From daveviner at yahoo.com  Tue Aug  1 20:48:41 2006
From: daveviner at yahoo.com (Dave Viner)
Date: Tue, 1 Aug 2006 20:48:41 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] time conversion question
In-Reply-To: <6.2.5.6.2.20060728150152.04876418@peterbenjamin.com>
References: <20060727053000.GA10558@mitch.veggiechinese.net>
	<20060727062606.GA7176@level22.com>
	<p06230901c0eefef84a40@[10.10.14.54]>
	<6.2.5.6.2.20060728150152.04876418@peterbenjamin.com>
Message-ID: <26E3FA07-E8BA-42B2-B7C3-5A691C642934@yahoo.com>

you might also check out the family of DateTime modules...
http://datetime.perl.org/index.cgi?Modules

not sure how they compare in terms of performance... but the  
information is quite extensive on date manipulations in perl.

dave

On Jul 28, 2006, at 3:03 PM, Peter Benjamin wrote:

>
> MySQL will reformat dates it outputs.
> It has an extensive set of input and output formats.
> And I've been told it is faster than perl's date handling.
>
> _______________________________________________
> Losangeles-pm mailing list
> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm


From naterajj at gmail.com  Thu Aug  3 12:17:26 2006
From: naterajj at gmail.com (Juan Jose Natera)
Date: Thu, 3 Aug 2006 12:17:26 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] possible dates for my "Perl Best Practices" talk
In-Reply-To: <86odv88jtn.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>
References: <86odv88jtn.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>
Message-ID: <349627440608031217w2d40b447l7047f386ffefc141@mail.gmail.com>

Hello Everyone,

Any chance this is going to happen?

If Ticketmaster can't host it, can someone offer another venue?

Thanks in advance,

JJ



On 29 Jul 2006 09:19:48 -0700, Randal L. Schwartz <merlyn at stonehenge.com> wrote:
>
> I'm in town from the 2nd to the 16th.  If you can find a room for me, I'd be
> happy to present "Perl Best Practices", an hour talk extracted from Damian's
> book of the same name.  Tuesdays would be best, as my Sunday and Monday nights
> are spoken for (karaoke at www.sardosbar.com).
>
> --
> Randal L. Schwartz - Stonehenge Consulting Services, Inc. - +1 503 777 0095
> <merlyn at stonehenge.com> <URL:http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/>
> Perl/Unix/security consulting, Technical writing, Comedy, etc. etc.
> See PerlTraining.Stonehenge.com for onsite and open-enrollment Perl training!
> _______________________________________________
> Losangeles-pm mailing list
> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
>

From merlyn at stonehenge.com  Thu Aug  3 12:19:09 2006
From: merlyn at stonehenge.com (Randal L. Schwartz)
Date: 03 Aug 2006 12:19:09 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] possible dates for my "Perl Best Practices" talk
In-Reply-To: <349627440608031217w2d40b447l7047f386ffefc141@mail.gmail.com>
References: <86odv88jtn.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>
	<349627440608031217w2d40b447l7047f386ffefc141@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <8664h9vd8y.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>

>>>>> "Juan" == Juan Jose Natera <naterajj at gmail.com> writes:

Juan> Any chance this is going to happen?

Nobody has contacted me in private, if that's what you mean.

Juan> If Ticketmaster can't host it, can someone offer another venue?

-- 
Randal L. Schwartz - Stonehenge Consulting Services, Inc. - +1 503 777 0095
<merlyn at stonehenge.com> <URL:http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/>
Perl/Unix/security consulting, Technical writing, Comedy, etc. etc.
See PerlTraining.Stonehenge.com for onsite and open-enrollment Perl training!

From sean at testmethods.net  Thu Aug  3 13:28:47 2006
From: sean at testmethods.net (Sean Gallagher)
Date: Thu, 3 Aug 2006 13:28:47 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] possible dates for my "Perl Best Practices" talk
In-Reply-To: <8664h9vd8y.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>
References: <86odv88jtn.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>
	<349627440608031217w2d40b447l7047f386ffefc141@mail.gmail.com>
	<8664h9vd8y.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>
Message-ID: <B44C1270-CF47-4F0D-8797-7455FFB32AF6@testmethods.net>


On Aug 3, 2006, at 12:19 PM, Randal L. Schwartz wrote:

> Nobody has contacted me

Hi Randall.
Sorry that no one has contacted you. Todd Cranson-Cuebas is the  
person who usually sets up the LA.pm events here at Ticketmaster. He  
is currently out of town on vacation.

A talk on Perl Best Practices sounds great! I would be happy to take  
on the task of setting things up if you are still available to speak.

I have booked the screening room here at Ticketmaster for Tuesday,  
8/8, from 7-9PM. (tentative until I hear back from you)

Please let me know if that will work for you and I will then confirm  
by sending another email to the LA.pm group.

Thanks!

--Sean

Sean Gallagher
sean at testmethods.net




From merlyn at stonehenge.com  Thu Aug  3 13:33:51 2006
From: merlyn at stonehenge.com (Randal L. Schwartz)
Date: 03 Aug 2006 13:33:51 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] possible dates for my "Perl Best Practices" talk
In-Reply-To: <B44C1270-CF47-4F0D-8797-7455FFB32AF6@testmethods.net>
References: <86odv88jtn.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>
	<349627440608031217w2d40b447l7047f386ffefc141@mail.gmail.com>
	<8664h9vd8y.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>
	<B44C1270-CF47-4F0D-8797-7455FFB32AF6@testmethods.net>
Message-ID: <86hd0ttv80.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>

>>>>> "Sean" == Sean Gallagher <sean at testmethods.net> writes:

Sean> I have booked the screening room here at Ticketmaster for Tuesday, 8/8,
Sean> from 7-9PM. (tentative until I hear back from you)

Apparently, Westlake.PM has gotten to me first.  the date is the 9th at
valueclick.  Details to follow.

I know that's a bit far for some of you.  Start earlier. :) :)

-- 
Randal L. Schwartz - Stonehenge Consulting Services, Inc. - +1 503 777 0095
<merlyn at stonehenge.com> <URL:http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/>
Perl/Unix/security consulting, Technical writing, Comedy, etc. etc.
See PerlTraining.Stonehenge.com for onsite and open-enrollment Perl training!

From rspier at pobox.com  Sat Aug  5 21:15:17 2006
From: rspier at pobox.com (Robert Spier)
Date: Sat, 05 Aug 2006 21:15:17 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] possible dates for my "Perl Best Practices" talk
In-Reply-To: <86hd0ttv80.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>
References: <86odv88jtn.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>
	<349627440608031217w2d40b447l7047f386ffefc141@mail.gmail.com>
	<8664h9vd8y.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>
	<B44C1270-CF47-4F0D-8797-7455FFB32AF6@testmethods.net>
	<86hd0ttv80.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>
Message-ID: <m3hd0q1ove.wl_rs@pobox.com>

> Sean> I have booked the screening room here at Ticketmaster for Tuesday, 8/8,
> Sean> from 7-9PM. (tentative until I hear back from you)
> 
> Apparently, Westlake.PM has gotten to me first.  the date is the 9th at
> valueclick.  Details to follow.
> 
> I know that's a bit far for some of you.  Start earlier. :) :)

Have you *seen* the 101 West during the evening rush hour?

-R

From mackenziemikebus at yahoo.com  Tue Aug  8 12:24:37 2006
From: mackenziemikebus at yahoo.com (Mike MacKenzie)
Date: Tue, 8 Aug 2006 12:24:37 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: [LA.pm] possible dates for my "Perl Best Practices" talk
In-Reply-To: <86hd0ttv80.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>
Message-ID: <20060808192437.91914.qmail@web52203.mail.yahoo.com>

The talk is tomorrow, right?  Do you have any additional information to share
with us so those of us who are interested might attend?

Thanks,

Mike MacKenzie

--- "Randal L. Schwartz" <merlyn at stonehenge.com> wrote:

> >>>>> "Sean" == Sean Gallagher <sean at testmethods.net> writes:
> 
> Sean> I have booked the screening room here at Ticketmaster for Tuesday, 8/8,
> Sean> from 7-9PM. (tentative until I hear back from you)
> 
> Apparently, Westlake.PM has gotten to me first.  the date is the 9th at
> valueclick.  Details to follow.
> 
> I know that's a bit far for some of you.  Start earlier. :) :)
> 
> -- 
> Randal L. Schwartz - Stonehenge Consulting Services, Inc. - +1 503 777 0095
> <merlyn at stonehenge.com> <URL:http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/>
> Perl/Unix/security consulting, Technical writing, Comedy, etc. etc.
> See PerlTraining.Stonehenge.com for onsite and open-enrollment Perl training!
> _______________________________________________
> Losangeles-pm mailing list
> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
> 


__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around 
http://mail.yahoo.com 

From naterajj at gmail.com  Tue Aug  8 12:30:44 2006
From: naterajj at gmail.com (Juan Jose Natera)
Date: Tue, 8 Aug 2006 12:30:44 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] possible dates for my "Perl Best Practices" talk
In-Reply-To: <20060808192437.91914.qmail@web52203.mail.yahoo.com>
References: <86hd0ttv80.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>
	<20060808192437.91914.qmail@web52203.mail.yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <349627440608081230k17bbf2d1s3f12cabf2b48450a@mail.gmail.com>

Hi,

Unfortunately it seems Randal had to cancel, though it is not confirmed:

http://mail.pm.org/pipermail/thousand-oaks-pm/2006-August/000314.html

It seems ThousandOaks.pm will meet regardless, but I don't know if
there will be any presentations.

Juan Natera

On 8/8/06, Mike MacKenzie <mackenziemikebus at yahoo.com> wrote:
> The talk is tomorrow, right?  Do you have any additional information to share
> with us so those of us who are interested might attend?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Mike MacKenzie
>
> --- "Randal L. Schwartz" <merlyn at stonehenge.com> wrote:
>
> > >>>>> "Sean" == Sean Gallagher <sean at testmethods.net> writes:
> >
> > Sean> I have booked the screening room here at Ticketmaster for Tuesday, 8/8,
> > Sean> from 7-9PM. (tentative until I hear back from you)
> >
> > Apparently, Westlake.PM has gotten to me first.  the date is the 9th at
> > valueclick.  Details to follow.
> >
> > I know that's a bit far for some of you.  Start earlier. :) :)
> >
> > --
> > Randal L. Schwartz - Stonehenge Consulting Services, Inc. - +1 503 777 0095
> > <merlyn at stonehenge.com> <URL:http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/>
> > Perl/Unix/security consulting, Technical writing, Comedy, etc. etc.
> > See PerlTraining.Stonehenge.com for onsite and open-enrollment Perl training!
> > _______________________________________________
> > Losangeles-pm mailing list
> > Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> > http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
> >
>
>
> __________________________________________________
> Do You Yahoo!?
> Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
> http://mail.yahoo.com
> _______________________________________________
> Losangeles-pm mailing list
> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
>

From merlyn at stonehenge.com  Tue Aug  8 12:31:27 2006
From: merlyn at stonehenge.com (Randal L. Schwartz)
Date: 08 Aug 2006 12:31:27 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] possible dates for my "Perl Best Practices" talk
In-Reply-To: <20060808192437.91914.qmail@web52203.mail.yahoo.com>
References: <20060808192437.91914.qmail@web52203.mail.yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <86psfbc9dc.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>

>>>>> "Mike" == Mike MacKenzie <mackenziemikebus at yahoo.com> writes:

Mike> The talk is tomorrow, right?  Do you have any additional information to
Mike> share with us so those of us who are interested might attend?

No, this talk was cancelled.  However, I'm in negotiation to do the same talk
at Ticketmaster for LA.pm next tuesday.  Details forthcoming (nudge nudge).

-- 
Randal L. Schwartz - Stonehenge Consulting Services, Inc. - +1 503 777 0095
<merlyn at stonehenge.com> <URL:http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/>
Perl/Unix/security consulting, Technical writing, Comedy, etc. etc.
See PerlTraining.Stonehenge.com for onsite and open-enrollment Perl training!

