Advice on becoming a programmer

[MutantLlama]

I am 32 and have only a little programming knowledge. My company has an opening for a starter COBOL programmer and I am tempted to go for it.

Can anyone offer any advice? Should I bother trying to get on the ladder at all and if so is this the best way?

 

[MarcLodge]

Impossible to give you a decent answer as you do not say what your current position and prospects are. I will therefore give you a highly biased and indecent one!

Cobol has been around for many many years, in many many guises and flavours, and will continue to do so for many more decades. Cobol seems to me to be a constant that the IT industry relies upon. If an IT innovation comes along (Relational database, client server, Web technology etc.) it's not long before work has begun on getting Cobol on board, thus ensuring that Cobol lives on. The many different platforms, operating systems, and software, that Cobol is available/interfaced on, and being developed with is awesome.

Because of it's longevity, there are quite literally millions (billions?) of lines of Cobol being run throughout the world every day/month/year, and this is a testament to the strength of the language.

That said, because of the volume of Cobol software, and it's relative ease of use, there are an awful lot of Cobol developers out there, and because of the diversity of software/platforms etc. I feel that the Cobol market is not as boyuant as it was 10 years ago, but then again, is any?

My advice: If you are working for a company that is offering the opportunity of a Cobol starter role, and this is a sideways, or not too much of a drop down, move, then I would be inclined to go for it. I would also look out for other courses once you have got Cobol under your belt, as it is a good weapon to have in your technical armoury, but should not be the only weapon (if of course you wish your career to go in that direction).

Hope this diatribe is of some use, and I look forward to the views of other members of this forum.

Marc

 

[Crox]

Did you do a test? If you have a high score, you will like programming. If you don't, you won't. It is difficult to say what the future is for COBOL but it will be important until 2030!

 

[3gm]

In recent years, many opportunities for COBOL work in the US have moved offshore. That trend will probably continue and will continue to depress the US market for COBOL developers. Of course, relatively few young people are learning COBOL these days and many of us dinosaurs will be retiring over the next 15-20 years, so the COBOL marketplace may improve despite the outflow of work.

Glenn

 

[ceh4702]

I say get the names of a couple of programmers in that department who are COBOL Programmers and see what they have to say.

Questions you might ask:

1. Working hours:

2. Stress Level:

3. Management relationships. What does management really think about COBOL?

4. Will they train you to do CICS?

5. Mainframe or PC Environment?



Often people will be offerred a job as a COBOL programmer only to do batch programming and run jobs, while they pay the older programmers the big money. Find out about career expectations and what kind of pay you can expect 5-10 years down the road.



If you do not like my post feel free to point out your opinion or my errors.

 

[MutantLlama]

Cheers guys, I have asked at work to be considered for the entry level post and await to see what happens...

Its good to know that, contrary to what I thought, COBOL is still being widely used and will continue to do so for a little longer..

Marclodge, I currently support motor trade software that would stand for nothing if ever anything happened in my curretn career...so I think that programming would be a step in the right direction..

Crox, I passed an aptitude/logic test and asked for the results, to be told I have an above average aptitude for programming..I do not know if this stands for much but I have always liked the idea of becoming a programmer...

ceh4702, I have spoken to a couple and they agree that current cobol programmers are getting older and no one seems to be taking there place...I would like to get into something where the skill would be in demand, hopefully...

Cheers for the help so far, I am still a little nervous about going from support to programming but will see how it goes!!

 

[Crox]

You will be succesful!

 

[slade]

Hi ML,

If you enjoy solving "technical" problems, programming is a good career choice.

One thing you should consider, though, is the current crisis in the field. Many of the jobs are being
"outsourced" to take advantage of "cheap" foreign labor. You may have read the horror stories of companies outsourcing thousands of jobs at a clip.

Another problem is the arrival of H1B workers from overseas, who can afford to take programming jobs at a fraction of the rate US pgmrs are willing to take. Their plan is to stay a few years and return home with enough in the bank to retire.

I see jobs currently advertized at $20-35/hr that a year ago were offered at $45-60/hr.

I'm not sure where or how it will all end. But some predict the end of the industry in the US. It's something to consider, especially for someone like yourself, with a 35 year career in your future.

Good luck, Jack.

 

[Crox]

Hi,

the difference in culture makes it alsmost impossible for people from 3rd world countries to do the job right. I have seen that many times and every time millions of Euro's are thrown away. I can't help that managers don't want to see after all those failures that it would be better to have people that understand them. Even working with people with the same background it happens that things are wrong interpreted. People in India and people in the west do have such a different background that the same words are differently interpreted. I have seen that a lot and I am sure that those problems will not be solved. Of course there will be a lot of money spoiled in the near future because managers make all the same mistakes over and over again. We read that every day in the paper. But you will see that - except perhaps pure technical work - business rules are best interpreted by people that have experience with this business and are truly speaking the same language which is probably even more important in Holland. I never met somebody from India (or America, Canada, ...) whom can speak Dutch in a reasonable way Also an example: people whom grown up in the mountains and others whom know about mountains because they watched television will not understand each other when talking about mountains. I am sure about that!

A nice link about the usage of COBOL:

http://www.search390.com/ateQuestionNResponse/0,289625,sid10_cid542331_tax285603,00.html

Regards,

Crox

 

[MarcLodge]

Hi All,
I'll back up Jack's cautionary words by saying that over here in the UK exactly the same thing is happening. Many projects are now handed over to consultancies who 'offshore outsource' the programming side of things, generally to India, where there exists a well trained and cheap workforce. We also have 'Multi Nationals' who are going abroad to where the labour is cheap and establishing a branch of their UK business. They can then employ the cheap labour force and re-locate them in the UK, bypassing the usual visa requirements, as they are already employees of a British company. Even the correct method of issuing visas is somehow being abused as according to the government agency, there is no IT skill shortage in the UK, yet 4,800 IT visas were issued in the 1st quarter of this year alone. And this is while approximately 48,000 IT professionals are out of work.

Hmmm.....

That said (rant over now!!), ML, I believe that a programming career would be a natural progression. It seems that you enjoy problem solving as you already support motor trade software. Programming is similar in that you are presented with a business requirement to which you have to work out and program an answer. There will be many times during the developement of a program when you will have to put your problem solving skills to the test. This is the pleasure and fun of it all!!! Cobol is a good place to start, although you will need to broaden your horizons as time moves on.

Good luck, although I agree with Crox, 'you'll be successful'.

 

[MutantLlama]

Appreciated guys, I have put in my internal request and await details!