«

It seems like Sat, 02 Oct 2004 16:54:37 +1200 was when "Dave -
Dave.net.nz" <Dave@_no_spam_here_please_dave.net.nz> said Blah blah
blah...

>When he left we were chatting about it and he said that I could have
>easily passed all of the exams in BIT, except for a few of the odd
>things that they make you learn with no relevance to anything.

Speaking of that, I'm about 6 months away from making my own engine
management computer for a car using either a MC68000 or a 80C552 micro
controller. The relevance this has to do with passing my MCSE, I can't
quite see yet, but I'm still a student. I'm sure someone has an
answer. Right? Guys? Anyone?

But really, there does seem to be a bit of "you need to know this,
just trust us on this one" going on in degrees. Whether it's all
valid, I'll tell you in 20 years
--
Regards,
Waylon Kenning.

1st Year B.I.T. WelTec

Waylon Kenning wrote:
> Oh, if anyone's in Wellington, and wants a 1st year BIT student for
> work experience, I'm quite willing to help. Whatever it is, I'll do it
> for free, as long as I don't have to say "Would you like fries with
> that".

so you dont do software development then?

Waylon Kenning wrote:

> It seems like Sat, 02 Oct 2004 16:54:37 +1200 was when "Dave -
> Dave.net.nz" <Dave@_no_spam_here_please_dave.net.nz> said Blah blah
> blah...
>
>
>>When he left we were chatting about it and he said that I could have
>>easily passed all of the exams in BIT, except for a few of the odd
>>things that they make you learn with no relevance to anything.
>
>
> Speaking of that, I'm about 6 months away from making my own engine
> management computer for a car using either a MC68000 or a 80C552 micro
> controller. The relevance this has to do with passing my MCSE, I can't
> quite see yet, but I'm still a student. I'm sure someone has an
> answer. Right? Guys? Anyone?
>
> But really, there does seem to be a bit of "you need to know this,
> just trust us on this one" going on in degrees. Whether it's all
> valid, I'll tell you in 20 years

although it sounds like fun, I don't see that it is relevant... although
it would be programming, flashing etc... but umm, yeah, odd.

It seems like Sun, 03 Oct 2004 10:05:17 +1300 was when "Dave -
Dave.net.nz" <Dave@_no_spam_here_please_dave.net.nz> said Blah blah
blah...

>> Oh, if anyone's in Wellington, and wants a 1st year BIT student for
>> work experience, I'm quite willing to help. Whatever it is, I'll do it
>> for free, as long as I don't have to say "Would you like fries with
>> that".
>
>so you dont do software development then?

I was thinking about this, is there still a demand for System Analysts
in contrast to Analyst/Programmers? I mean, I'm really enjoying
reading about System Analysis and Design, I just *dislike* coding. I
don't even mind doing pseudocode, I just don't want to be a programmer
and be caught up in the semantics of the language that's all. So
perhaps yeah, I'll do software development right up until you want me
to program it, then I'm taking a holiday!

Actually, with the disappointing looking field for graduates (I
searched http://it.seek.co.nz for "graduate" and came up with about 5
valid hits), I'm looking at going into teaching. Funnily enough, at
least you know you have a guaranteed job at the end of it, and it's as
easy as tacking on a post grad. diploma in teaching. Anything that
helps me retire to Niue or New Caledonia, I'm happy with
--
Regards,
Waylon Kenning.

1st Year B.I.T. WelTec

"Waylon Kenning" <> wrote in message
news:...
>I read an interesting article here
> http://it.seek.co.nz/editorial/0-9-4...employment.htm about the IT
> industry having a hard time finding staff, yet so many are reluctant
> to accept graduates. Is this because of a widening gap between what
> skills graduates come out with, and what employers want? And if so,
> why aren't universities and polytechnics doing more about this?
>
> I find it interesting to note that students at certain universities
> sometimes get firm job offers in their *first* year of study, yet
> recently, I offered a local computing company in Lower Hutt unpaid
> work experience, they seem to have turned me down. I can't even get
> unpaid work around here! Every where I look people want 3 years
> experience-this, and 5 years experience-that, alas, why aren't the
> skills I'm learning at polytech better matched to what the industry
> wants?
>
> The above's all my opinion and could be totally illogical, what's your
> views?
> --
> Regards,
> Waylon Kenning.
>
> 1st Year B.I.T. WelTec

First off I wouldn't offer anything for free. Put yourself in their shoes
and I sure wouldn't want to let some new guy loose on my code, networks etc
who wasn't fully confident in what they were doing. And offering to do it
for free would tell me you weren't. You could sell it better of course, and
sound like you really know what you're doing. But willing to do it for free
doesn't look good IMHO. But that's just me.

That being said, some people will love free work. Mostly businesses who
aren't I.T. orientated. I had a friend who offered to do free website
development for local Dunedin businesses, and they got so many call backs
they had to turn a lot down. Plus they did really good work and usually got
paid for it anyway. People who have no knowledge of such things will love
free work since they don't really have anything to loose.

