy part (assuming you got the earlier steps
correct).
Show me one job opening that matches my strenghths in Lisp programming
or computer-assisted instruction.

Again, I woldn't consider those to really be strengths. Your strengths
are (possibly) in your rigor and ability to abstract a problem down to
its fundamental parts (coming from a maths background), possibly your
life experiences, possibly skills you developed in what little work
you have had etc. I will employ the prson who fits in with the rest of
the team, shows they are self motivated and have initiative and keen
before I'll ever employ that bitter twisted arrogant and difficult
loner who has 10 yeras experience with the language we use - its much
easier to teach simple language syntax than to change someones
personality or waste resources getting them motivated etc.

Tim
 
T

Tim X

Please give me advice: After I have already FAXed my resume to a given
employment agency, how long should I wait before I FAX them another
copy?

That depends on the agency. Pesonally, I only use them if I have to
(ie company I want to work for only hires via that agency). I would
send them the fax, ring the next day to verify they received it
OK, you be the judge. Here is a resume I sent in response to a job ad
on May 26:

OK. Lets assume you formatted it better than it is here. This looks
like you put about 10 minutes into it. If it landed n my desk, I'd use
it to stop coffee cups from leaving rings on the desktop.

Robert Elton Maas, Sunnyvale, CA
Voice: 408-749-0453
Internet electronic-mail: (e-mail address removed)

Resonable - but only just. Normally, you should include a postal
address as well. Forget about "Internet electronic-mail" - its been
around for a while now, you can just say E-Mail. Also, why the mixed
case in the domain name - anyone who knows anyting knows that case is
irrelevant in this context.
EDUCATION:
Mathematics major at University of Santa Clara, Bachelor of Science
degree

Make it brief! What about the year you graduated? i.e.

1967 B. Sci (Mathematics Major)
University of Santa Clara

What about the courses you have done since (Java, C, Data structures etc)

ACADEMIC/INTELLECTUAL HONORS, PROFESSIONAL LICENSES, AND PUBLISHED WORKS:
- Among top five (in whole United States) in William Lowell Putnam
undergraduate mathematics competition
- Report on nuclear magnetic resonance relaxation published
- Report on English-language programming for robot published

Shorten the first one. For the published papers, where were they
published, when and in what? Were the articles refereed? Put this
last.
PROGRAMMED IN THESE LANGUAGES:
- Java (on 3 platforms)
- C (on 4 platforms) C++ (on 2 platforms)
- Visual Basic
- Fortran (on 5 platforms)
- Lisp (on 5 platforms)
- Assembly/machine language on 7 different CPUs

How long have you programmed in these languages? When did you lat use
them? Drop the stuff about the platforms.

Platforms (programming environments) include: Macintosh, Unix+CGI, MS-Windows,
RedHat Linux

Why Unix+CGI - there is no specific relationship here - you can do CGI
programming on any platform which has a web server. Skip the brand
names (ie. Red Hat). You want to just show you are familiar with and
competent on these platforms. Again, give an indication of how long
you have worked on each platform.
MAJOR PROGRAMMING PROJECTS:
- Computer-assisted instruction for Calculus
- Laying out text mixed with mathematical formulas for printing or
display
- Information retrieval and indexing, including linked-text frames
- Packet-based client/server telecommunications, including handling
interrupts from I/O devices
- Effective algorithm for flashcard drill

All of the above means nearly nothing. You need to re-work this to
give more of an idea of what this means and why it is relevant to the
job your applying for.

ADDITIONAL SPECIFIC ACCOMPLISHMENTS/ACTIVITIES/EXPERTISE/EXPERIENCE:
- Wrote software to use SAX parser in Java/J2EE to convert XML to SQL
for update to relational database.
- Wrote software to build&update tables in relational database using JDBC/SQL.
- Used ANT to maintain compiled versions of J2EE applications as source edited.
- Wrote white-box unit-testing at all levels of software modules from
single lines of code to full application use-cases.
- HTTP, HTML, CGI.
- Used JCreator to build Java projects.

this does more harm than good. It looks like someone who has no real
experience and is trying to pad things to make it look like they have
some skills. Re-work this to give a better impression - what databases
did you use for this, what did you do it for etc. In fact, I would
probably try and work this into something in the previous section. You
can't call any of this a specific accumplishment - I would assume
anyone working with data retrieval and databases and java would have
all of this.