From Todd.Cranston-Cuebas at Ticketmaster.com  Tue Aug  8 15:50:27 2006
From: Todd.Cranston-Cuebas at Ticketmaster.com (Todd Cranston-Cuebas)
Date: Tue, 8 Aug 2006 15:50:27 -0700 
Subject: [LA.pm] LA.pm Tech Talk - Randal Schwartz's Best Practices and
	Inside-Out	 Objects
Message-ID: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D403540@pasmail3.office.tmcs>

Announcing the Next LA.pm Tech Talk!

Randal Schwartz will present 2 different talks from 7-9 p.m.
Plan to stay afterward to get a bite in a local restaurant.

Date:
Tuesday, August 15th

Location:
Ticketmaster
8800 W. Sunset Blvd.
West Hollywood, CA 90069

Talk number 1 from roughly 7 - 8 p.m. (arrive on time!).

Perl Best Practices
Randal Schwartz presents an excerpt from Damian Conway's book of the same
name, including some practical examples.

And from 8-9 p.m.

Inside-out Objects
Randal Schwartz provides insight and motivation into "inside out objects": a
means to precisely control access to attributes and reduce the chance that a
typo can mess up your day.

Practical information you should know....

Please arrive a few minutes early if you can. I realize that traffic can be
difficult in LA but since we have 2 back-to-back talks, Randal will start at
7:00 sharp. Ticketmaster is located on the southeast corner of Sunset Blvd.
and Palm Avenue. At night, it is hard to see the 8800 number on our red
brick building so be careful you don't drive past. Parking is off of Palm
Avenue. Please see the map link below for our location. When you arrive,
please pull into our parking structure below our building unless you like
getting parking tickets ;)

http://www.google.com/maps?f=q
<http://www.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&q=8800+w.+sunset+blvd.+west+hollywood,
+ca&ie=UTF8&om=1&ll=34.092934,-118.380542&spn=0.025482,0.054245>
&hl=en&q=8800+w.+sunset+blvd.+west+hollywood,+ca&ie=UTF8&om=1&ll=34.092934,-
118.380542&spn=0.025482,0.054245

Also note that you must meet a Ticketmaster employee on the 1st floor. We
will escort you to a conference room in our building for this event.

RSVP Please

Finally, if you plan to attend, please RSVP to the link below. It is very
helpful for us to know how many people will arrive so we can make the
necessary plans.

http://www.evite.com/app/publicUrl/tcc at ticketmaster.com/techtalk081506
<http://www.evite.com/app/publicUrl/tcc at ticketmaster.com/techtalk081506> 

If you have any other questions, you can contact me directly.

Todd Cranston-Cuebas
310-360-2436
tcc at ticketmaster.com <mailto:tcc at ticketmaster.com> 

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From naterajj at gmail.com  Tue Aug  8 15:59:55 2006
From: naterajj at gmail.com (Juan Jose Natera)
Date: Tue, 8 Aug 2006 15:59:55 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] LA.pm Tech Talk - Randal Schwartz's Best Practices and
	Inside-Out Objects
In-Reply-To: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D403540@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D403540@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
Message-ID: <349627440608081559r35763a35sced6188a8c032644@mail.gmail.com>

This is good news, thanks!

On 8/8/06, Todd Cranston-Cuebas <Todd.Cranston-Cuebas at ticketmaster.com> wrote:
> Announcing the Next LA.pm Tech Talk!
>
> Randal Schwartz will present 2 different talks from 7-9 p.m.
> Plan to stay afterward to get a bite in a local restaurant.

From david at fetter.org  Tue Aug  8 18:58:10 2006
From: david at fetter.org (David Fetter)
Date: Tue, 8 Aug 2006 18:58:10 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] [JOB] [Jstomel@oversee.net: Oversee.net (Sr. Perl
	Developer) -- Los Angeles]
Message-ID: <20060809015810.GB31528@fetter.org>

Folks,

I neither know this person nor vouch for him, but I figured somebody
might be interested.  Contact him if you are :)

Cheers,
D
----- Forwarded message from "Josh S." <Jstomel at oversee.net> -----

> X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.1.3 (2006-06-01) on fetter.org
> X-Spam-Level: 
> X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.0 required=4.0 tests=BAYES_00,DNS_FROM_RFC_WHOIS,
> 	FORGED_RCVD_HELO autolearn=no version=3.1.3
> X-Original-To: david at fetter.org
> Delivered-To: david at fetter.org
> From: "Josh S." <Jstomel at oversee.net>
> To: David Fetter <david at fetter.org>
> Date: Mon, 07 Aug 2006 15:15:27 -0800
> Subject: Oversee.net (Sr. Perl Developer) -- Los Angeles
> X-Mailer: XyberSleuth - TalentHook
> X-Virus-Scanned: by amavisd-new at oversee.net
> 
> 
> David
> 
> Wanted to see if you may be able to assist me. (Came across an old resume of
> yours)
> 
> I am with Oversee.net (Located in Downtown Los Angeles)
> 
> Anyways, I am looking to hire some extremely solid Perl / Mod_perl Developers. 
> 
> We are a completely privately held company. We have about 160 employees and
> have been growing over the past few years.
> 
> ** I have a .ppt about our business if you are interested....
> 
> Some of our premier .com's are; 
> 
> www.domainsponsor.com (Leader in Domain Monetization)
> www.information.com
> www.livedigital.com (Consumer Site)
> www.compare.com (Coming soon)
> www.low.com (Lead gen for Mortgage)
> www.degrees.com (lead gen for .edu) 
> 
> We are doing some amazing things and we need some STRONG perl talent.
> 
> Let me know if you may know anyone that may be interested!
> 
> We are considering both FULL TIME AND CONTRACT!! However it needs to be in our San Mateo office or Los Angeles Office!
> 
> 
> Josh Stomel
> 
> 
> Josh Stomel | Business Development
> Jstomel at oversee.net
> Tel: 213.408.0072
> Fax: 213.892.1214
> YIM: TechRecruiter00
> 
> _________________________ 
> 
> Headquartered in Los Angeles, California, Oversee.net is a dynamic, growing
> company with interests in multiple segments of the online media and
> advertising space.  It is the parent company of Revenue.net, a leading
> online advertising network and domain monetization service that is built for
> performance marketing.
> 
> Oversee operates two lead generation businesses.   Low.com is a leading
> consumer financial services portal committed to helping users find the
> lowest cost, most reputable purchase, refinance and home equity loans.  They
> connect highly-motivated consumers with financial institutions, resulting in 
> leads that generate among the highest percentage of closed loans in our
> industry.  Degrees.com offers lead generation opportunities for
> post-secondary institutions, helping match students with the right school 
> and schools with the right students.
> 
> The Company also owns premium consumer properties that include
> Information.com, Newsalerts.com and Blogsource.com.
> 
> 
> Oversee's Technical Team is seeking a senior-level Perl developer. This
> position will focus on building clever, scalable, extensible, reliable web
> applications and support frameworks. We need someone who will be creative 
> and thorough and takes great pride in creating the best possible systems for
> continued development. We use mod_perl and HTML::Mason on Linux.
> 
> Requirements:
> 
>  4+ years of experience developing under mod_perl. 
>  Very strong Perl skills. Strong knowledge of OO concepts a must.
>  Experience engineering large Perl software projects from modules to
> scripts and web interfaces.
>  HTML::Mason experience
>  Experience with relational database and DBI 
>  MySQL experience is a plus.
>  Strong Unix/Linux user skills.
>  System administration experience is a plus.
> 
> 
> Company Benefits
> * Competitive salaries and generous bonus programs aligned with company 
> goals.
> * Excellent Medical, Dental and Vision Insurance
> * 401(k) Retirement Savings Plan, and a Company Match
> * Tuition Reimbursement
> * Company paid short-term and long term disability
> * Company paid group term life insurance 
> * Company Holidays and Paid Time Off (PTO)
> * Gym membership
> * Employee Referral Bonus
> * Friendly work environment and flexible schedules
> * Enjoy friendly competition in our game room
> * Catered weekly lunches, complimentary soft drinks, Starbucks coffee, food 
> and snacks
> 
> 
> To learn more, please visit us at http://www.oversee.net 
> 
> 
> Josh Stomel | Business Development 
> Jstomel at oversee.net
> Tel: 213.408.0072
> Fax: 213.892.1214
> YIM: TechRecruiter00
> AIM: WcidUsa
> Skype: JoshStomel
> Professional Profile 
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
> Properties
> www.revenue.net 
> www.domainsponsor.com
> www.blogsource.com
> www.low.com
> www.information.com
> www.degrees.com
> www.newsalerts.com 
> www.livedigital.com 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 

----- End forwarded message -----

-- 
David Fetter <david at fetter.org> http://fetter.org/
phone: +1 415 235 3778        AIM: dfetter666
                              Skype: davidfetter

Remember to vote!

From Todd.Cranston-Cuebas at Ticketmaster.com  Thu Aug 10 17:24:24 2006
From: Todd.Cranston-Cuebas at Ticketmaster.com (Todd Cranston-Cuebas)
Date: Thu, 10 Aug 2006 17:24:24 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] As if you didn't know... Ticketmaster is looking for solid
	perl p	eople ; )
Message-ID: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D40357E@pasmail3.office.tmcs>

Since the topic came up, I thought I should point out that Ticketmaster
<http://www.ticketmaster.com>  is continuing to grow and is also looking for
solid perl engineers.

Basically, if you love perl, love the open-source development world, can
code OO-perl, then we'll have a great place to work.

I have positions on both our primary Ticketmaster.com development team and a
position in our datawarehousing group. The main distinction between the
roles is that the datawarehousing team is focusing on the applicant's
ability to work with databases and data models and perl is secondary
(although you will be working in perl).

So, if you're a database wizard, consider this role and you can learn the
perl on the job. If you're already a perl guru and looking to work for one
of the coolest perl teams in town, then let me know.

Drop me a note and we'll talk.



Regards,

Todd

Todd Cranston-Cuebas
Manager of Technical Recruiting
Ticketmaster <http://www.ticketmaster.com/careers/> 
8800 W. Sunset Blvd.
West Hollywood, CA 90069
Phone: (310) 360-2436; Mobile: (310) 422-3347
tcc at ticketmaster.com <mailto:tcc at ticketmaster.com?subject=Clicked the Sig of
Todd Cranston-Cuebas> 

Available
<http://jobsearch.iac-careers.com/jobsearch.asp?col=dtcl&co=xcityx,xtmukx&q=
&vw=b&sort=rv> Ticketmaster Positions

Join the Ticketmaster Job  <http://www.jobster.com/view.html?i=BUZRTYFJFHUO>
Network! Your dream job is just a click away...

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From lapm at veggiechinese.net  Thu Aug 10 17:30:45 2006
From: lapm at veggiechinese.net (William Yardley)
Date: Thu, 10 Aug 2006 17:30:45 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] As if you didn't know... Ticketmaster is looking for
	solid perl p	eople ; )
In-Reply-To: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D40357E@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D40357E@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
Message-ID: <20060811003045.GC21037@mitch.veggiechinese.net>

On Thu, Aug 10, 2006 at 05:24:24PM -0700, Todd Cranston-Cuebas wrote:

> Since the topic came up, I thought I should point out that Ticketmaster
> <http://www.ticketmaster.com>  is continuing to grow and is also looking for
> solid perl engineers.

What I want to see is a special deal where members of LAPM can get
accounts that are free of Ticketmaster's surcharges! If anyone working
for Ticketmaster can hook me up, hit me up off-list.

(Bonus if we can also get exempted from the junk emails too)

w


From ask at develooper.com  Thu Aug 10 19:54:20 2006
From: ask at develooper.com (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Ask_Bj=F8rn_Hansen?=)
Date: Thu, 10 Aug 2006 19:54:20 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] As if you didn't know... Ticketmaster is looking for
	solid perl p	eople ; )
In-Reply-To: <20060811003045.GC21037@mitch.veggiechinese.net>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D40357E@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
	<20060811003045.GC21037@mitch.veggiechinese.net>
Message-ID: <4CC93424-9AAA-4858-A391-FD7D23F13E16@develooper.com>


On Aug 10, 2006, at 5:30 PM, William Yardley wrote:


If you take up Todd's offer and get a job there I'm pretty sure  
you'll be able to get tickets without the ticketing fees.  :-)


  - ask


From jeff at yoak.com  Fri Aug 11 08:02:00 2006
From: jeff at yoak.com (Jeff Yoak)
Date: Fri, 11 Aug 2006 08:02:00 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] [JOB] [Jstomel@oversee.net: Oversee.net (Sr. Perl
 Developer) -- Los Angeles]
In-Reply-To: <20060809015810.GB31528@fetter.org>
References: <20060809015810.GB31528@fetter.org>
Message-ID: <7.0.0.16.0.20060811075015.04ded2e0@tomorrowsearch.com>

All,

         I don't know him either, but I know that company pretty well 
having built some of those systems.  This guy must have come along 
after my vintage.
         The company is a solid one and a pretty good place to 
work.  There are some really top tech people there which is always a 
pleasure.  I'm still in touch with some of the technology 
decision-makers there so if any of you here that I know are thinking 
of applying, drop me a line and I'll see if I can move things along, 
pass the good word, etc.