Kippla said the following on 3/10/2004 11:16:
> "Waylon Kenning" <> wrote in message
> news:...
>
>>I read an interesting article here
>>http://it.seek.co.nz/editorial/0-9-4...employment.htm about the IT
>>industry having a hard time finding staff, yet so many are reluctant
>>to accept graduates. Is this because of a widening gap between what
>>skills graduates come out with, and what employers want? And if so,
>>why aren't universities and polytechnics doing more about this?
>>
>>I find it interesting to note that students at certain universities
>>sometimes get firm job offers in their *first* year of study, yet
>>recently, I offered a local computing company in Lower Hutt unpaid
>>work experience, they seem to have turned me down. I can't even get
>>unpaid work around here! Every where I look people want 3 years
>>experience-this, and 5 years experience-that, alas, why aren't the
>>skills I'm learning at polytech better matched to what the industry
>>wants?
>>
>>The above's all my opinion and could be totally illogical, what's your
>>views?
>>--
>>Regards,
>>Waylon Kenning.
>>
>>1st Year B.I.T. WelTec
>
>
> First off I wouldn't offer anything for free. Put yourself in their shoes
> and I sure wouldn't want to let some new guy loose on my code, networks etc
> who wasn't fully confident in what they were doing. And offering to do it
> for free would tell me you weren't. You could sell it better of course, and
> sound like you really know what you're doing. But willing to do it for free
> doesn't look good IMHO. But that's just me.
>
> That being said, some people will love free work. Mostly businesses who
> aren't I.T. orientated. I had a friend who offered to do free website
> development for local Dunedin businesses, and they got so many call backs
> they had to turn a lot down. Plus they did really good work and usually got
> paid for it anyway. People who have no knowledge of such things will love
> free work since they don't really have anything to loose.
>
>
Over the years I have had a number of people offer to work for free for
experiance, I have never accepted one of them as free, free means no
responsibilty or answerability for there own actions. That said I have
been impressed by some of the people and given them a temporary position
at a basic rate, that way they and I are covered as far as responsibilty
and answerabilty goes. Those who I have helped in this way have gone on
to bigger and better things.

On Sat, 02 Oct 2004 15:26:25 +1200, Waylon Kenning wrote:

> The above's all my opinion and could be totally illogical, what's your
> views?

i think it may have more to do with the standard of graduates.

im in my third year of BIT at otago polytechnic, right now iam starting my
thrid year project (where we get together with a client a build a system).
one thing i have noticed looking around the project room (the hot smelly
room that it is) is that there are a lot of "good ideas" but just badly
implemented, whether due to stupid design or just plain stupid programming.

im talking about third years that cant program their way out of a inatimate
paper bag, teams that do ****-all analysis & design and end up re-coding
their system dozens of times because of that fact - end up getting more
marks than the teams who design it the right way in the first place.

in talking to people who have been through this paper i know of cases where
the "lead developer" in a team has to do tripple the work to get a system
out the door. think up a concept, get it down on paper, analyse that design
untill it works, build up a "working example", get that working example to
a stage where a monkey with a hammer can fill in the gaps umongst all the
documentation & comments - and they still get asked stupid questions.

one thing i expect of my classmates is at least knowledge to a similar
level when it comes to development principals (after all we went through
the same classes) - i dunno mabye iam expecting too much.


--------
steven h

Waylon Kenning wrote:

> I was thinking about this, is there still a demand for System Analysts
> in contrast to Analyst/Programmers? I mean, I'm really enjoying
> reading about System Analysis and Design, I just *dislike* coding. I
> don't even mind doing pseudocode, I just don't want to be a programmer
> and be caught up in the semantics of the language that's all. So
> perhaps yeah, I'll do software development right up until you want me
> to program it, then I'm taking a holiday!

There never was a demand for "System Analyst" with no coding experience. You
simply cannot divorce the development of specifications from the coding
tools used. The environment has a huge impact on how applications are
implemented.

The decisions made in developing specifications can make all the difference
between implementing something in one month or one year. Without being a
coder there is little to no idea about how difficult something is to
actually implement.

I am personally doing very little coding nowdays - but I am still able to do
so, and I have come up with some very innovative solutions to problems that
someone with no coding experience never could have.

steven wrote:

> im talking about third years that cant program their way out of a
> inatimate paper bag, teams that do ****-all analysis & design and end up
> re-coding their system dozens of times because of that fact - end up
> getting more marks than the teams who design it the right way in the first
> place.

Getting a design 100% right at the outset and then simply having
monkeys write the code has been the aspiration of millions
of IT specialists.

Unlike architecture or engineering IT design encompasses an enormous
range of human requirements many of which are simply not known,
not understood, or not elaborated at design time.

Also, many monkeys show a distinct unwillingness to be monkeys.

So the reality is that a real design will incorporate the best possible
initial analysis and design, and a couple of implemetation iterations.

Cheetah wrote:

> Waylon Kenning wrote:
>
>> I was thinking about this, is there still a demand for System Analysts
>> in contrast to Analyst/Programmers? I mean, I'm really enjoying
>> reading about System Analysis and Design, I just *dislike* coding. I
>> don't even mind doing pseudocode, I just don't want to be a programmer
>> and be caught up in the semantics of the language that's all. So
>> perhaps yeah, I'll do software development right up until you want me
>> to program it, then I'm taking a holiday!
>
> There never was a demand for "System Analyst" with no coding experience.
> You simply cannot divorce the development of specifications from the
> coding tools used. The environment has a huge impact on how applications
> are implemented.
>
> The decisions made in developing specifications can make all the
> difference between implementing something in one month or one year.
> Without being a coder there is little to no idea about how difficult
> something is to actually implement.
>
> I am personally doing very little coding nowdays - but I am still able to
> do so, and I have come up with some very innovative solutions to problems
> that someone with no coding experience never could have.

You are obviously a valuable asset to the company that employs you.
If only everyone who posted to this ng showed the commonsense and
intelligence that you obviously have.