Based on the above, I would assume you have no work experience at all,
have no previous employers who are willing to vouch for you and not
even any friends who are able to provide you with even a basic
haracter refeence.

If I bothered to read this resume, I would guess it was from a high
school kid trying to get their first job (if not for the dgree). It
shows no specific ability, gives me no idea of what your real skills
look like and no idea why I would bother to interview you. In fact, I
would possibly even be pissed off as it appears I spent more time
reading it than you did writing it.

Generally, I spend around two days preparing a job application. Yours
looks like you put in as little effort as possible. Certainly not what
I want from a new employee.


Here's another customized resume I sent for a different job ad on Jun1.15:

Robert Elton Maas, Sunnyvale, CA
Voice: 408-749-0453
Internet electronic-mail: (e-mail address removed)
ditto


EDUCATION:
Mathematics major at University of Santa Clara, Bachelor of Science
degree
ditto

ACADEMIC/INTELLECTUAL HONORS, PROFESSIONAL LICENSES, AND PUBLISHED WORKS:
- Among top five nationwide in William Lowell Putnam undergraduate
mathematics competition
- Report on nuclear magnetic resonance relaxation published
- Report on English-language programming for robot published
- Toplevel meta-index to the Internet (including Usenet and Bitnet)
published electronically and available via HTTP/WWW

Huh? What is this? If its published and available via the web, why not
include the url so that they can check it out?
PROGRAMMED IN THESE LANGUAGES:
- Java (on 3 platforms), including: applets, JDBC/ODBC, JSP, J2EE servlets,
XML parsing (SAX), JavaDoc
- JavaScript, including calls to Java packages
- C (on 4 platforms) C++ (on 2 platforms)
- Visual Basic
- Fortran (on 5 platforms)
- Lisp (on 5 platforms)
- Assembly/machine language on 7 different CPUs
* Platforms (programming environments) include: Unix+CGI,
Macintosh (systems 6.0.3, 6.0.5, 6.0.7, 7.5.5), MS-Windows, RedHat Linux

ditto as above

MAJOR PROGRAMMING PROJECTS:
- Computer-assisted instruction for Calculus
- Laying out text mixed with mathematical formulas for printing or
display
- Information retrieval and indexing, including linked-text frames
- Packet-based client/server telecommunications, including handling
interrupts from I/O devices
- Effective algorithm for flashcard drill
ditto

OTHER SKILLS/EXPERIENCE/EXPERTISE:
- HTML, SQL/databases (MicroSoft Access, CloudScape), WebServer applications

Slightly better.


Your demos and web site look like crap - keep them a secret and don't
offer them up. Alternatively, turn your website into something
impressive, but don't let them see it as it is now!


Here's another tailored resume I sent to another job ad on the same day:

Robert Elton Maas, Sunnyvale, CA
Voice: 408-749-0453
Internet electronic-mail: (e-mail address removed)

EDUCATION:
Mathematics major at University of Santa Clara, Bachelor of Science
degree

ACADEMIC/INTELLECTUAL HONORS, PROFESSIONAL LICENSES, AND PUBLISHED WORKS:
- Among top five nationwide in William Lowell Putnam undergraduate
mathematics competition
- Report on nuclear magnetic resonance relaxation published
- Report on English-language programming for robot published
- Toplevel meta-index to the Internet (including Usenet and Bitnet)
published electronically and available via HTTP/WWW

