At 12:00 PM 4/27/01 -0400, JR Mayberry wrote:
>there will be more dreams jobs like you described.. simple fact is, I
>couldn't name more then 3 companies in my area who use it, and I never
>expect to do work with it again.
... on the other hand, even as recently as one year ago, it was almost
impossible for our company (in southern california) to find mod_perl
programmers. Our last few job searches, tho, we've been able to find a
*very* good supply of applicants with mod_perl experience... it's no longer
been an issue. (Most mod_perl applicants seem to have come by their
experience from working on college campuses, BTW... which is another
interesting -- and valuable -- change. Not the fact that schools use it,
but the _volume_ of applicants who are now learning it there.)
So I don't know how exactly it's happened, but mod_perl "knowledge" seems
to have skyrocketed recently, and at least to my mind it's given mod_perl a
viability that it didn't have recently. A year ago, we were even talking
seriously about moving our development to Java, simply because we could
find a lot more Java programmers than Perl programmers, but that tide is
definitely turned... we're no longer even considering switching, we have no
trouble finding people, and I'm finding investors and corporate officers a
*lot* more willing to consider the development and use of open-source tools
in general as being a very valid and credible business decision. The use
of Apache and mod_perl has made me look very, very smart lately. ;-)
I think the key is going to be Perl 6. If it improves the areas they think
it will, and if Apache / mod_perl 2.x are themselves the improvements we
expect them to be, we may all be pleasantly surprised by a major growth in
usage. The market downturn has given people who use open source tools --
Perl, Apache, mySQL, postgreSQL, Linux, etc... a major credibility boost,
at least in my own circles -- I think we *might* be in for a pleasant
surprise in 1-2 years. :-/
MikeL