Cheers,
Jeff


At 06:58 PM 8/8/2006, David Fetter wrote:
>Folks,
>
>I neither know this person nor vouch for him, but I figured somebody
>might be interested.  Contact him if you are :)
>
>Cheers,
>D
>----- Forwarded message from "Josh S." <Jstomel at oversee.net> -----
>
> > X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.1.3 (2006-06-01) on fetter.org
> > X-Spam-Level:
> > X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.0 required=4.0 
> tests=BAYES_00,DNS_FROM_RFC_WHOIS,
> >       FORGED_RCVD_HELO autolearn=no version=3.1.3
> > X-Original-To: david at fetter.org
> > Delivered-To: david at fetter.org
> > From: "Josh S." <Jstomel at oversee.net>
> > To: David Fetter <david at fetter.org>
> > Date: Mon, 07 Aug 2006 15:15:27 -0800
> > Subject: Oversee.net (Sr. Perl Developer) -- Los Angeles
> > X-Mailer: XyberSleuth - TalentHook
> > X-Virus-Scanned: by amavisd-new at oversee.net
> >
> >
> > David
> >
> > Wanted to see if you may be able to assist me. (Came across an 
> old resume of
> > yours)
> >
> > I am with Oversee.net (Located in Downtown Los Angeles)
> >
> > Anyways, I am looking to hire some extremely solid Perl / 
> Mod_perl Developers.
> >
> > We are a completely privately held company. We have about 160 employees and
> > have been growing over the past few years.
> >
> > ** I have a .ppt about our business if you are interested....
> >
> > Some of our premier .com's are;
> >
> > www.domainsponsor.com (Leader in Domain Monetization)
> > www.information.com
> > www.livedigital.com (Consumer Site)
> > www.compare.com (Coming soon)
> > www.low.com (Lead gen for Mortgage)
> > www.degrees.com (lead gen for .edu)
> >
> > We are doing some amazing things and we need some STRONG perl talent.
> >
> > Let me know if you may know anyone that may be interested!
> >
> > We are considering both FULL TIME AND CONTRACT!! However it needs 
> to be in our San Mateo office or Los Angeles Office!
> >
> >
> > Josh Stomel
> >
> >
> > Josh Stomel | Business Development
> > Jstomel at oversee.net
> > Tel: 213.408.0072
> > Fax: 213.892.1214
> > YIM: TechRecruiter00
> >
> > _________________________
> >
> > Headquartered in Los Angeles, California, Oversee.net is a dynamic, growing
> > company with interests in multiple segments of the online media and
> > advertising space.  It is the parent company of Revenue.net, a leading
> > online advertising network and domain monetization service that 
> is built for
> > performance marketing.
> >
> > Oversee operates two lead generation businesses.   Low.com is a leading
> > consumer financial services portal committed to helping users find the
> > lowest cost, most reputable purchase, refinance and home equity 
> loans.  They
> > connect highly-motivated consumers with financial institutions, 
> resulting in
> > leads that generate among the highest percentage of closed loans in our
> > industry.  Degrees.com offers lead generation opportunities for
> > post-secondary institutions, helping match students with the right school
> > and schools with the right students.
> >
> > The Company also owns premium consumer properties that include
> > Information.com, Newsalerts.com and Blogsource.com.
> >
> >
> > Oversee's Technical Team is seeking a senior-level Perl developer. This
> > position will focus on building clever, scalable, extensible, reliable web
> > applications and support frameworks. We need someone who will be creative
> > and thorough and takes great pride in creating the best possible 
> systems for
> > continued development. We use mod_perl and HTML::Mason on Linux.
> >
> > Requirements:
> >
> > 4+ years of experience developing under mod_perl.
> > Very strong Perl skills. Strong knowledge of OO concepts a must.
> > Experience engineering large Perl software projects from modules to
> > scripts and web interfaces.
> > HTML::Mason experience
> > Experience with relational database and DBI
> > MySQL experience is a plus.
> > Strong Unix/Linux user skills.
> > System administration experience is a plus.
> >
> >
> > Company Benefits
> > * Competitive salaries and generous bonus programs aligned with company
> > goals.
> > * Excellent Medical, Dental and Vision Insurance
> > * 401(k) Retirement Savings Plan, and a Company Match
> > * Tuition Reimbursement
> > * Company paid short-term and long term disability
> > * Company paid group term life insurance
> > * Company Holidays and Paid Time Off (PTO)
> > * Gym membership
> > * Employee Referral Bonus
> > * Friendly work environment and flexible schedules
> > * Enjoy friendly competition in our game room
> > * Catered weekly lunches, complimentary soft drinks, Starbucks 
> coffee, food
> > and snacks
> >
> >
> > To learn more, please visit us at http://www.oversee.net
> >
> >
> > Josh Stomel | Business Development
> > Jstomel at oversee.net
> > Tel: 213.408.0072
> > Fax: 213.892.1214
> > YIM: TechRecruiter00
> > AIM: WcidUsa
> > Skype: JoshStomel
> > Professional Profile
> > -----------------------------------------------------------------------
> > Properties
> > www.revenue.net
> > www.domainsponsor.com
> > www.blogsource.com
> > www.low.com
> > www.information.com
> > www.degrees.com
> > www.newsalerts.com
> > www.livedigital.com
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
>
>----- End forwarded message -----
>
>--
>David Fetter <david at fetter.org> http://fetter.org/
>phone: +1 415 235 3778        AIM: dfetter666
>                               Skype: davidfetter
>
>Remember to vote!
>_______________________________________________
>Losangeles-pm mailing list
>Losangeles-pm at pm.org
>http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm


From pablo at paeli.com  Fri Aug 11 18:38:33 2006
From: pablo at paeli.com (Pablo Velasquez)
Date: Fri, 11 Aug 2006 18:38:33 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm]
	=?iso-8859-1?q?As_if_you_didn=27t_know=2E=2E=2E_Ticketmas?=
	=?iso-8859-1?q?ter_is_looking_for_solid_perl_p=09eople_=3B_=29?=
In-Reply-To: <4CC93424-9AAA-4858-A391-FD7D23F13E16@develooper.com>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D40357E@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
	<20060811003045.GC21037@mitch.veggiechinese.net>
	<4CC93424-9AAA-4858-A391-FD7D23F13E16@develooper.com>
Message-ID: <200608111838.33354.pablo@paeli.com>

but never from the spam, no exceptions to that one! :-)

On Thursday 10 August 2006 7:54 pm, Ask Bj?rn Hansen wrote:
> On Aug 10, 2006, at 5:30 PM, William Yardley wrote:
>
>
> If you take up Todd's offer and get a job there I'm pretty sure
> you'll be able to get tickets without the ticketing fees.  :-)
>
>
>   - ask
>
> _______________________________________________
> Losangeles-pm mailing list
> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm


From nick at ccl4.org  Sat Aug 12 07:24:12 2006
From: nick at ccl4.org (Nicholas Clark)
Date: Sat, 12 Aug 2006 15:24:12 +0100
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
Message-ID: <20060812142412.GC5342@plum.flirble.org>

There's some irony here, I feel. In LA we have (at least) 3 big money-
making mod_perl using companies trying to recruit solid Perl people to
write in depth Perl code, and finding that they're in short supply locally.

(Shopzilla, Ticketmaster, Oversee.net. Not sure if Citysearch are currently
recruiting, not aware if I've missed any other firms. If so, sorry)

Yet in London it seems that there are more good people than good jobs to
stretch them:

http://london.pm.org/pipermail/london.pm/Week-of-Mon-20060731/003436.html
thread spills into the next week
http://london.pm.org/pipermail/london.pm/Week-of-Mon-20060807/thread.html

(and I've had feedback that Paris and Amsterdam are roughly similar)

What's wrong with the world?

Nicholas Clark

From dpisoni at shopzilla.com  Sat Aug 12 10:15:06 2006
From: dpisoni at shopzilla.com (David Pisoni)
Date: Sat, 12 Aug 2006 10:15:06 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <20060812142412.GC5342@plum.flirble.org>
References: <20060812142412.GC5342@plum.flirble.org>
Message-ID: <6035E2A8-E9D8-4999-AD28-E7D16AB96123@shopzilla.com>

Well, Citysearch == Ticketmaster (and many other brands.)  Valueclick  
seems to be as aggressive as the aforementioned companies as well,  
though they're a bit further afield.

What's wrong with the world? Lots of things, though I'm not sure this  
issue qualifies as something "wrong with the world."  Chock it up to  
the peculiarity of market forces?  That's all I got.

David

On Aug 12, 2006, at 07.24 , Nicholas Clark wrote:

> There's some irony here, I feel. In LA we have (at least) 3 big money-
> making mod_perl using companies trying to recruit solid Perl people to
> write in depth Perl code, and finding that they're in short supply  
> locally.
>
> (Shopzilla, Ticketmaster, Oversee.net. Not sure if Citysearch are  
> currently
> recruiting, not aware if I've missed any other firms. If so, sorry)
>
> Yet in London it seems that there are more good people than good  
> jobs to
> stretch them:
>
> http://london.pm.org/pipermail/london.pm/Week-of- 
> Mon-20060731/003436.html
> thread spills into the next week
> http://london.pm.org/pipermail/london.pm/Week-of-Mon-20060807/ 
> thread.html
>
> (and I've had feedback that Paris and Amsterdam are roughly similar)
>
> What's wrong with the world?
>
> Nicholas Clark
> _______________________________________________
> Losangeles-pm mailing list
> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm


From rspier at pobox.com  Sat Aug 12 10:27:36 2006
From: rspier at pobox.com (Robert Spier)
Date: Sat, 12 Aug 2006 10:27:36 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <6035E2A8-E9D8-4999-AD28-E7D16AB96123@shopzilla.com>
References: <20060812142412.GC5342@plum.flirble.org>
	<6035E2A8-E9D8-4999-AD28-E7D16AB96123@shopzilla.com>
Message-ID: <m3irkxyid3.wl_rs@pobox.com>

> Well, Citysearch == Ticketmaster (and many other brands.) 

This is not true, and has not been true for many years.

When I left, the companies shared a parent company and some corporate
IT infrastructure (i.e. Exchange Servers and a few other things).
That's pretty much it.

-R


From nick at ccl4.org  Sat Aug 12 10:40:03 2006
From: nick at ccl4.org (Nicholas Clark)
Date: Sat, 12 Aug 2006 18:40:03 +0100
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <m3irkxyid3.wl_rs@pobox.com>
References: <20060812142412.GC5342@plum.flirble.org>
	<6035E2A8-E9D8-4999-AD28-E7D16AB96123@shopzilla.com>
	<m3irkxyid3.wl_rs@pobox.com>
Message-ID: <20060812174002.GF5342@plum.flirble.org>

On Sat, Aug 12, 2006 at 10:27:36AM -0700, Robert Spier wrote:
> > Well, Citysearch == Ticketmaster (and many other brands.) 
> 
> This is not true, and has not been true for many years.
> 
> When I left, the companies shared a parent company and some corporate
> IT infrastructure (i.e. Exchange Servers and a few other things).
> That's pretty much it.

I wasn't sure, but I found that the street addresses on whois and the
nameservers were totally different, so I assumed that they were not.

whois is a great source of information, some of which people are careful
not to put on the web.

