Re: Entry Level Python Jobs
On Wed, Sep 02, 2009 at 08:31:20AM -0700, JonathanB wrote: I am a self-taught Python programmer with a liberal arts degree (Cross- cultural studies). I have been programming for several years now and would like to get a job as a python programmer. Unfortunately most of the job posts I have seen are for CS Majors or people with experience. Is there a place I can look for job posts for entry level positions requiring no experience? For the hiring managers, if the job post said CS Major in the requirements, would you consider a liberal arts major at all? I have a liberal arts degree and have been working in the field for years now, not as a programmer but as a high-level technical support engineer (doing core dump analysis and the like). While I opted for not working as a programmer, other co-workers without a CompSci degree have managed to do so without major problems. It seems to me that most managers are willing to hire someone based on his/her experience and proven knowledge, and not so much on the actual degree you have. Obviously, this means you will need to get some experience before moving into actual programming. So, what would I recommend? First of all, make sure you get your foot in the door. Apply for an entry-level position at a company that works in the technology field, even if it's doing technical support or writing documentation. Once you are in, work hard, show an interest in learning programming skills, talk to the developers in the company, survey people around and try to figure out where there is a need that can be met with a not-yet-written application and put it together yourself, then show it to your manager and try to convince him/her to deploy it as an official tool for your team. I've seen this work many times. Second, search around for open source projects that may look interesting to you, download the source code, study it, subscribe to their development mailing list, check out standing bugs and see if you can fix them. This is something you can definitely add to your resume. -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Entry Level Python Jobs
On Sep 2, 5:31 pm, JonathanB doulo...@gmail.com wrote: I am a self-taught Python programmer with a liberal arts degree (Cross- cultural studies). I have been programming for several years now and would like to get a job as a python programmer. Unfortunately most of the job posts I have seen are for CS Majors or people with experience. Is there a place I can look for job posts for entry level positions requiring no experience? For the hiring managers, if the job post said CS Major in the requirements, would you consider a liberal arts major at all? Requiring a CS Major does not make sense. Sensible employers asks for programmers that know how to program, not for a piece of paper. For instance, at work here nobody has a CS degree, but still I would say that we have very competent programmers. You need a way to prove that you are a competent programmer. Partecipating to Open Source projects, writing articles about programming or having a technical blog are ways to show your expertise. Here when we hire people we look at their posts in public newsgroups. I find the quality of the posts a very good indicator of the quality of the perspective employees. -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Entry Level Python Jobs
On Sep 3, 9:19 am, steve st...@lonetwin.net wrote: On 09/03/2009 09:36 AM, steve wrote: Hi Jonathan, [...snip...] I feel stupid replying to my own post but just one more thing i thought about mentioning but forgot to add: - Look at your Liberal Arts major as an advantage. Every field has a 'computing gap' that needs to be filled but cannot be done because they aren't any too many good people who have the relevant cross-domain knowledge. For instance, one of the reasons I think this month's sourceforge.net project of the month is really great is because the lead dev. has a CS degree and is listed as being a medicine student:http://sourceforge.net/community/potm-200909/ So, look for these gaps in your domain which can be filled using your technical knowledge. again, .. Wish you the best, regards, - steve -- random non tech spiel:http://lonetwin.blogspot.com/ tech randomness:http://lonehacks.blogspot.com/ what i'm stumbling into:http://lonetwin.stumbleupon.com/ Also, I think topcoder.com is a good place for him. I have not used them much, but their business plan -- of asking medium to difficult questions every week, and contacting people who solves them with jobs -- is quite sound. Try that too. -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Entry Level Python Jobs
On Thu, 03 Sep 2009 06:36:24 -0700, koranthala wrote: snip Also, I think topcoder.com is a good place for him. I have not used them much, but their business plan -- of asking medium to difficult questions every week, and contacting people who solves them with jobs -- is quite sound. Try that too. I got my first consulting job in a similar fashion. Local newspaper ad said the first consultant who could answer their questions got the job. I was the only one that responded correctly and despite my Biochem degree was off doing my first commercial application (purchase order system for a local Credit Union). -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Entry Level Python Jobs