PROGRAMMED IN THESE LANGUAGES:
- Java (on 3 platforms), including: applets, JDBC/ODBC, JSP, J2EE servlets,
XML parsing (SAX), JavaDoc
- JavaScript, including calls to Java packages
- C (on 4 platforms) C++ (on 2 platforms)
- Visual Basic
- Fortran (on 5 platforms)
- Lisp (on 5 platforms)
- Assembly/machine language on 7 different CPUs
* Platforms (programming environments) include: Unix+CGI,
Macintosh (systems 6.0.3, 6.0.5, 6.0.7, 7.5.5), MS-Windows, RedHat Linux

MAJOR PROGRAMMING PROJECTS:
- Computer-assisted instruction for Calculus
- Laying out text mixed with mathematical formulas for printing or
display
- Information retrieval and indexing, including linked-text frames
- Packet-based client/server telecommunications, including handling
interrupts from I/O devices
- Effective algorithm for flashcard drill

OTHER SKILLS/EXPERIENCE/EXPERTISE:
- UML, API documentation of my own modules via JavaDoc
- proficient at rapid protyping&development&deployment via TDD
(Test-Driven Development based on unit-testing at all levels)
- developed major application which explored multiple data sources to
collect the best information, and consolidated it into database

Major application? I really am beginning to think you have deluded
yourself on what you have done - there seems nothing here I can
classify as "major". I will also challenge your claim to proficiency
at rapid prototypeing and development as there is no evidence you have
devleoped anything other than a few very minor small apps.
ONLINE (Web-accessible) DEMOS:
- Unix+CGI: http://www.rawbw.com/~rem/demos.html
- Applet: http://www.rawbw.com/~rem/Lab7a.class
- JavaDoc: http://www.rawbw.com/~rem/JavaDoc/Blab2/index-all.html
- JavaScript: http://www.geocities.com/rem642b/JavaScript/js1.html
- Multi-CGI-language education: http://www.rawbw.com/~rem/HelloPlus/hellos.html
- XML parsing (SAX): http://members.tripod.com/~MaasInfo/New/2005.6.12a.zip

Here's another custom version I sent to yet another job ad the same day:

Notice how they're all based on that same starting resume but I removed
different items in each and put in special stuff in each to better fit
the job from among the experience I have but which is relevant to only
a few jobs?

I noticed that they were all based on the same flawed starting point -
that was obvious. As to them being customized for specific jobs -
although they had minor differences, these were superficial at
best. Funny that if they were taylored for specific jobs how I
couldn't tell what the jobs were.

I don't have any money to pay for MicroSoft Word for Macintosh, so
that's not an option for me here.

More bloody excuses! If there is a will there is a way and it doesn't
need money. I don't run Windows at home and have not done so for a
very long time and don't have MS Word or Office. However, wehn asked,
I can provide my CV in doc format with no problems.
I have only 17 megabytes of unused space on my Macintosh hard disk.
How much space does the Macintosh version of OpenOffice need?

More pathetic excuses. The only one who makes you a victim is you.

Tim
 
G

Gerry Quinn

My most recent employment is more than ten years ago. I've gotten good
advice *not* to make my lack of recent employment a major attraction in
my resume, or it'd be tossed before any of the good stuff would ever be
seen.
I've also been advised very strongly not to include any employment more
than ten years ago, and to only summarize anything between five and ten
years ago, not list it individually.

That advice pre-supposes that there is something more recent that you
will be talking about instead!

For what it's worth, I think you should consider looking for some job
right now that will give you exercise preferably in the open air, and
give your brain a bit of a rest. You might find that things look
different after a couple of months.

- Gerry Quinn
 
G

Guest

I've never used any programming language commercially, except 2.5 weeks
of Think C 9n 1992.

So all those stories about years of programming experience were
basically untrue ?

I hate to say this, but at 50-60 years of age, with no
track-record or industry experience, you are not going to get a job in programming.
 