Nicholas Clark

From ask at develooper.com  Sat Aug 12 11:30:18 2006
From: ask at develooper.com (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Ask_Bj=F8rn_Hansen?=)
Date: Sat, 12 Aug 2006 11:30:18 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <m3irkxyid3.wl_rs@pobox.com>
References: <20060812142412.GC5342@plum.flirble.org>
	<6035E2A8-E9D8-4999-AD28-E7D16AB96123@shopzilla.com>
	<m3irkxyid3.wl_rs@pobox.com>
Message-ID: <CC78FA41-7641-49D0-9487-B2CDBD49A3FB@develooper.com>


On Aug 12, 2006, at 10:27, Robert Spier wrote:

>> Well, Citysearch == Ticketmaster (and many other brands.)
>
> This is not true, and has not been true for many years.
>
> When I left, the companies shared a parent company and some corporate
> IT infrastructure (i.e. Exchange Servers and a few other things).
> That's pretty much it.

They share the Peets Coffee under the Citysearch office as  
well.  :-)   Despite what whois says they are neighbors across the  
street on Sunset Blvd.

On the original subject: <strike>Overture</strike> Yahoo Search  
Marketing is in Burbank and of course Google in Santa Monica have  
suckered a few people to come work there (even if they aren't much of  
a Perl shop).

My impression is that it's much more common to use LAMP-stuff for  
building web things here than than in Europe (and the rest of the  
world, maybe with the exception of Japan).

Maybe the bigger "local" market makes it easier to get forced away  
from Windows systems?


  - ask

-- 
http://www.askbjoernhansen.com/



From kevin+lapm at scaldeferri.com  Sat Aug 12 11:42:33 2006
From: kevin+lapm at scaldeferri.com (Kevin Scaldeferri)
Date: Sat, 12 Aug 2006 11:42:33 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <20060812142412.GC5342@plum.flirble.org>
References: <20060812142412.GC5342@plum.flirble.org>
Message-ID: <57dcc083f3539b096f7f5566f96cf257@scaldeferri.com>


On Aug 12, 2006, at 7:24 AM, Nicholas Clark wrote:

> There's some irony here, I feel. In LA we have (at least) 3 big money-
> making mod_perl using companies trying to recruit solid Perl people to
> write in depth Perl code, and finding that they're in short supply  
> locally.
>
> (Shopzilla, Ticketmaster, Oversee.net. Not sure if Citysearch are  
> currently
> recruiting, not aware if I've missed any other firms. If so, sorry)
>
> Yet in London it seems that there are more good people than good jobs  
> to
> stretch them:
>
> http://london.pm.org/pipermail/london.pm/Week-of-Mon-20060731/ 
> 003436.html
> thread spills into the next week
> http://london.pm.org/pipermail/london.pm/Week-of-Mon-20060807/ 
> thread.html
>
> (and I've had feedback that Paris and Amsterdam are roughly similar)
>
> What's wrong with the world?
>

Well, I don't know about the world, but in the US many people don't  
want to live in LA (perhaps even for valid reasons), and it is nearly  
impossible to get people to move from the Bay Area / Silicon Valley in  
particular, even when the job situation there was truly dire but LA was  
hiring like crazy.

Of course, there's also the fact that we (Overture) never lacked for  
applicants.  What was hard to find was people we were willing to hire  
(and who didn't also have other offers in Silicon Valley, which they  
inevitably took even when we were offering more money in a less  
expensive area).



-kevin


From Todd.Cranston-Cuebas at Ticketmaster.com  Mon Aug 14 08:41:56 2006
From: Todd.Cranston-Cuebas at Ticketmaster.com (Todd Cranston-Cuebas)
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2006 08:41:56 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
Message-ID: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035BD@pasmail3.office.tmcs>

David,

Wanted to point out that while Ticketmaster and Citysearch are both IAC
companies (owned by InterActiveCorp), the relationship really isn't
Citysearch == Ticketmaster. At one point, that was much closer to being
true, but for many years now, the two companies act independently in just
about every way short of certain cross-promotion agreements. In fact, it is
my understanding that Citysearch is now doing more Java development, but
honestly, I'd need someone from that team to clarify the situation.

In terms of market forces, I think that there are a number of issues worth
discussing. I hope that the local demand for perl engineers is enough to
cause the much needed market shift (i.e., more people in the States learning
perl on a very deep level). I'm concerned that other forces may counteract
this adjustment including the fact that schools in the States push Java,
python is becoming more popular as a general purpose scripting language, and
other languages and frameworks (e.g., Ruby on Rails) are taking up the "I
want to build a simple web site" position.

As far as engineers in the UK go, the visa issues making things tough, but
when the next allotment of visas are available next year (We can apply in
April, 07), I'd love to talk to UK engineers!

Todd
tcc at ticketmaster.com

> -----Original Message-----
> From: losangeles-pm-bounces+tcc=ticketmaster.com at pm.org 
> [mailto:losangeles-pm-bounces+tcc=ticketmaster.com at pm.org] On 
> Behalf Of David Pisoni
> Sent: Saturday, August 12, 2006 10:15 AM
> To: Nicholas Clark
> Cc: losangeles-pm at pm.org
> Subject: Re: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
> 
> Well, Citysearch == Ticketmaster (and many other brands.)  
> Valueclick seems to be as aggressive as the aforementioned 
> companies as well, though they're a bit further afield.
> 
> What's wrong with the world? Lots of things, though I'm not 
> sure this issue qualifies as something "wrong with the 
> world."  Chock it up to the peculiarity of market forces?  
> That's all I got.
> 
> David
> 
> On Aug 12, 2006, at 07.24 , Nicholas Clark wrote:
> 
> > There's some irony here, I feel. In LA we have (at least) 3 
> big money- 
> > making mod_perl using companies trying to recruit solid 
> Perl people to 
> > write in depth Perl code, and finding that they're in short supply 
> > locally.
> >
> > (Shopzilla, Ticketmaster, Oversee.net. Not sure if Citysearch are 
> > currently recruiting, not aware if I've missed any other 
> firms. If so, 
> > sorry)
> >
> > Yet in London it seems that there are more good people than 
> good jobs 
> > to stretch them:
> >
> > http://london.pm.org/pipermail/london.pm/Week-of-
> > Mon-20060731/003436.html
> > thread spills into the next week
> > http://london.pm.org/pipermail/london.pm/Week-of-Mon-20060807/
> > thread.html
> >
> > (and I've had feedback that Paris and Amsterdam are roughly similar)
> >
> > What's wrong with the world?
> >
> > Nicholas Clark
> > _______________________________________________
> > Losangeles-pm mailing list
> > Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> > http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Losangeles-pm mailing list
> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
> 

From nick at ccl4.org  Mon Aug 14 09:02:01 2006
From: nick at ccl4.org (Nicholas Clark)
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2006 17:02:01 +0100
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035BD@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035BD@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
Message-ID: <20060814160200.GQ5342@plum.flirble.org>

On Mon, Aug 14, 2006 at 08:41:56AM -0700, Todd Cranston-Cuebas wrote:

> As far as engineers in the UK go, the visa issues making things tough, but
> when the next allotment of visas are available next year (We can apply in
> April, 07), I'd love to talk to UK engineers!

The US Technology industry thinks that it's unlikely to be able to
successfully lobby the government to change this?

Nicholas Clark
 

From dpisoni at shopzilla.com  Mon Aug 14 09:27:48 2006
From: dpisoni at shopzilla.com (David Pisoni)
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2006 09:27:48 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035BD@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035BD@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
Message-ID: <CD5B0FBF-33E1-4969-B13E-7E3E9A698235@shopzilla.com>


On Aug 12, 2006, at 10.27 , Robert Spier wrote:
>> Well, Citysearch == Ticketmaster (and many other brands.)
>
> This is not true, and has not been true for many years.
>
> When I left, the companies shared a parent company and some corporate
> IT infrastructure (i.e. Exchange Servers and a few other things).
> That's pretty much it.

On Aug 14, 2006, at 08.41 , Todd Cranston-Cuebas wrote:

> David,
>
> Wanted to point out that while Ticketmaster and Citysearch are both  
> IAC
> companies (owned by InterActiveCorp), the relationship really isn't
> Citysearch == Ticketmaster. At one point, that was much closer to  
> being
> true, but for many years now, the two companies act independently  
> in just
> about every way short of certain cross-promotion agreements. In  
> fact, it is
> my understanding that Citysearch is now doing more Java  
> development, but
> honestly, I'd need someone from that team to clarify the situation.

I got it guys, thanks. :)

Per Ask's point, you can't blame me too much for drawing the  
inference, erroneous as it may have been.

David


From dpisoni at shopzilla.com  Mon Aug 14 09:31:51 2006
From: dpisoni at shopzilla.com (David Pisoni)
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2006 09:31:51 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <20060814160200.GQ5342@plum.flirble.org>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035BD@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
	<20060814160200.GQ5342@plum.flirble.org>
Message-ID: <7889F878-77D8-4E57-84C7-680E6CB94B0B@shopzilla.com>


On Aug 14, 2006, at 09.02 , Nicholas Clark wrote:

> On Mon, Aug 14, 2006 at 08:41:56AM -0700, Todd Cranston-Cuebas wrote:
>
>> As far as engineers in the UK go, the visa issues making things  
>> tough, but
>> when the next allotment of visas are available next year (We can  
>> apply in
>> April, 07), I'd love to talk to UK engineers!
>
> The US Technology industry thinks that it's unlikely to be able to
> successfully lobby the government to change this?
>
> Nicholas Clark

The need for foreign, technical workers and the paranoia of "Homeland  
Security" are often at odds.  It muddies the water a bit in Congress.

David


From apisoni at shopzilla.com  Mon Aug 14 10:10:22 2006
From: apisoni at shopzilla.com (Adam Pisoni)
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2006 10:10:22 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035BD@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035BD@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
Message-ID: <B47A2D35-1344-412A-B435-028BA3AC3CA4@shopzilla.com>

On Aug 14, 2006, at 8:41 AM, Todd Cranston-Cuebas wrote:

> I'm concerned that other forces may counteract
> this adjustment including the fact that schools in the States push  
> Java,
> python is becoming more popular as a general purpose scripting  
> language, and
> other languages and frameworks (e.g., Ruby on Rails) are taking up  
> the "I
> want to build a simple web site" position.
>

Ruby is a great language, but it is also just the flavor of the  
month.  I don't think Perl is going anywhere anytime soon.   Since  
Rails is basically the de-facto web app framework for Ruby, it gets a  
lot of press.   Perl has any number of similar and perhaps better  
frameworks, but they are not as well known.  Most people writing perl  
web apps still think in terms of scripts.   If anything, we just need  
more publicity of the ease of creating Perl web apps.

Thanks,
adam


From Peter at PSDT.com  Mon Aug 14 10:22:58 2006
From: Peter at PSDT.com (Peter Scott)
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2006 10:22:58 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <20060814160200.GQ5342@plum.flirble.org>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035BD@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
	<20060814160200.GQ5342@plum.flirble.org>
Message-ID: <6.2.3.4.2.20060814101456.025ca710@mail.webquarry.com>

At 09:02 AM 8/14/2006, Nicholas Clark wrote:
> > As far as engineers in the UK go, the visa issues making things tough, but
> > when the next allotment of visas are available next year (We can apply in
> > April, 07), I'd love to talk to UK engineers!
>
>The US Technology industry thinks that it's unlikely to be able to
>successfully lobby the government to change this?

The ITAA has some powerful opponents.  The AFL-CIO (eq TUC) for one, I 
assume, but there is also opposition in the senate from, e.g., Chris 
Dodd.  Numerous federal bills have been proposed limiting offshoring, 
all of them shot down or watered down in some way, but H1-Bs have been 
caught in the crossfire and several similar statewide bills have 
passed.  Public sentiment in the US is somewhat, um, xenophobic at the 
moment, and the politicos are pandering to the popular vote.  Plus, the 
immigration department is in disarray due to reorganization and 
backlogs caused by far stricter applicant checking requirements.
-- 
Peter Scott
Pacific Systems Design Technologies
http://www.perldebugged.com/
http://www.perlmedic.com/


From jamespitts at yahoo.com  Mon Aug 14 10:28:16 2006
From: jamespitts at yahoo.com (James Pitts)
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2006 10:28:16 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <CC78FA41-7641-49D0-9487-B2CDBD49A3FB@develooper.com>
Message-ID: <20060814172816.2754.qmail@web55206.mail.re4.yahoo.com>

Perl seems to be a strong thread throughout the Idealabs companies. For
those of you who worked at Shopzilla, eToys, and Citysearch, do you
know any of the history about how Bill Gross' companies became perl
shops? Was there a perl advocate from Caltech or JPL on the Idealabs
staff? 