I am a self-taught Python programmer with a liberal arts degree (Cross- cultural studies). I have been programming for several years now and would like to get a job as a python programmer. Unfortunately most of the job posts I have seen are for CS Majors or people with experience. Is there a place I can look for job posts for entry level positions requiring no experience? For the hiring managers, if the job post said CS Major in the requirements, would you consider a liberal arts major at all? -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Entry Level Python Jobs
On Sep 2, 10:31 am, JonathanB doulo...@gmail.com wrote: I am a self-taught Python programmer with a liberal arts degree (Cross- cultural studies). I have been programming for several years now and would like to get a job as a python programmer. Unfortunately most of the job posts I have seen are for CS Majors or people with experience. Is there a place I can look for job posts for entry level positions requiring no experience? For the hiring managers, if the job post said CS Major in the requirements, would you consider a liberal arts major at all? Have you thought about getting involved with the Python core development. Not a paying position, but may lead you to some good connections, and i can't think of a better place to prove yourself than that ;-) -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Entry Level Python Jobs
On Sep 2, 2009, at 11:48 AM, r wrote: On Sep 2, 10:31 am, JonathanB doulo...@gmail.com wrote: I am a self-taught Python programmer with a liberal arts degree (Cross- cultural studies). I have been programming for several years now and would like to get a job as a python programmer. Unfortunately most of the job posts I have seen are for CS Majors or people with experience. Is there a place I can look for job posts for entry level positions requiring no experience? For the hiring managers, if the job post said CS Major in the requirements, would you consider a liberal arts major at all? Have you thought about getting involved with the Python core development. Not a paying position, but may lead you to some good connections, and i can't think of a better place to prove yourself than that ;-) Or instead of diving into the Python core which might be pretty heavy stuff, create some open source code -- a game, a calculator, a music generator, an app to automatically download weather maps, etc. Whatever tickles your fancy. If you're willing to stand on your merits (and it sounds like you are), you can point people to where your code is hosted and say, I wrote that. Anyway, it's something to do in between hitting refresh on http://www.python.org/community/jobs/ Good luck to you Philip -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Entry Level Python Jobs
JonathanB doulo...@gmail.com writes: I am a self-taught Python programmer with a liberal arts degree (Cross- cultural studies) Is there a place I can look for job posts for entry level positions requiring no experience? For the hiring managers, if the job post said CS Major in the requirements, would you consider a liberal arts major at all? I think in the current economy there are not many entry level positions requiring no experience, except for internships and that sort of thing. Also there are some jobs which really do call for a CS major or someone of equivalent background. Often though, pure technical background doesn't matter as much as inventiveness and the ability to make things happen, which is more a matter of personality than training. I don't know what cross-cultural studies is, but I could imagine assignments (e.g. internationalizing the user interface of a program or web site) where someone with that background could work out fine. Basically I think for pure software development openings, you may be difficult to place, but there's lots of other types of openings where the primary task is something other than programming and yet incidental amounts of programming are involved. For those, you'd have a much better shot. One thing that can certainly help is to have a portfolio of code you've written for personal or academic projects or whatever. Where I work we're in the process of interviewing a guy who is some kind of artist, who has used Python in some pretty cool art projects. He has a bunch of code on his web site that were very helpful in getting an impression of his capabilities. -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Entry Level Python Jobs
