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Did you try to get all the Apple details out of your posting and replace them with Android ones? What difference does it make whether they built an iOS app if

Did you try to get all the Apple details out of your posting and replace them with Android ones? What difference does it make whether they built an iOS app if they are a mobile app developer? Also, why not look for a web app developer specializing in front end. Same skills, just a few minor technical details are different. I think a lot of employers do not understand what the word "skill" actually means. Generally skills increase with years of experience and if you take someone at the right level and throw a new platform at them, they will spend a week on reading and tutorials and then dive into a prototype of the app they need to build. After all, Google hires Apple and Microsoft engineers, then expects them to build stuff on the Google internal platform. And they DO!

TheOtherHobbes 11y ago
There are big, big differences between the native iOS programming model, the native Android programming model, and the web programming model. They're not just "a few minor technical details." The toolchains are different, the UI design details are different, the event model is different, the model/backend details are different, and there are significant conceptual differences. I would be astonished if someone could move from web dev to iOS dev in a week with no previous experience. A good coder can probably bolt together a twinky do-nothing hello world app that quickly from a cold start, but they'll be a long way short of what's needed for a solid commercial-grade app with useful features.
- deciplex 11y ago
  Perhaps the reason everyone thinks there is a shortage of developers, is that 'to iOS dev in a week' is somehow an acceptable metric to determine if someone is a good hire or not. I can not fathom the mindset that goes into the line of thought "yeah he's clearly a great developer - sadly he is currently working from framework X and we would need him to work from framework Y". I can only hope that such an attitude leaves a company more likely to go out of business (and I suspect it does). A strong engineer with a proven track record building enterprise-level applications is not going to become a shit-hot iOS developer in a week. However he will be just as likely to bring in 10x his salary in value to your company in his first year, as nearly anyone else you hire. But most hiring managers will probably not bother to promote such an applicant to even a phone screen, since it would take too much time out of everyone's daily 'where are all the iOS devs' bitch session on HN or proggit or whatever.
coldcode 11y ago
As an iOS developer who works with Android developers, we couldn't be further apart than if it was Lisp and Fortran. Sure I could learn Android but if I tried to be an expert in both, I would be an expert in neither.
nostrademons 11y ago
It takes about 6-9 months for a Noogler to become productive on the Google internal platform.

TheOtherHobbes 11y ago

There are big, big differences between the native iOS programming model, the native Android programming model, and the web programming model. They're not just "a few minor technical details." The toolchains are different, the UI design details are different, the event model is different, the model/backend details are different, and there are significant conceptual differences. I would be astonished if someone could move from web dev to iOS dev in a week with no previous experience. A good coder can probably bolt together a twinky do-nothing hello world app that quickly from a cold start, but they'll be a long way short of what's needed for a solid commercial-grade app with useful features.

deciplex 11y ago
Perhaps the reason everyone thinks there is a shortage of developers, is that 'to iOS dev in a week' is somehow an acceptable metric to determine if someone is a good hire or not. I can not fathom the mindset that goes into the line of thought "yeah he's clearly a great developer - sadly he is currently working from framework X and we would need him to work from framework Y". I can only hope that such an attitude leaves a company more likely to go out of business (and I suspect it does). A strong engineer with a proven track record building enterprise-level applications is not going to become a shit-hot iOS developer in a week. However he will be just as likely to bring in 10x his salary in value to your company in his first year, as nearly anyone else you hire. But most hiring managers will probably not bother to promote such an applicant to even a phone screen, since it would take too much time out of everyone's daily 'where are all the iOS devs' bitch session on HN or proggit or whatever.

coldcode 11y ago

As an iOS developer who works with Android developers, we couldn't be further apart than if it was Lisp and Fortran. Sure I could learn Android but if I tried to be an expert in both, I would be an expert in neither.

nostrademons 11y ago

It takes about 6-9 months for a Noogler to become productive on the Google internal platform.