D

David

Hi Robert,

I noticed your resumes don't include an indication of expertise
in the various categories you provide. I went over to your web
resume last night and tried to check out your languages and C++.
There was no info or C++ category. ...I know you are in the process
of a rewrite.

The resumes you posted last night list languages, OSes, and so
on, but no indication of experience. When looking for someone's
resume I'll start with a few simple buzzwords like language but
I'd really like to see an indication of the level you are at in
them. That might help to some degree. Obviously you also want
to list references to items you would like to use. I've dropped
a couple of terms from my resume because they were unrelated on
my resume, but commonly related terms when headhunters looked at
it. I kept getting inquiries for job with languages on an
operating system that I did not prefer. Yes a different resume
might use those terms again, but it is unlikely that even big
blue would consider them useful again.

The relatively simple text resumes posted last night could
be improved a bit and at least give you a chance at getting
an inquiry. Sending any of your large resume references is
both overkill and an excuse for a prospective employer to never
have the need to talk to you.

The resume is there to introduce yourself, your talents,
and get their interest to actually start a dialog. It can
be all encompassing, but rarely does that serve both your
purpose and theirs.

I've left the resumes intact below.

Good luck,

David
 
M

Michael Sullivan

It's been more than 24 hours since I asked for suggestions about the
wording in this explanation why I'm discontinuing my work on WAP and
dismantling most of what I previously did. So-far I haven't seen any
followup that gives any specific comments about anything I may have
worded wrong that needs improvement. If I don't get any feedback soon,
I don't know what I'll do.
http://www.rawbw.com/~rem/WAP/WhyInactive.html
Please, everybody, hurry up and tell me any improvements in wording
that you can suggest.

You really are an ass, Robert.

You're waiting for constructive criticism because you couldn't recognize
constructive criticism if it was a shark that swallowed you whole.
You've gotten so much more than you deserve, from people who persist in
giving you real informatin and suggestions in the face of your bitching
and moaning about what they say to you.

It's not anybody's job here to edit your fucking wording. Did you grow
up rich with a bunch of servants around or something? Or have you been
catered to by a wife/mother/brother/whatever for your whole life? Take
responsibility for your own shit. When you ask a question on a
newsgroup and nobody answers, that means nobody gives a shit, and they
have every right not to give a shit. Do you really think that because
you beg and plead, you are being any more polite than if you were
ordering people around?

You're asking a favor. Apparently few people care about why you aren't
doing WAP anymore. Which makes sense, because if I read your page
correctly, you're not doing it essentially because nobody cared when you
*were* doing it.

I'm amazed at the lengths you go build the case for a world in which
your huge talents go untapped because of the stupidity/malice/whatever
of hiring managers. If you had put half that much energy into thinking
what people actually want and where it intersects with your
skills/wants, instead of looking for exactly and precisely the kind of
work that you have done in the distant past, I'm quite sure you wouldn't
be where you are.

Go work at McDonalds or a factory for crying out loud. You want a job
where people define the exact parameters of what you have do as if you
aren't much more aware of business and culture than the computers you
program, and that's that. Well, there aren't any programming jobs like
that anymore. Not in the US anyway. Because a lot more brainpower goes
into defining the problems that explicitly than into the actual coding,
and once you've done that part -- Indians and Chinese can and will
finish the code just as well for 1/10th the money. Tough luck. Buggy
whip makers and weavers have been having trouble finding work too, I
hear.

The world doesn't owe you a living. Frankly I'd rather have my taxes
paying you a welfare check than listen to your faux self-righteous
whiny-ass moocher bitching as an employer.



Michael
 
P

Pascal Bourguignon

Your question is based on a false premise. I **have** been trying to
get programming jobs in areas where I have expertise (educational
software, information retrieval/access, etc.), but I've never been able
to find anyone interested in my skills in those areas. The closest I
ever came was when my former boss referred me to a company that did
educational software for children, and took me on a tour of what they
were doing, but none of it was actually educational where it actually
makes sure a child learns something, it was all play-explore stuff
which is fine for spending idle time getting familiar with some stuff
that looks interesting but is totally insufficient at making sure the
child ever really learned anything. It's like a computer version of the
child watching Sesame Street all day. Yeah, the child eventually picks
up a few things here and there, but there's no competance at anything.
So anyway I was told they aren't interested in any software that
actually teaches the child anything, only in making sure the child
enjoys the experience of playing with the computer games, so none of my
experience is of any value there.