Or has LA been a good place for perl merely because it became ubiq in
the online porn industry :)

- James

--- Ask Bj?rn Hansen <ask at develooper.com> wrote:

> 
> On the original subject: <strike>Overture</strike> Yahoo Search  
> Marketing is in Burbank and of course Google in Santa Monica have  
> suckered a few people to come work there (even if they aren't much of
>  
> a Perl shop).
> 
> My impression is that it's much more common to use LAMP-stuff for  
> building web things here than than in Europe (and the rest of the  
> world, maybe with the exception of Japan).
> 
> Maybe the bigger "local" market makes it easier to get forced away  
> from Windows systems?
> 
> 
>   - ask
> 

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around 
http://mail.yahoo.com 

From ehammond at thinksome.com  Mon Aug 14 12:26:07 2006
From: ehammond at thinksome.com (Eric Hammond)
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2006 12:26:07 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <20060814172816.2754.qmail@web55206.mail.re4.yahoo.com>
References: <CC78FA41-7641-49D0-9487-B2CDBD49A3FB@develooper.com>
	<20060814172816.2754.qmail@web55206.mail.re4.yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <20060814192607.GC6037@level22.com>

James Pitts wrote:
> Perl seems to be a strong thread throughout the Idealabs companies. For
> those of you who worked at Shopzilla, eToys, and Citysearch, do you
> know any of the history about how Bill Gross' companies became perl
> shops? Was there a perl advocate from Caltech or JPL on the Idealabs
> staff? 

I am pretty sure I can take credit for being the first Perl advocate
at the first Idealab company.  I was one of the first technology folks
hired at Citysearch and was writing and pushing Perl there in July 1996.  
I was previously coding Perl (and C, C++, etc) in Cincinnati before 
Caskey (18 at the time) asked me to move to LA for Citysearch.

Though the Citysearch development team was not able to switch the front 
end to Perl until after I left, we did code large chunks of the back 
end in Perl and ended up with quite a few Perl lovers who spread out to
other companies in the area.  In particular two groups of developers
left Citysearch and went to eToys (an Idealab company) and Rent.com
(not an Idealab company).

I don't know how Perl became popular at other Idealab companies and 
the rest of LA.  I'm sure it wasn't any one person's influence unless 
you count Larry.

--
Eric Hammond
ehammond at thinksome.com

From Todd.Cranston-Cuebas at Ticketmaster.com  Mon Aug 14 12:59:55 2006
From: Todd.Cranston-Cuebas at Ticketmaster.com (Todd Cranston-Cuebas)
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2006 12:59:55 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
Message-ID: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035D0@pasmail3.office.tmcs>

While perl is very popular in LA, we should note that I'm hearing that perl
is being supplanted in a number of industries by languages like Python. For
example, python used more and more for movie industry "pipelining"
applications where images are pipelined through image processors until they
are then consolidated again for the final production. I've heard that this
industry was mostly perl and now may be as much 50/50 perl/python. The perl
foundation has to take this type of a shift seriously. I think each engineer
thinks in terms of their own, individual needs (which is understandable),
but the perl foundation needs to see perl in the context of a changing
industry. I know that they are and do take these points seriously. I
recently met with two perl foundation members to discuss this very point.

I only mentioned ruby on rails in an earlier post since many people "stick"
with the language that scratched their earliest itches. This was clearly the
case for many PHP people. If perl is the language of choice only for ad-hoc
automation scripts or large-scale, complex solutions on the other extreme,
then you run the risk of having your potential "new blood" siphoned off by
other technologies that allow for the building of modest, but complete
solutions with lower learning curves. All groups/organizations/entities need
to think in terms of the overall "health" of the community (e.g.,
maintaining a flow of new members, satisfying the needs of existing members,
etc.).

Todd 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: losangeles-pm-bounces+tcc=ticketmaster.com at pm.org 
> [mailto:losangeles-pm-bounces+tcc=ticketmaster.com at pm.org] On 
> Behalf Of Eric Hammond
> Sent: Monday, August 14, 2006 12:26 PM
> To: James Pitts
> Cc: losangeles-pm at pm.org
> Subject: Re: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
> 
> James Pitts wrote:
> > Perl seems to be a strong thread throughout the Idealabs companies. 
> > For those of you who worked at Shopzilla, eToys, and Citysearch, do 
> > you know any of the history about how Bill Gross' companies became 
> > perl shops? Was there a perl advocate from Caltech or JPL on the 
> > Idealabs staff?
> 
> I am pretty sure I can take credit for being the first Perl 
> advocate at the first Idealab company.  I was one of the 
> first technology folks hired at Citysearch and was writing 
> and pushing Perl there in July 1996.  
> I was previously coding Perl (and C, C++, etc) in Cincinnati 
> before Caskey (18 at the time) asked me to move to LA for Citysearch.
> 
> Though the Citysearch development team was not able to switch 
> the front end to Perl until after I left, we did code large 
> chunks of the back end in Perl and ended up with quite a few 
> Perl lovers who spread out to other companies in the area.  
> In particular two groups of developers left Citysearch and 
> went to eToys (an Idealab company) and Rent.com (not an 
> Idealab company).
> 
> I don't know how Perl became popular at other Idealab 
> companies and the rest of LA.  I'm sure it wasn't any one 
> person's influence unless you count Larry.
> 
> --
> Eric Hammond
> ehammond at thinksome.com
> _______________________________________________
> Losangeles-pm mailing list
> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
> 

From nick at ccl4.org  Mon Aug 14 13:17:33 2006
From: nick at ccl4.org (Nicholas Clark)
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2006 21:17:33 +0100
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035BD@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035BD@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
Message-ID: <20060814201732.GS5342@plum.flirble.org>

On Mon, Aug 14, 2006 at 08:41:56AM -0700, Todd Cranston-Cuebas wrote:

> In terms of market forces, I think that there are a number of issues worth
> discussing. I hope that the local demand for perl engineers is enough to
> cause the much needed market shift (i.e., more people in the States learning
> perl on a very deep level). I'm concerned that other forces may counteract
> this adjustment including the fact that schools in the States push Java,
> python is becoming more popular as a general purpose scripting language, and
> other languages and frameworks (e.g., Ruby on Rails) are taking up the "I
> want to build a simple web site" position.

Surely the adjustment will only happen if forces in favour of Perl increase
relative to other languages? Basically Perl has to be perceived as some
combination of "more fun" and "more lucrative" than the average of the
competition. And right now there's a general recruiting suck across the
field, isn't there, rather than a particularly hard vacuum in the area of
Perl?

Nicholas Clark

From jleader at alumni.caltech.edu  Mon Aug 14 13:22:59 2006
From: jleader at alumni.caltech.edu (Jeremy Leader)
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2006 13:22:59 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <20060814172816.2754.qmail@web55206.mail.re4.yahoo.com>
References: <20060814172816.2754.qmail@web55206.mail.re4.yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <44E0DBA3.40308@alumni.caltech.edu>

on 08/14/2006 10:28 AM James Pitts  wrote:
> Perl seems to be a strong thread throughout the Idealabs companies. For
> those of you who worked at Shopzilla, eToys, and Citysearch, do you
> know any of the history about how Bill Gross' companies became perl
> shops? Was there a perl advocate from Caltech or JPL on the Idealabs
> staff? 
> 
> Or has LA been a good place for perl merely because it became ubiq in
> the online porn industry :)
> 
> - James

I worked with Dan Kegel at Knowledge Adventure, Bill Gross's edutainment
CDROM (and floppy!) company before the start of Idealabs.  This was around
'93 to '95.  Dan was a big Perl and open source advocate; as a result, we
had a fair number of internal tools and scripts, originally written in Perl 4.
Dan also set up KA's first web site, and mentored quite a few interns, some
of whom went on to other Idealabs companies, including CitySearch, New.net,
and Evolution Robotics.  I believe Dan was probably the first person to
expose Bill Gross to Perl.

-- 
Jeremy Leader
jleader at alumni.caltech.edu
leaderj at yahoo-inc.com (work)

From Peter at PSDT.com  Mon Aug 14 13:24:04 2006
From: Peter at PSDT.com (Peter Scott)
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2006 13:24:04 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <20060814201732.GS5342@plum.flirble.org>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035BD@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
	<20060814201732.GS5342@plum.flirble.org>
Message-ID: <6.2.3.4.2.20060814132107.024c1b70@mail.webquarry.com>

At 01:17 PM 8/14/2006, Nicholas Clark wrote:
>Surely the adjustment will only happen if forces in favour of Perl increase
>relative to other languages?

Two words: Perl 6.

>Basically Perl has to be perceived as some
>combination of "more fun" and "more lucrative" than the average of the
>competition. And right now there's a general recruiting suck across the
>field, isn't there, rather than a particularly hard vacuum in the area of
>Perl?

Regardless of the general trend, there's a more pronounced, er, 
suckiness, in the Perl arena.  Take a look at 
http://www.google.com/trends?q=perl+programming%2Cpython+programming%2Cruby+programming&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all 
.  The Perl line is going down while the Python line is level and the 
Ruby line is coming up.  I think this is as close to unbiased empirical 
industrywide data as we're going to get.
-- 
Peter Scott
Pacific Systems Design Technologies
http://www.perldebugged.com/
http://www.perlmedic.com/


From nick at ccl4.org  Mon Aug 14 13:49:36 2006
From: nick at ccl4.org (Nicholas Clark)
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2006 21:49:36 +0100
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <6.2.3.4.2.20060814132107.024c1b70@mail.webquarry.com>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035BD@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
	<20060814201732.GS5342@plum.flirble.org>
	<6.2.3.4.2.20060814132107.024c1b70@mail.webquarry.com>
Message-ID: <20060814204934.GU5342@plum.flirble.org>

On Mon, Aug 14, 2006 at 01:24:04PM -0700, Peter Scott wrote:
> At 01:17 PM 8/14/2006, Nicholas Clark wrote:
> >Surely the adjustment will only happen if forces in favour of Perl increase
> >relative to other languages?
> 
> Two words: Perl 6.

I can't see that really kicking in until an implementation is sufficiently
production ready that it's a viable choice for quick scripts and true
prototypes. There's a lot of activity both in the language spec and the
various implementations, but it's not easy to gauge how near anything is
to readiness.

Nicholas Clark

From merlyn at stonehenge.com  Mon Aug 14 14:16:04 2006
From: merlyn at stonehenge.com (Randal L. Schwartz)
Date: 14 Aug 2006 14:16:04 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <20060814192607.GC6037@level22.com>
References: <CC78FA41-7641-49D0-9487-B2CDBD49A3FB@develooper.com>
	<20060814172816.2754.qmail@web55206.mail.re4.yahoo.com>
	<20060814192607.GC6037@level22.com>
Message-ID: <8664gvxbl7.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>

>>>>> "Eric" == Eric Hammond <ehammond at thinksome.com> writes:

Eric> I am pretty sure I can take credit for being the first Perl advocate at
Eric> the first Idealab company.  I was one of the first technology folks
Eric> hired at Citysearch and was writing and pushing Perl there in July 1996.

I'm not entirely sure of the history, but I think Idealabs was also the
breeding grounds of goto.com, which became Overture and eventually Yahoo
Search Marketing.  And there's still quite a bit of Perl in those parts.  I
can't exactly say how I know. :)

-- 
Randal L. Schwartz - Stonehenge Consulting Services, Inc. - +1 503 777 0095
<merlyn at stonehenge.com> <URL:http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/>
Perl/Unix/security consulting, Technical writing, Comedy, etc. etc.
See PerlTraining.Stonehenge.com for onsite and open-enrollment Perl training!

From apisoni at shopzilla.com  Mon Aug 14 14:10:46 2006
From: apisoni at shopzilla.com (Adam Pisoni)
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2006 14:10:46 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <20060814201732.GS5342@plum.flirble.org>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035BD@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
	<20060814201732.GS5342@plum.flirble.org>
Message-ID: <92386C7D-D1E6-48EF-A85C-4AE1E95E35D8@shopzilla.com>

I don't know.   Its pretty easy to find Java guys right now.  Good  
ones too.  At least in LA, there is definitely a difference in the  
availability of qualified Perl engineers as opposed to C, Java,  
PHP..  Not sure about Python or Ruby.