Philip Semanchuk wrote: On Sep 2, 2009, at 11:48 AM, r wrote: On Sep 2, 10:31 am, JonathanB doulo...@gmail.com wrote: I am a self-taught Python programmer with a liberal arts degree (Cross- cultural studies). I have been programming for several years now and would like to get a job as a python programmer. Unfortunately most of the job posts I have seen are for CS Majors or people with experience. Is there a place I can look for job posts for entry level positions requiring no experience? For the hiring managers, if the job post said CS Major in the requirements, would you consider a liberal arts major at all? Have you thought about getting involved with the Python core development. Not a paying position, but may lead you to some good connections, and i can't think of a better place to prove yourself than that ;-) Or instead of diving into the Python core which might be pretty heavy stuff, create some open source code -- a game, a calculator, a music generator, an app to automatically download weather maps, etc. Whatever tickles your fancy. If you're willing to stand on your merits (and it sounds like you are), you can point people to where your code is hosted and say, I wrote that. Anyway, it's something to do in between hitting refresh on http://www.python.org/community/jobs/ Good luck to you Philip Philip is right -- I would consider a non-CS major, but then you'd get round-filed for the no experience. Write something, or better yet, a few smallish somethings and a medium something, and then you can claim experience. ~Ethan~ -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Entry Level Python Jobs
Ok, so what I'm hearing is Get a code portfolio together and watch the job board on python.org. Thanks for the advice! I've been watching the python job board 3-4 times a week and I've been working my way through the Project Euler problems in my free time. I also have a trade generator that I wrote up to support a Traveller game I was running a while back, but that code is old (the first non- trivial program I ever wrote) and really fairly buggy. The user interface is basically an infinite recursion that I sys.exit() out of when I'm through, which means the code slows considerably as you do more stuff in it because each trip back to the main menu is a recursive call to the main() function. Hey, I was young and naive. I'm working on cleaning it up right now. Any other tips? -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Entry Level Python Jobs
In article c477b7ce-bea7-4855-ab71-94d016239...@t13g2000yqn.googlegroups.com, JonathanB doulo...@gmail.com wrote: I am a self-taught Python programmer with a liberal arts degree (Cross- cultural studies). I have been programming for several years now and would like to get a job as a python programmer. Unfortunately most of the job posts I have seen are for CS Majors or people with experience. Is there a place I can look for job posts for entry level positions requiring no experience? For the hiring managers, if the job post said CS Major in the requirements, would you consider a liberal arts major at all? You should also look into finding e.g. a tech support job at a company using Python. -- Aahz (a...@pythoncraft.com) * http://www.pythoncraft.com/ Look, it's your affair if you want to play with five people, but don't go calling it doubles. --John Cleese anticipates Usenet -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Entry Level Python Jobs
On Sep 2, 11:31 am, JonathanB doulo...@gmail.com wrote: For the hiring managers, if the job post said CS Major in the requirements, would you consider a liberal arts major at all? I got my English Writing degree in 1990, and I have been a software engineer ever since. Landing the first job was very difficult, but it gave me the foundation of experience that allowed me to circumvent the CS-degree or equivalent requirement on every job that I have had since. If you do choose to pursue software development as a career, you'll be shocked at how many of your fellow liberal arts degree holders are doing the same. It will be a hard road. You will have to overcome significant obstacles. You will do boring, tedious work. You will find out what it really means to pay one's dues. You will also, perchance, succeed and find happiness in a fulfilling career. I think that Python is an outstanding foundation for learning programming, but I would advise you to branch out as quickly as possible. I imagine that saying so won't endear me to anyone here, but in good conscience, I have to recommend C# and the .NET framework; it has lead me to continual and well-paying employment for many, many years now. Also, put together an on-line portfolio of code, preferably composed of complete and useful programs. Actually seeing well- written, well-documented code can go a long way towards getting you in the door for an interview. -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Entry Level Python Jobs