Isn't that a problem? Couldn't you solve it?

Forget about getting a job: you're not a "professionnal".
(read Jeff Schmidt's, "Discplined Minds. a critical look at salaried
professionals and the soul battering system that shapes their lives.")
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/t...f=sr_1_2/102-5385686-2832937?v=glance&s=books

Instead, start up an enterprise to develop and commercialize truly
educationnal software. Well, start progressively. You've already got
some code you said. So make sure that it's better than most of the
reading educational software described in the 7,620,000 hits returned
by google http://www.google.com/search?q=reading+educational+software
and package it into an easily downloadable and installable software,
an make a web page to let parents download it against Paypal payment.

Once you've got a little war treasury from paypal payments, you'll be
able to feed yourself and perhaps an employee to develop a arithmetic
educational software, and then a whole calatlog.
 
P

Pascal Bourguignon

I have only 17 megabytes of unused space on my Macintosh hard disk.
How much space does the Macintosh version of OpenOffice need?

Go buy yourself a new hard disk! Yes, I know you don't have the
money. Then you can just do some garbage collection: with a some luck
you'll even find a whole functional CPU.
 
J

jonathon

Pascal said:
Go buy yourself a new hard disk! Yes, I know you don't have the
money. Then you can just do some garbage collection: with a some luck
you'll even find a whole functional CPU.

I'll only say this once, but this thread is getting *really* tedious.
If this guy doesn't have the resources and/or ingenuity to put together
or access a decent machine, who would trust him to write their
software??
 
S

Scott Ellsworth

Hi, Robert.

Just a couple of quick comments in direct response to some questions:

From: Scott Ellsworth <[email protected]>
[...]

I'm not the kind of person to toot my own horn, to brag and brag and
brag incessantly until somebody takes a chance and hires me without any
evidence except my bragging. I'm a shy kind of person who would rather
show a demo of my work and let the other person decide if it's good or
not. But if nobody will ever look at my work, then nobody will ever
have any reason to hire me.

So if I can't brag about my abilities (because I'm not the braggart
type), and if I can't show demonstrations of my work to people, then
what's your advice how to ever get somebody to hire me again?[/QUOTE]

Simply put, there is a world of difference between "brag and brag and
brag incessantly" and making it clear to the world that you are looking,
and bringing certain skills to the party. Essentially, you try to find
a context where talking about what you know how to do, and what "they"
need is acceptable, like a user's group meeting or a BOF.

I would not want to hire someone that buttonholed me, then would not
shut up. I do not think, though, that it is out of line to attend a
Java users group meeting, talk about recent projects, and then to hand
out my cards to those who seem at all interested in what I have done.
Mine say 'Java, Cocoa, and database consulting for the life sciences' as
that is what earns _most_ of my income.

I do a heck of a lot more than that - after reading a rails book,
experimenting some on my own, and writing up my feelings about how it
compares to Tapestry, JSP, and PHP, I have a pretty good feel for how
Ruby on Rails works. I would be willing to take on a contract in it.
My card does not mention it, but I might in conversation at such a
users' group meeting.

I might consider presenting my thoughts at such a meeting, perhaps with
a few slides showing identical results, and how I got there using the
three technologies. Alternatively, perhaps this goes on a blog.
Different audience, and no way to pass out cards, but people can find it
by google - it balances.

[...]

