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Well, I spent years doing C, then Java, and now I'm a CTO at a tech company that's a React/Typescript/Ruby shop. However, I needed to sit down and spend the tim

Well, I spent years doing C, then Java, and now I'm a CTO at a tech company that's a React/Typescript/Ruby shop. However, I needed to sit down and spend the time to actually learn those technologies. What you don't want is to interview for a React job with only a cursory/tutorial knowledge of it, and try to fall back to "well I'm an expert at 10 other languages, it's all easy". A lot of companies are looking for that expertise now, not to spend 6 months training you on the job, especially at a big salary and title.

vonmoltke 6y ago
> What you don't want is to interview for a React job with only a cursory/tutorial knowledge of it The problem I encountered as I hit the 10-year mark is that it is hard to get the interview when you have extensive professional experience and none of it is in $TECH the company is looking for.
- ghaff 6y ago
  I'm not sure that's unreasonable in general and it goes beyond just $TECH. I have experience and skills in a lot of different areas and, sure, I could pick up new skills in related areas of business and tech fairly quickly. However, if a company is looking for a senior person to "hit the ground running" in an area where I have at best peripheral experience, I wouldn't seriously expect to get hired--especially as an IC. The details matter of course. If $TECH is something relatively new without a lot of experienced practitioners, it may be reasonable to hire someone with a lot of experience in somewhat related techs. But no matter how skilled the person is, you're probably not going to hire someone for front-end or mobile development who has only ever worked on back-end infrastructure.
  - drchopchop 6y ago
    Right, it's not so much a reflection of age-ism as it is just not having the skills in the job description. It doesn't matter if you're 25 or 45 - if they need X years of language Y, it's for a reason and 20 years of generic dev experience is not usually an acceptable substitute.
    - vonmoltke 6y ago
      I don't understand the point you were making in the original post then. > What you don't want is to interview for a React job with only a cursory/tutorial knowledge of it, and try to fall back to "well I'm an expert at 10 other languages, it's all easy" Of course I would expect someone who claimed professional experience with React to have more than "a cursory/tutorial knowledge of it". In the post that started this chain, though, you said > Decades of experience in C/Java is not going to work at a React shop. Either learn (and be opinionated about!) frameworks built in the last 5 years, or stick to somewhere within your expertise I take that (in combination with the above) to mean that you somehow need to get a job where you can use React in order to get a job where you use React. I'm not sure what the point of that advice is, then. Perhaps I'm misunderstanding something here.
hi41 6y ago
I lost my previous hob where I used to work in C/C++. I tried to get a job in Java because i wanted to work in newer technologies. I found a low paying job and I took it since I couldn’t find another . However, I found the switch very difficult and did not last at that job long enough. Why is it that expertise in one language like C does not translate well to other technology areas?
- jki275 6y ago
  C is not C++ is not Java. Different mindsets. I haven’t found any of them difficult to learn though, I code in all three along with Python, almost daily. I think it’s mostly just doing - I get the books out all the time.

vonmoltke 6y ago

> What you don't want is to interview for a React job with only a cursory/tutorial knowledge of it The problem I encountered as I hit the 10-year mark is that it is hard to get the interview when you have extensive professional experience and none of it is in $TECH the company is looking for.

ghaff 6y ago
I'm not sure that's unreasonable in general and it goes beyond just $TECH. I have experience and skills in a lot of different areas and, sure, I could pick up new skills in related areas of business and tech fairly quickly. However, if a company is looking for a senior person to "hit the ground running" in an area where I have at best peripheral experience, I wouldn't seriously expect to get hired--especially as an IC. The details matter of course. If $TECH is something relatively new without a lot of experienced practitioners, it may be reasonable to hire someone with a lot of experience in somewhat related techs. But no matter how skilled the person is, you're probably not going to hire someone for front-end or mobile development who has only ever worked on back-end infrastructure.
- drchopchop 6y ago
  Right, it's not so much a reflection of age-ism as it is just not having the skills in the job description. It doesn't matter if you're 25 or 45 - if they need X years of language Y, it's for a reason and 20 years of generic dev experience is not usually an acceptable substitute.
  - vonmoltke 6y ago
    I don't understand the point you were making in the original post then. > What you don't want is to interview for a React job with only a cursory/tutorial knowledge of it, and try to fall back to "well I'm an expert at 10 other languages, it's all easy" Of course I would expect someone who claimed professional experience with React to have more than "a cursory/tutorial knowledge of it". In the post that started this chain, though, you said > Decades of experience in C/Java is not going to work at a React shop. Either learn (and be opinionated about!) frameworks built in the last 5 years, or stick to somewhere within your expertise I take that (in combination with the above) to mean that you somehow need to get a job where you can use React in order to get a job where you use React. I'm not sure what the point of that advice is, then. Perhaps I'm misunderstanding something here.

hi41 6y ago

I lost my previous hob where I used to work in C/C++. I tried to get a job in Java because i wanted to work in newer technologies. I found a low paying job and I took it since I couldn’t find another . However, I found the switch very difficult and did not last at that job long enough. Why is it that expertise in one language like C does not translate well to other technology areas?

jki275 6y ago
C is not C++ is not Java. Different mindsets. I haven’t found any of them difficult to learn though, I code in all three along with Python, almost daily. I think it’s mostly just doing - I get the books out all the time.