Thanks,
Adam

On Aug 14, 2006, at 1:17 PM, Nicholas Clark wrote:

> On Mon, Aug 14, 2006 at 08:41:56AM -0700, Todd Cranston-Cuebas wrote:
>
>> In terms of market forces, I think that there are a number of  
>> issues worth
>> discussing. I hope that the local demand for perl engineers is  
>> enough to
>> cause the much needed market shift (i.e., more people in the  
>> States learning
>> perl on a very deep level). I'm concerned that other forces may  
>> counteract
>> this adjustment including the fact that schools in the States push  
>> Java,
>> python is becoming more popular as a general purpose scripting  
>> language, and
>> other languages and frameworks (e.g., Ruby on Rails) are taking up  
>> the "I
>> want to build a simple web site" position.
>
> Surely the adjustment will only happen if forces in favour of Perl  
> increase
> relative to other languages? Basically Perl has to be perceived as  
> some
> combination of "more fun" and "more lucrative" than the average of the
> competition. And right now there's a general recruiting suck across  
> the
> field, isn't there, rather than a particularly hard vacuum in the  
> area of
> Perl?
>
> Nicholas Clark
> _______________________________________________
> Losangeles-pm mailing list
> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm


From Peter at PSDT.com  Mon Aug 14 14:34:16 2006
From: Peter at PSDT.com (Peter Scott)
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2006 14:34:16 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <20060814204934.GU5342@plum.flirble.org>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035BD@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
	<20060814201732.GS5342@plum.flirble.org>
	<6.2.3.4.2.20060814132107.024c1b70@mail.webquarry.com>
	<20060814204934.GU5342@plum.flirble.org>
Message-ID: <6.2.3.4.2.20060814143326.024bf8a0@mail.webquarry.com>

At 01:49 PM 8/14/2006, Nicholas Clark wrote:
>On Mon, Aug 14, 2006 at 01:24:04PM -0700, Peter Scott wrote:
> > At 01:17 PM 8/14/2006, Nicholas Clark wrote:
> > >Surely the adjustment will only happen if forces in favour of Perl 
> increase
> > >relative to other languages?
> >
> > Two words: Perl 6.
>
>I can't see that really kicking in until an implementation is sufficiently
>production ready that it's a viable choice for quick scripts and true
>prototypes. There's a lot of activity both in the language spec and the
>various implementations, but it's not easy to gauge how near anything is
>to readiness.

Right, but I was responding to the future hypothetical tense in your 
statement :-)

-- 
Peter Scott
Pacific Systems Design Technologies
http://www.perldebugged.com/
http://www.perlmedic.com/


From ehammond at thinksome.com  Mon Aug 14 14:41:01 2006
From: ehammond at thinksome.com (Eric Hammond)
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2006 14:41:01 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <8664gvxbl7.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>
References: <CC78FA41-7641-49D0-9487-B2CDBD49A3FB@develooper.com>
	<20060814172816.2754.qmail@web55206.mail.re4.yahoo.com>
	<20060814192607.GC6037@level22.com>
	<8664gvxbl7.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>
Message-ID: <20060814214101.GB6403@level22.com>

Randal L. Schwartz wrote:
> I'm not entirely sure of the history, but I think Idealabs was also the
> breeding grounds of goto.com, which became Overture and eventually Yahoo
> Search Marketing.  

For those not familiar with the history, Citysearch was marketed as
"an Idealab company" but had very little to do with the Idealabs 
incubation factory.  We were not located near any other Idealabs
companies and had zero interaction with their developers.  I only 
remember seeing Bill Gross once in my years at Citysearch.

The Perl growth in Idealabs and other LA companies has come from
many corners with each developer using it adding his or her own
contribution to the expansion.

I have programmed almost exclusively in Perl since 1993 and am
quick to explain to others how useful I find it, but I don't think
the whole world should use Perl, nor do I object to the rise of
Ruby or Python.  Coming from an evangelical Christian background
I understand how strong the human desire is to belong to a group
and to want to convince everybody to do things the way "we" do.

I see some of the same traits in users of programming language 
and operating systems.

--
Eric Hammond
ehammond at thinksome.com

From apisoni at shopzilla.com  Mon Aug 14 17:29:54 2006
From: apisoni at shopzilla.com (Adam Pisoni)
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2006 17:29:54 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <20060814204934.GU5342@plum.flirble.org>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035BD@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
	<20060814201732.GS5342@plum.flirble.org>
	<6.2.3.4.2.20060814132107.024c1b70@mail.webquarry.com>
	<20060814204934.GU5342@plum.flirble.org>
Message-ID: <21D16D3E-87EE-4BA9-B338-2DED7018EA80@shopzilla.com>


On Aug 14, 2006, at 1:49 PM, Nicholas Clark wrote:

> On Mon, Aug 14, 2006 at 01:24:04PM -0700, Peter Scott wrote:
>> At 01:17 PM 8/14/2006, Nicholas Clark wrote:
>>> Surely the adjustment will only happen if forces in favour of  
>>> Perl increase
>>> relative to other languages?
>>
>> Two words: Perl 6.
>
> I can't see that really kicking in until an implementation is  
> sufficiently
> production ready that it's a viable choice for quick scripts and true
> prototypes. There's a lot of activity both in the language spec and  
> the
> various implementations, but it's not easy to gauge how near  
> anything is
> to readiness.
>
> Nicholas Clark

I think there's a conflict of interest having the Perl 5 maintainer  
say we shouldn't use Perl 6 now.  You're just trying to keep your  
job, admit it!

Thanks,
adam



From perl.monger at yahoo.com  Mon Aug 14 20:14:57 2006
From: perl.monger at yahoo.com (Christian Bryant)
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2006 20:14:57 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035BD@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
Message-ID: <20060815031457.54430.qmail@web39808.mail.mud.yahoo.com>


On a completely side note, did Randal ever appear at
Ticketmaster?  We had just wrapped up our Perl
training with Mr. Sherer of the TO PM, when we learned
Schwartz was, then wasn't showing up at Value Click. 
Personally, I'd prefer Ticketmaster where all the real
Perl elite work...


Regards,

Christian Bryant
A Los Angeles Perl Monger
http://la.pm.org/
Phone:  818-519-1880
E-mail:  perl.monger at yahoo.com

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around 
http://mail.yahoo.com 

From merlyn at stonehenge.com  Mon Aug 14 20:53:00 2006
From: merlyn at stonehenge.com (Randal L. Schwartz)
Date: 14 Aug 2006 20:53:00 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <20060815031457.54430.qmail@web39808.mail.mud.yahoo.com>
References: <20060815031457.54430.qmail@web39808.mail.mud.yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <861wriwt7n.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>

>>>>> "Christian" == Christian Bryant <perl.monger at yahoo.com> writes:

Christian> On a completely side note, did Randal ever appear at
Christian> Ticketmaster?  We had just wrapped up our Perl
Christian> training with Mr. Sherer of the TO PM, when we learned
Christian> Schwartz was, then wasn't showing up at Value Click. 
Christian> Personally, I'd prefer Ticketmaster where all the real
Christian> Perl elite work...

That's tomorrow night.

-- 
Randal L. Schwartz - Stonehenge Consulting Services, Inc. - +1 503 777 0095
<merlyn at stonehenge.com> <URL:http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/>
Perl/Unix/security consulting, Technical writing, Comedy, etc. etc.
See PerlTraining.Stonehenge.com for onsite and open-enrollment Perl training!

From perl.monger at yahoo.com  Mon Aug 14 20:54:20 2006
From: perl.monger at yahoo.com (Christian Bryant)
Date: Mon, 14 Aug 2006 20:54:20 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <861wriwt7n.fsf@blue.stonehenge.com>
Message-ID: <20060815035420.94793.qmail@web39808.mail.mud.yahoo.com>


Most excellent.  I shall be there, Mr. Schwartz.  

--- "Randal L. Schwartz" <merlyn at stonehenge.com>
wrote:

> >>>>> "Christian" == Christian Bryant
> <perl.monger at yahoo.com> writes:
> 
> Christian> On a completely side note, did Randal
> ever appear at
> Christian> Ticketmaster?  We had just wrapped up our
> Perl
> Christian> training with Mr. Sherer of the TO PM,
> when we learned
> Christian> Schwartz was, then wasn't showing up at
> Value Click. 
> Christian> Personally, I'd prefer Ticketmaster where
> all the real
> Christian> Perl elite work...
> 
> That's tomorrow night.
> 
> -- 
> Randal L. Schwartz - Stonehenge Consulting Services,
> Inc. - +1 503 777 0095
> <merlyn at stonehenge.com>
> <URL:http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/>
> Perl/Unix/security consulting, Technical writing,
> Comedy, etc. etc.
> See PerlTraining.Stonehenge.com for onsite and
> open-enrollment Perl training!
> 


Regards,

Christian Bryant
A Los Angeles Perl Monger
http://la.pm.org/
Phone:  818-519-1880
E-mail:  perl.monger at yahoo.com

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around 
http://mail.yahoo.com 

From ehgrad at yahoo-inc.com  Tue Aug 15 09:54:23 2006
From: ehgrad at yahoo-inc.com (Eric Gradman)
Date: Tue, 15 Aug 2006 09:54:23 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035D0@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035D0@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
Message-ID: <DDA90CB9-2E7B-44BE-8BB8-F892463260F7@yahoo-inc.com>

When I was a Perl Monger at Oversee.net, I conducted a sobering  
interview.  We had a candidate come in the door with a strong command  
of Perl (a rare event to be sure).  During the interview it came out  
that he was learning Java.  I asked him why, and he explained that  
former colleagues at Idealab had complained that due to the extreme  
difficulty of finding competent Perl programmers, they were  
increasingly starting new development projects in Java.  My jaw  
dropped, and I spent the rest of the interview in shock.

Personally, I'm avoiding learning anything at all about Perl 6... I  
worry that if I fall in love with new language features that I can't  
use in a production environment for a decade, I'll have switch to a  
different language that scratches that itch.  And despite their  
faults, Python and Ruby have a lot of compelling features.

On Aug 14, 2006, at 12:59 PM, Todd Cranston-Cuebas wrote:

> While perl is very popular in LA, we should note that I'm hearing  
> that perl
> is being supplanted in a number of industries by languages like  
> Python. For
> example, python used more and more for movie industry "pipelining"
> applications where images are pipelined through image processors  
> until they
> are then consolidated again for the final production. I've heard  
> that this
> industry was mostly perl and now may be as much 50/50 perl/python.  
> The perl
> foundation has to take this type of a shift seriously. I think each  
> engineer
> thinks in terms of their own, individual needs (which is  
> understandable),
> but the perl foundation needs to see perl in the context of a changing
> industry. I know that they are and do take these points seriously. I
> recently met with two perl foundation members to discuss this very  
> point.
>
> I only mentioned ruby on rails in an earlier post since many people  
> "stick"
> with the language that scratched their earliest itches. This was  
> clearly the
> case for many PHP people. If perl is the language of choice only  
> for ad-hoc
> automation scripts or large-scale, complex solutions on the other  
> extreme,
> then you run the risk of having your potential "new blood" siphoned  
> off by
> other technologies that allow for the building of modest, but complete
> solutions with lower learning curves. All groups/organizations/ 
> entities need
> to think in terms of the overall "health" of the community (e.g.,
> maintaining a flow of new members, satisfying the needs of existing  
> members,
> etc.).
>
> Todd
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: losangeles-pm-bounces+tcc=ticketmaster.com at pm.org
>> [mailto:losangeles-pm-bounces+tcc=ticketmaster.com at pm.org] On
>> Behalf Of Eric Hammond
>> Sent: Monday, August 14, 2006 12:26 PM
>> To: James Pitts
>> Cc: losangeles-pm at pm.org
>> Subject: Re: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
>>
>> James Pitts wrote:
>>> Perl seems to be a strong thread throughout the Idealabs companies.
>>> For those of you who worked at Shopzilla, eToys, and Citysearch, do
>>> you know any of the history about how Bill Gross' companies became
>>> perl shops? Was there a perl advocate from Caltech or JPL on the
>>> Idealabs staff?
>>
>> I am pretty sure I can take credit for being the first Perl
>> advocate at the first Idealab company.  I was one of the
>> first technology folks hired at Citysearch and was writing
>> and pushing Perl there in July 1996.
>> I was previously coding Perl (and C, C++, etc) in Cincinnati
>> before Caskey (18 at the time) asked me to move to LA for Citysearch.
>>
>> Though the Citysearch development team was not able to switch
>> the front end to Perl until after I left, we did code large
>> chunks of the back end in Perl and ended up with quite a few
>> Perl lovers who spread out to other companies in the area.
>> In particular two groups of developers left Citysearch and
>> went to eToys (an Idealab company) and Rent.com (not an
>> Idealab company).
>>
>> I don't know how Perl became popular at other Idealab
>> companies and the rest of LA.  I'm sure it wasn't any one
>> person's influence unless you count Larry.
>>
>> --
>> Eric Hammond
>> ehammond at thinksome.com
>> _______________________________________________
>> Losangeles-pm mailing list
>> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
>> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
>>
> _______________________________________________
> Losangeles-pm mailing list
> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
>
>