Others have discussed how you might research Sun and what they do, and
how you might find people at Sun who are publicly visible, and perhaps
willing to talk.
Please clarify what you mean by "problem elimination". It sounds like
"pest extermination", but I don't think that's what you mean. Do you
mean like if they have a business procedure involving five steps, but
one of the steps is taking an inordinate amount of time, but if that
one step were automated in a way that fit in with the other steps
nicely then that one step would take much less time without any bad
side effect on the procedure as a whole? Or one of the five steps is
producing very inaccurate results which is messing up the next step
after it, and if that one step were made more accurate then the whole
procedure would come out better? Or am I guessing wrong?

Exactly right. More, I want my clients to feel like I make their lives
easier - if they ask me to solve a problem, they get a list of options,
their costs and tradeoffs, and someone willing to implement them for
those prices. Sometimes, they just want me to pick a solution,
implement it, and tell them it is done, and it is my call which class a
given problem is in.

I do guess wrong sometimes, but if I understand their process, and keep
my eye on how much they are paying, those mistakes are minor and can be
recovered from.
That's what I'd like to do. How can I find somebody who needs help and
is willing to admit it to a total stranger like me?

The user group example I gave above is just an example, but it is one I
am trying to work up. Based on the past, if I convince the people
running a user group to let me talk, at least one person is going to
want to talk about their problems in that area - something like 'We
tried a JSP-based app, and it was just too slow.' This might lead to
work - I know how a profiler works and a depressing number of people do
not.

[...]
I have no idea how much other people charge for custom software on a
per-use-case basis or per-function/method basis, so I wouldn't know how
to compare their standard charges with my (hopefully) more-affordable
charges.

I meant that you should compare it to what the problem is costing them.
For example - if every sales guy has his own Access database of
contacts, and I am proposing one big MySql database with everyone's
contacts, I can argue that this will let them cross sell, or perhaps
that it will save them their four hour 'sales report meeting' every
week. If it saves ten people three hours (they still likely need to
report and meet some), then that is worth mumble mumble figure figure
30*25 or $750 per week for ten sales guys at $50k.

Again, I have to guess, but a wild assed guess is better than nothing,
and if I am clear about my assumptions, they will usually correct any
really boneheaded number I used.

Others have already addressed ruby, and pointed out some online
piecework places.

Good luck,

Scott
 
R

Robert Uhl

Petter Gustad said:
My impression is that the term resumé is used mostly in the US and CV
(curriculum vitae) in Europe.

At least in my experience, a resume is purely work-related, and hence
fairly short, whereas a curriculum vitae is everything one has done, and
can thus be quite long.
 
R

Robert Maas, see http://tinyurl.com/uh3t

From: "Phlip said:
The first few sentences should "hook" the readers, and make them
"care" about the story.

I have no skill in this area, and there's no available source of free
help in this area. Accordingly I'll have to skip over this suggestion.

Linkname: Why WAP inactive?
URL: http://www.rawbw.com/~rem/WAP/WhyInactive.html
In your case, you start with negative complaints about yourself, like
this post. "In the first place" and "briefly" are complaintful.

OK, I've changed that now. See if it looks better.
and "stopped work soon after beginning" & "cruddy" are negative and
self-abasing.

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=self-abasing&db=*
Lowering or humbling one's self.

Saying that I stopped work on that project because I lacked the
resources necessary to continue, is factual, not what you say.

Saying that AT&T services is cruddy is my person opinion based on
suffering beeping from incoming text-message spam about once every two
or three minutes and spending several hours per day for several days on
customer support trying to get them to shut down the incessant beeping,
all to no avail. I hope somebody sues AT&T for all the spam they've
sent out, at $1000 per spam, hundreds of billions of dollars per day
they owe, and puts AT&T out of business, because I hate that fucking
company for multiple reasons.

Do you honstly consider my hatred of AT&T to be "humble"? Howso?
Then, readers have trouble getting started without at least
expository verbiage about what WAP is.

I turned my first mention of WAP into a link to suitable WAP-p.r.
I used to think that Free Software emulators for WAP were available.

