I suppose that what qualifies as a good Haskell candidate depends on what you
are looking for in a software engineer in general. For my part, having hired
engineers into various groups over the last 20+ years, I've always preferred to
hire people who demonstrate a broad understanding of computing rather than a
deep knowledge of the particular domain at hand. So, for example, when hiring
into a C++ shop, I expect a medium level applicant to know templates, STL,
iostreams, boost, etc..., but I don't expect them to be able to rattle them off
off the top of their head. What I want is for them to be able to know what
tools are available, when they should consider using them, and where to go get
the details if they need them. An expert C++ programmer, who can rattle off
complicated template structures is not that useful to me if they don't have a
broader sense of what libraries are out there, or where to look, or even when
to use Python (or Haskell) instead!
On Jul 3, 2010, at 11:29 AM, Yves Parès wrote:
> Back to initial topic, I have a sudden fear: do you have to master Template
> Haskell so as to be regarded as a guru :-{ ?
> Let it be no, please, let it be no...
Well, perhaps one doesn't really want that kind of guru! I've used Template
Haskell, I've written a Quasi-Quoter, but I've by no means mastered it. I've
got 77 packages installed in --user above and beyond Haskell Platform and while
I've not mastered all of them, what I know is what is there, and where to look
when needed. I've by no means mastered the various GHC extensions, but I've
written code with dependent types and know where to find the papers if I need a
deeper understanding. So, I think of myself as a general programming guru - one
who knows a pretty broad swath of computer science, and w.r.t. to many
programing languages one who knows enough about the language and libraries to
be able to find what I need to write excellent code. I suppose for Haskell I'd
call myself guru-in-training. Those are the kinds of gurus (or
gurus-in-training) that I've always looked to hire.
- Mark
Mark Lentczner
http://www.ozonehouse.com/mark/
IRC: mtnviewmark
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