From perl.monger at yahoo.com  Tue Aug 15 10:29:14 2006
From: perl.monger at yahoo.com (Christian Bryant)
Date: Tue, 15 Aug 2006 10:29:14 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <DDA90CB9-2E7B-44BE-8BB8-F892463260F7@yahoo-inc.com>
Message-ID: <20060815172914.98499.qmail@web39801.mail.mud.yahoo.com>


As a _user_ more than a programmer, I have to say that
over the last 15 years I've seen many usage arguments
for various languages.  I consider myself a Perl
monger as a user and integrator, certainly not a
programmer, and I'm personally excited to see Perl 6
(which, by the way, I believe is a mostly transparent
change when it comes to language features) start
reaching the production environment in major
companies.  

I've worked with Java this last year on a level I'd
never had before in an online banking environment. 
All our Configuration Management tasks are automated
and controlled by Perl.  All our applications are
J2EE.  I see that as perfect symbiosis.  Nobody ever
suggested we use Java for the CM tasks - well, I
explored the notion then discounted it due to detailed
requirements analysis.

What I would say in response to this anecdote is, if
detailed requirements were written and it was
determined that in fact Java was the most useful
language for their task, then great!  I don't believe
the availability of coders in a language has any part
in such a decision, though.  Never discount a language
as useful, either.  As a systems integrator, I see the
value of multiple languages at work every day.

- CB

--- Eric Gradman <ehgrad at yahoo-inc.com> wrote:

> When I was a Perl Monger at Oversee.net, I conducted
> a sobering  
> interview.  We had a candidate come in the door with
> a strong command  
> of Perl (a rare event to be sure).  During the
> interview it came out  
> that he was learning Java.  I asked him why, and he
> explained that  
> former colleagues at Idealab had complained that due
> to the extreme  
> difficulty of finding competent Perl programmers,
> they were  
> increasingly starting new development projects in
> Java.  My jaw  
> dropped, and I spent the rest of the interview in
> shock.
> 
> Personally, I'm avoiding learning anything at all
> about Perl 6... I  
> worry that if I fall in love with new language
> features that I can't  
> use in a production environment for a decade, I'll
> have switch to a  
> different language that scratches that itch.  And
> despite their  
> faults, Python and Ruby have a lot of compelling
> features.
> 
> On Aug 14, 2006, at 12:59 PM, Todd Cranston-Cuebas
> wrote:
> 
> > While perl is very popular in LA, we should note
> that I'm hearing  
> > that perl
> > is being supplanted in a number of industries by
> languages like  
> > Python. For
> > example, python used more and more for movie
> industry "pipelining"
> > applications where images are pipelined through
> image processors  
> > until they
> > are then consolidated again for the final
> production. I've heard  
> > that this
> > industry was mostly perl and now may be as much
> 50/50 perl/python.  
> > The perl
> > foundation has to take this type of a shift
> seriously. I think each  
> > engineer
> > thinks in terms of their own, individual needs
> (which is  
> > understandable),
> > but the perl foundation needs to see perl in the
> context of a changing
> > industry. I know that they are and do take these
> points seriously. I
> > recently met with two perl foundation members to
> discuss this very  
> > point.
> >
> > I only mentioned ruby on rails in an earlier post
> since many people  
> > "stick"
> > with the language that scratched their earliest
> itches. This was  
> > clearly the
> > case for many PHP people. If perl is the language
> of choice only  
> > for ad-hoc
> > automation scripts or large-scale, complex
> solutions on the other  
> > extreme,
> > then you run the risk of having your potential
> "new blood" siphoned  
> > off by
> > other technologies that allow for the building of
> modest, but complete
> > solutions with lower learning curves. All
> groups/organizations/ 
> > entities need
> > to think in terms of the overall "health" of the
> community (e.g.,
> > maintaining a flow of new members, satisfying the
> needs of existing  
> > members,
> > etc.).
> >
> > Todd
> >
> >> -----Original Message-----
> >> From:
> losangeles-pm-bounces+tcc=ticketmaster.com at pm.org
> >>
>
[mailto:losangeles-pm-bounces+tcc=ticketmaster.com at pm.org]
> On
> >> Behalf Of Eric Hammond
> >> Sent: Monday, August 14, 2006 12:26 PM
> >> To: James Pitts
> >> Cc: losangeles-pm at pm.org
> >> Subject: Re: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
> >>
> >> James Pitts wrote:
> >>> Perl seems to be a strong thread throughout the
> Idealabs companies.
> >>> For those of you who worked at Shopzilla, eToys,
> and Citysearch, do
> >>> you know any of the history about how Bill
> Gross' companies became
> >>> perl shops? Was there a perl advocate from
> Caltech or JPL on the
> >>> Idealabs staff?
> >>
> >> I am pretty sure I can take credit for being the
> first Perl
> >> advocate at the first Idealab company.  I was one
> of the
> >> first technology folks hired at Citysearch and
> was writing
> >> and pushing Perl there in July 1996.
> >> I was previously coding Perl (and C, C++, etc) in
> Cincinnati
> >> before Caskey (18 at the time) asked me to move
> to LA for Citysearch.
> >>
> >> Though the Citysearch development team was not
> able to switch
> >> the front end to Perl until after I left, we did
> code large
> >> chunks of the back end in Perl and ended up with
> quite a few
> >> Perl lovers who spread out to other companies in
> the area.
> >> In particular two groups of developers left
> Citysearch and
> >> went to eToys (an Idealab company) and Rent.com
> (not an
> >> Idealab company).
> >>
> >> I don't know how Perl became popular at other
> Idealab
> >> companies and the rest of LA.  I'm sure it wasn't
> any one
> >> person's influence unless you count Larry.
> >>
> >> --
> >> Eric Hammond
> >> ehammond at thinksome.com
> >> _______________________________________________
> >> Losangeles-pm mailing list
> >> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> >> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
> >>
> > _______________________________________________
> > Losangeles-pm mailing list
> > Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> > http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
> >
> >
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Losangeles-pm mailing list
> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
> 


Regards,

Christian Bryant
A Los Angeles Perl Monger
http://la.pm.org/
Phone:  818-519-1880
E-mail:  perl.monger at yahoo.com

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around 
http://mail.yahoo.com 

From duong.v at gmail.com  Tue Aug 15 10:32:53 2006
From: duong.v at gmail.com (Duong Vu)
Date: Tue, 15 Aug 2006 10:32:53 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <DDA90CB9-2E7B-44BE-8BB8-F892463260F7@yahoo-inc.com>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035D0@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
	<DDA90CB9-2E7B-44BE-8BB8-F892463260F7@yahoo-inc.com>
Message-ID: <50b93bb00608151032x359ddc22obc2195f3a6ffb5f@mail.gmail.com>

One of the things I've observe in our industry, and not just the Perl
market, is that everyone wants seasoned veterans. No one seems to be
willing to hire junior anything in IT anymore.

In order for there more competent Perl developers with experience,
Perl companies need to be willing to hire and train young undeveloped
talents. Young kids out of college will commit themselves to what ever
pays the bills more often than what suites their personal interests or
likes. And very often, these kids won't know what they like yet.
Java/.Net with its many more  jobs will be much more attractive to
them.

In order for there to be more Perl shops, there need to be more Perl
developers. And if we want more Perl developers, we need to recruit,
train, and give them enough experiences so they are desirable.

Duong

On 8/15/06, Eric Gradman <ehgrad at yahoo-inc.com> wrote:
> When I was a Perl Monger at Oversee.net, I conducted a sobering
> interview.  We had a candidate come in the door with a strong command
> of Perl (a rare event to be sure).  During the interview it came out
> that he was learning Java.  I asked him why, and he explained that
> former colleagues at Idealab had complained that due to the extreme
> difficulty of finding competent Perl programmers, they were
> increasingly starting new development projects in Java.  My jaw
> dropped, and I spent the rest of the interview in shock.
>
> Personally, I'm avoiding learning anything at all about Perl 6... I
> worry that if I fall in love with new language features that I can't
> use in a production environment for a decade, I'll have switch to a
> different language that scratches that itch.  And despite their
> faults, Python and Ruby have a lot of compelling features.
>
> On Aug 14, 2006, at 12:59 PM, Todd Cranston-Cuebas wrote:
>
> > While perl is very popular in LA, we should note that I'm hearing
> > that perl
> > is being supplanted in a number of industries by languages like
> > Python. For
> > example, python used more and more for movie industry "pipelining"
> > applications where images are pipelined through image processors
> > until they
> > are then consolidated again for the final production. I've heard
> > that this
> > industry was mostly perl and now may be as much 50/50 perl/python.
> > The perl
> > foundation has to take this type of a shift seriously. I think each
> > engineer
> > thinks in terms of their own, individual needs (which is
> > understandable),
> > but the perl foundation needs to see perl in the context of a changing
> > industry. I know that they are and do take these points seriously. I
> > recently met with two perl foundation members to discuss this very
> > point.
> >
> > I only mentioned ruby on rails in an earlier post since many people
> > "stick"
> > with the language that scratched their earliest itches. This was
> > clearly the
> > case for many PHP people. If perl is the language of choice only
> > for ad-hoc
> > automation scripts or large-scale, complex solutions on the other
> > extreme,
> > then you run the risk of having your potential "new blood" siphoned
> > off by
> > other technologies that allow for the building of modest, but complete
> > solutions with lower learning curves. All groups/organizations/
> > entities need
> > to think in terms of the overall "health" of the community (e.g.,
> > maintaining a flow of new members, satisfying the needs of existing
> > members,
> > etc.).
> >
> > Todd
> >
> >> -----Original Message-----
> >> From: losangeles-pm-bounces+tcc=ticketmaster.com at pm.org
> >> [mailto:losangeles-pm-bounces+tcc=ticketmaster.com at pm.org] On
> >> Behalf Of Eric Hammond
> >> Sent: Monday, August 14, 2006 12:26 PM
> >> To: James Pitts
> >> Cc: losangeles-pm at pm.org
> >> Subject: Re: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
> >>
> >> James Pitts wrote:
> >>> Perl seems to be a strong thread throughout the Idealabs companies.
> >>> For those of you who worked at Shopzilla, eToys, and Citysearch, do
> >>> you know any of the history about how Bill Gross' companies became
> >>> perl shops? Was there a perl advocate from Caltech or JPL on the
> >>> Idealabs staff?
> >>
> >> I am pretty sure I can take credit for being the first Perl
> >> advocate at the first Idealab company.  I was one of the
> >> first technology folks hired at Citysearch and was writing
> >> and pushing Perl there in July 1996.
> >> I was previously coding Perl (and C, C++, etc) in Cincinnati
> >> before Caskey (18 at the time) asked me to move to LA for Citysearch.
> >>
> >> Though the Citysearch development team was not able to switch
> >> the front end to Perl until after I left, we did code large
> >> chunks of the back end in Perl and ended up with quite a few
> >> Perl lovers who spread out to other companies in the area.
> >> In particular two groups of developers left Citysearch and
> >> went to eToys (an Idealab company) and Rent.com (not an
> >> Idealab company).
> >>
> >> I don't know how Perl became popular at other Idealab
> >> companies and the rest of LA.  I'm sure it wasn't any one
> >> person's influence unless you count Larry.
> >>
> >> --
> >> Eric Hammond
> >> ehammond at thinksome.com
> >> _______________________________________________
> >> Losangeles-pm mailing list
> >> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> >> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
> >>
> > _______________________________________________
> > Losangeles-pm mailing list
> > Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> > http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
> >
> >
>
> _______________________________________________
> Losangeles-pm mailing list
> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
>

From nick at ccl4.org  Tue Aug 15 10:45:44 2006
From: nick at ccl4.org (Nicholas Clark)
Date: Tue, 15 Aug 2006 18:45:44 +0100
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <50b93bb00608151032x359ddc22obc2195f3a6ffb5f@mail.gmail.com>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035D0@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
	<DDA90CB9-2E7B-44BE-8BB8-F892463260F7@yahoo-inc.com>
	<50b93bb00608151032x359ddc22obc2195f3a6ffb5f@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <20060815174541.GA5342@plum.flirble.org>

I read this:

> On 8/15/06, Eric Gradman <ehgrad at yahoo-inc.com> wrote:

> > that he was learning Java.  I asked him why, and he explained that
> > former colleagues at Idealab had complained that due to the extreme
> > difficulty of finding competent Perl programmers, they were
> > increasingly starting new development projects in Java.  My jaw
> > dropped, and I spent the rest of the interview in shock.