I don't have any net access such that it'd be possible to correctly
emulate a small cellphone screen. Piping small-screen Web pages through
a VT100 (fixed-pitch single-font test) would not give a proper idea
what a WebPage would look like rendered properly on a cellphone screen,
and IMO would not be worth even trying.
you seem to complain that without a cell phone with good "service"
(signal? tech support?) you can't continue to experiment with WAP.

Without any cellphone whatsoever, nor any other way to render WAP
output to look as it would on a cellphone, indeed I can't do any
meaningful experiments in that medium.
And the reason you didn't whip out your computer science credentials
and _write_ a WAP emulator are..?

Because I don't have access to any system on which it would be possible
to render Web output in any way similar to how it'd appear on a cellphone.
"person opinion" should read "personal opinion"
 
B

Bob Day

I have no skill in this area, and there's no available source of free
help in this area. Accordingly I'll have to skip over this suggestion.

Linkname: Why WAP inactive?
URL: http://www.rawbw.com/~rem/WAP/WhyInactive.html


OK, I've changed that now. See if it looks better.


http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=self-abasing&db=*
Lowering or humbling one's self.

Saying that I stopped work on that project because I lacked the
resources necessary to continue, is factual, not what you say.

Saying that AT&T services is cruddy is my person opinion based on
suffering beeping from incoming text-message spam about once every two
or three minutes and spending several hours per day for several days on
customer support trying to get them to shut down the incessant beeping,
all to no avail. I hope somebody sues AT&T for all the spam they've
sent out, at $1000 per spam, hundreds of billions of dollars per day
they owe, and puts AT&T out of business, because I hate that fucking
company for multiple reasons.

Do you honstly consider my hatred of AT&T to be "humble"? Howso?


I turned my first mention of WAP into a link to suitable WAP-p.r.


I don't have any net access such that it'd be possible to correctly
emulate a small cellphone screen. Piping small-screen Web pages through
a VT100 (fixed-pitch single-font test) would not give a proper idea
what a WebPage would look like rendered properly on a cellphone screen,
and IMO would not be worth even trying.


Without any cellphone whatsoever, nor any other way to render WAP
output to look as it would on a cellphone, indeed I can't do any
meaningful experiments in that medium.


Because I don't have access to any system on which it would be possible
to render Web output in any way similar to how it'd appear on a cellphone.
"person opinion" should read "personal opinion"

I could give you some suggestions, but you'd probably
just figure out reasons you "can't" do them. So I won't
waste my time. Go find something you can do.

-- Bob Day
http://bobday.vze.com
 
P

Pascal Bourguignon

I don't have any net access such that it'd be possible to correctly
emulate a small cellphone screen. Piping small-screen Web pages through
a VT100 (fixed-pitch single-font test) would not give a proper idea
what a WebPage would look like rendered properly on a cellphone screen,
and IMO would not be worth even trying.

Once again, this doesn't bode well for your employability, if you
don't understand what was suggested here.

The suggested setup is to put your web pages on your computer, to run
a web server on your computer and to run a web browser on the emulator
running on your computer, so you can spend all the time you need to
test the communication chain without having to pay for actual
communications. Once you're satisfied with your modified web pages,
you connect to your Internet web server and transfer your new web page
to it.

Because I don't have access to any system on which it would be possible
to render Web output in any way similar to how it'd appear on a cellphone.

You're being silly! To write your own WAP emulator you only need
programmig knowledge (what you claim to have with your computer
science credentials), and information about the WAP protocols. You
don't need access to an existing WAP system.

Alternatively, http://www.google.com/search?q=wap+emulator returns 436,000 hits,
and http://www.google.com/search?q=free+wap+emulator returns 278,000 hits.
 
D

die reine Wahrheit

The weak are the most treacherous of us all. They come to the strong and
drain them. They are bottomless. They are insatiable. They are always
parched and always bitter. They are everyone's concern and like vampires
they suck out life's blood. (Bette Davis)
 

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