Slightly OT... This talk about degree-holders and non-degree holders makes me think of a person I worked with at a university resently.
I was in a small, tight group in the administrative arm of the university system. We were responsible for any system-wide sites and for any campus-based sites that couldn't be hosted by the individual campus (or didn't want to). We had just made the decision to go to CF from Perl (back in 2001) and after a very brief training started coding new pages at a furious pace. One of the trainees had dropped out of the training because she couldn't keep up. It turns out that she had several degrees in programming theory and other mathematical and theoretical studies. Had even written a book. Very impressive on paper, but she couldn't program her way out of a paper bag. A few days after we had finished the core of our first CF site she stepped into the fracas and suggested that we should be learning java instead. I stopped and looked at her and came very close to asking her if she'd fair any better at learing that language. I mean, if she couldn't hack CF... Java?!? I passed on the barb, and we continued working with CF. Advance the film a couple of years and now we've advanced beyond the basics and are now building a single, server-based, multi-site-hosting CMS to end all CMSes. But one day we're stuck on a particular problem. We three programmers are sitting around in our swivel chairs tossing paper balls at each other trying to figure it out. In walks the PhD non-programmer and makes a suggestion. We all put our hands up and skoff. She walks up to the wipe board and explains the situation and we argue for 20 minutes. When it's all over the three of us are staring at each other at how well the suggestion will solve the problem, and probably a few others as well. She wipes her hands and walks out of the room, smiling. I have to say, up until that point I was wondering (a) how she had ever gotten any degrees and (b) what the hell she was doing in our group. She couldn't program her way out of a paper bag, but she did that theoretical trick on us two more times before I left the university. Experience is everything, but it gets stale without an occasional theory. Funny thing, too. She was the "Accessability Specialist" in our group. A real stickler for fine detail. Mik -------- Michael Muller Admin, MontagueMA.net Website Montague, MA 01351 work (413) 863-0030 cell (413) 320-5336 fax (518) 713-1569 skype: michaelBmuller email [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.MontagueMA.net Eschew Obfuscation ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Message: http://www.houseoffusion.com/lists.cfm/link=i:11:2949 Archives: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/threads.cfm/11 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/lists.cfm/link=s:11 Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.11 Donations & Support: http://www.houseoffusion.com/tiny.cfm/54