On Wed, 2009-09-02 at 08:31 -0700, JonathanB wrote: I am a self-taught Python programmer with a liberal arts degree (Cross-cultural studies). I have been programming for several years now and would like to get a job as a python programmer. Unfortunately most of the job posts I have seen are for CS Majors or people with experience. Is there a place I can look for job posts for entry level positions requiring no experience? For the hiring managers, if the job post said CS Major in the requirements, would you consider a liberal arts major at all? Definately not without any experience - but experience doesn't have to come from paid work - coding as a hobby in your free time is what's made all the best developers I know. Some things I personally would expect (and find more important than a CS background) - in order of importance: * Experience (e.g. open source / hobby projects / work) - several years worth. * Problem solving ability * A good comprehension of C, machine code, or something where you have to care about pointers/references. * Basic maths skills. Tim -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Entry Level Python Jobs
JonathanB doulo...@gmail.com writes: Any other tips? Learn some more languages besides Python. Python is good to know but other languages present other ways of doing things. A skillful programmer has a variety of techniques to draw from. -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Entry Level Python Jobs
On Sep 2, 12:52 pm, JonathanB doulo...@gmail.com wrote: Any other tips? I'm probably going to come off as very old school, but give yourself a good and thorough education in data structures and algorithms. You might never be called on to actually code a quick sort, merge sort, heap sort, doubly-linked list or trie, but knowing what they are and why they are important will fundamentally shape how you approach all software problem solving. There are a lot of good data structures and algorithms books that use C, so that'd be a good approach to also adding a very important language to your toolbelt. -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Entry Level Python Jobs
Hi Jonathan, On 09/02/2009 10:22 PM, JonathanB wrote: Ok, so what I'm hearing is Get a code portfolio together and watch the job board on python.org. Thanks for the advice! I've been watching the python job board 3-4 times a week and I've been working my way through the Project Euler problems in my free time. I also have a trade generator that I wrote up to support a Traveller game I was running a while back, but that code is old (the first non- trivial program I ever wrote) and really fairly buggy. The user interface is basically an infinite recursion that I sys.exit() out of when I'm through, which means the code slows considerably as you do more stuff in it because each trip back to the main menu is a recursive call to the main() function. Hey, I was young and naive. I'm working on cleaning it up right now. Any other tips? - Keep an eye out for jobs which are not directly programming related -- things like system administration (which might involve scripting), that's the way I started. - Bid for some projects at places like odesk.com, rentacoder.com, getafreelancer.com etc. A lot of people here might be averse to the idea (and they'd have good reasons for it too), but doing this will pay off in the long run. You might get a feel of why people might be averse to the idea by reading these: http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/001190.html http://www.examiner.com/x-1652-Gadgets-Examiner~y2008m11d14-oDesk-Guru-Elance-and-RentACoder--Are-they-worth-it Basically, these kind of jobs might end up being more trouble than their worth. However, I personally found that it is possible to build long term business relationships, which you can then take external to these sites, quite quickly if you are any good. Here is a comparison chart in case you decide to go for it http://thethriftygeek.com/2008/11/comparing-the-online-consulting-sites/ Wish you the best, regards, - steve -- random non tech spiel: http://lonetwin.blogspot.com/ tech randomness: http://lonehacks.blogspot.com/ what i'm stumbling into: http://lonetwin.stumbleupon.com/ -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Entry Level Python Jobs
On 09/03/2009 09:36 AM, steve wrote: Hi Jonathan, [...snip...] I feel stupid replying to my own post but just one more thing i thought about mentioning but forgot to add: - Look at your Liberal Arts major as an advantage. Every field has a 'computing gap' that needs to be filled but cannot be done because they aren't any too many good people who have the relevant cross-domain knowledge. For instance, one of the reasons I think this month's sourceforge.net project of the month is really great is because the lead dev. has a CS degree and is listed as being a medicine student: http://sourceforge.net/community/potm-200909/ So, look for these gaps in your domain which can be filled using your technical knowledge. again, .. Wish you the best, regards, - steve -- random non tech spiel: http://lonetwin.blogspot.com/ tech randomness: http://lonehacks.blogspot.com/ what i'm stumbling into: http://lonetwin.stumbleupon.com/ -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list