And was about to write this very reply:

On Tue, Aug 15, 2006 at 10:32:53AM -0700, Duong Vu wrote:
> One of the things I've observe in our industry, and not just the Perl
> market, is that everyone wants seasoned veterans. No one seems to be
> willing to hire junior anything in IT anymore.
> 
> In order for there more competent Perl developers with experience,
> Perl companies need to be willing to hire and train young undeveloped
> talents. Young kids out of college will commit themselves to what ever
> pays the bills more often than what suites their personal interests or
> likes. And very often, these kids won't know what they like yet.
> Java/.Net with its many more  jobs will be much more attractive to
> them.
> 
> In order for there to be more Perl shops, there need to be more Perl
> developers. And if we want more Perl developers, we need to recruit,
> train, and give them enough experiences so they are desirable.

(So now I'm guilty of the Usenet sin not trimming any of it)

The only thing I can add is that nowhere I've worked has had any sort of
process of mentoring junior perl programmers into competent, senior perl
programmers. Every firm seems to expect to hire senior people straight out,
which isn't sustainable, as it gives no consideration to who is going to
train the next iteration.

This sort of naive policy *does* work with C, C++ or Java programmers (for
example, and for accountants, for that matter), because there are degree
courses churning them out, and there are large consulting firms that recruit
smart young things straight out of university and indoctrinate them into
their way of doing things. Although based on a straw poll of one at a
previous job, whilst the C++ programmer we hired ex-Logica was competent, he
didn't have anywhere near the breadth of knowledge that the self taught open
source hacking C++ programmer knew. So I'm not convinced that these mass
production factories are the answer either.

So, next question, how many recruiters/hiring managers on this list are
looking to recruit smart juniors and mentor them up?

Nicholas Clark

From Craig.McLane at ticketmaster.com  Tue Aug 15 11:09:12 2006
From: Craig.McLane at ticketmaster.com (Craig McLane)
Date: Tue, 15 Aug 2006 11:09:12 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
Message-ID: <D27EFF9FEC5BD44D8554294DC70F882105E43259@SUNCA-EXB-AV1.ticketmaster.corp>

Of the 8 software engineers we have hired in the last 12 months 6 were
hired with the knowledge that we would need to provide them training or
mentoring in Perl.  Several of them had prior experience in other
languages so they weren't junior by any means, but in all cases we
planed on helping develop their software engineering and Perl skills.

Craig



-----Original Message-----
<snip>

The only thing I can add is that nowhere I've worked has had any sort of
process of mentoring junior perl programmers into competent, senior perl
programmers. Every firm seems to expect to hire senior people straight
out,
which isn't sustainable, as it gives no consideration to who is going to
train the next iteration.


From ehgrad at yahoo-inc.com  Tue Aug 15 11:20:37 2006
From: ehgrad at yahoo-inc.com (Eric Gradman)
Date: Tue, 15 Aug 2006 11:20:37 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <20060815174541.GA5342@plum.flirble.org>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035D0@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
	<DDA90CB9-2E7B-44BE-8BB8-F892463260F7@yahoo-inc.com>
	<50b93bb00608151032x359ddc22obc2195f3a6ffb5f@mail.gmail.com>
	<20060815174541.GA5342@plum.flirble.org>
Message-ID: <15CFA267-6A6D-4358-B8F4-92DD5A0791AA@yahoo-inc.com>

At Oversee we did just that.  Just to be clear, I am no longer an  
employee of Oversee, but I have great things to say about them.  We  
hired good developers with good computer science skills (in whatever  
language), and sat them down with a Perl book.  I conducted multiple  
"Perl Boot Camps."  New developers' first couple weeks with the  
company were spent learning basic Perl, templating (TT), MVC design  
patterns, and database interaction.

What I noticed is that even a few months developing commercial  
software (in any language) made a new hire immeasurably more apt to  
pick up the Perl in our dev environment.  That is to say, I think the  
major stumbling block isn't so much the language but the patterns of  
development: MVC, etc. but also patterns for handling high traffic  
volumes, and even "how do I write code that talks to an SQL server?"   
That should come as no surprise, but I have a feeling that those  
sorts of patterns are easier to pick up in languages other than Perl.

TMTOWTDI (did I get that right?) can free experienced developers from  
the constraints that other languages impose.  Coming to Perl from C  
many years ago was an experience of "wow, I can write efficient code  
concisely in a fraction of the time with Perl"  But I would not want  
universities to necessarily churn out new developers who know Perl.   
There's More Than One Way To Do It, and 95% of them are crap.   
Identifying that 5% is easier if you've written production code in a  
more structured language.

On Aug 15, 2006, at 10:45 AM, Nicholas Clark wrote:

> I read this:
>
>> On 8/15/06, Eric Gradman <ehgrad at yahoo-inc.com> wrote:
>
>>> that he was learning Java.  I asked him why, and he explained that
>>> former colleagues at Idealab had complained that due to the extreme
>>> difficulty of finding competent Perl programmers, they were
>>> increasingly starting new development projects in Java.  My jaw
>>> dropped, and I spent the rest of the interview in shock.
>
> And was about to write this very reply:
>
> On Tue, Aug 15, 2006 at 10:32:53AM -0700, Duong Vu wrote:
>> One of the things I've observe in our industry, and not just the Perl
>> market, is that everyone wants seasoned veterans. No one seems to be
>> willing to hire junior anything in IT anymore.
>>
>> In order for there more competent Perl developers with experience,
>> Perl companies need to be willing to hire and train young undeveloped
>> talents. Young kids out of college will commit themselves to what  
>> ever
>> pays the bills more often than what suites their personal  
>> interests or
>> likes. And very often, these kids won't know what they like yet.
>> Java/.Net with its many more  jobs will be much more attractive to
>> them.
>>
>> In order for there to be more Perl shops, there need to be more Perl
>> developers. And if we want more Perl developers, we need to recruit,
>> train, and give them enough experiences so they are desirable.
>
> (So now I'm guilty of the Usenet sin not trimming any of it)
>
> The only thing I can add is that nowhere I've worked has had any  
> sort of
> process of mentoring junior perl programmers into competent, senior  
> perl
> programmers. Every firm seems to expect to hire senior people  
> straight out,
> which isn't sustainable, as it gives no consideration to who is  
> going to
> train the next iteration.
>
> This sort of naive policy *does* work with C, C++ or Java  
> programmers (for
> example, and for accountants, for that matter), because there are  
> degree
> courses churning them out, and there are large consulting firms  
> that recruit
> smart young things straight out of university and indoctrinate them  
> into
> their way of doing things. Although based on a straw poll of one at a
> previous job, whilst the C++ programmer we hired ex-Logica was  
> competent, he
> didn't have anywhere near the breadth of knowledge that the self  
> taught open
> source hacking C++ programmer knew. So I'm not convinced that these  
> mass
> production factories are the answer either.
>
> So, next question, how many recruiters/hiring managers on this list  
> are
> looking to recruit smart juniors and mentor them up?
>
> Nicholas Clark
>
>


From kevin+lapm at scaldeferri.com  Tue Aug 15 12:20:21 2006
From: kevin+lapm at scaldeferri.com (Kevin Scaldeferri)
Date: Tue, 15 Aug 2006 12:20:21 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <20060815174541.GA5342@plum.flirble.org>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D4035D0@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
	<DDA90CB9-2E7B-44BE-8BB8-F892463260F7@yahoo-inc.com>
	<50b93bb00608151032x359ddc22obc2195f3a6ffb5f@mail.gmail.com>
	<20060815174541.GA5342@plum.flirble.org>
Message-ID: <0e554e27134781886541157d9a7d5348@scaldeferri.com>


On Aug 15, 2006, at 10:45 AM, Nicholas Clark wrote:

>
> So, next question, how many recruiters/hiring managers on this list are
> looking to recruit smart juniors and mentor them up?
>

We (Overture/Yahoo Search Marketing) absolutely did bring people in as 
summer interns, and frequently hired them full-time after graduation.

Personally, I never used perl knowledge as a filter, even when hiring 
for jobs that were primarily perl programming.  (Well, that's not quite 
true.  If someone claimed to be a perl whiz but couldn't correctly 
answer intermediate perl questions, that would get them the axe.)  What 
was a problem in my view was the number of people, at any level of 
experience, who couldn't answer questions about freshman level CS: 
basic data structures and the like.


-kevin


From Todd.Cranston-Cuebas at Ticketmaster.com  Tue Aug 15 12:28:42 2006
From: Todd.Cranston-Cuebas at Ticketmaster.com (Todd Cranston-Cuebas)
Date: Tue, 15 Aug 2006 12:28:42 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
Message-ID: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D403601@pasmail3.office.tmcs>

Duong,

I can't agree with you more. One of my main concerns is that the industry as
a whole needs to have more of a "grow your own" philosophy. When the
industry was "down" a few years box, nobody hired juniors at all. It's not
that surprising that a 3-4 years later, there are no mid-level people now.

Basically, the funnel ran dry and it's time to fill up the funnel again.

Todd 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: losangeles-pm-bounces+tcc=ticketmaster.com at pm.org 
> [mailto:losangeles-pm-bounces+tcc=ticketmaster.com at pm.org] On 
> Behalf Of Duong Vu
> Sent: Tuesday, August 15, 2006 10:33 AM
> To: Eric Gradman
> Cc: losangeles-pm at pm.org
> Subject: Re: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
> 
> One of the things I've observe in our industry, and not just 
> the Perl market, is that everyone wants seasoned veterans. No 
> one seems to be willing to hire junior anything in IT anymore.
> 
> In order for there more competent Perl developers with 
> experience, Perl companies need to be willing to hire and 
> train young undeveloped talents. Young kids out of college 
> will commit themselves to what ever pays the bills more often 
> than what suites their personal interests or likes. And very 
> often, these kids won't know what they like yet.
> Java/.Net with its many more  jobs will be much more 
> attractive to them.
> 
> In order for there to be more Perl shops, there need to be 
> more Perl developers. And if we want more Perl developers, we 
> need to recruit, train, and give them enough experiences so 
> they are desirable.
> 
> Duong
> 
> On 8/15/06, Eric Gradman <ehgrad at yahoo-inc.com> wrote:
> > When I was a Perl Monger at Oversee.net, I conducted a sobering 
> > interview.  We had a candidate come in the door with a 
> strong command 
> > of Perl (a rare event to be sure).  During the interview it 
> came out 
> > that he was learning Java.  I asked him why, and he explained that 
> > former colleagues at Idealab had complained that due to the extreme 
> > difficulty of finding competent Perl programmers, they were 
> > increasingly starting new development projects in Java.  My jaw 
> > dropped, and I spent the rest of the interview in shock.
> >
> > Personally, I'm avoiding learning anything at all about Perl 6... I 
> > worry that if I fall in love with new language features 
> that I can't 
> > use in a production environment for a decade, I'll have switch to a 
> > different language that scratches that itch.  And despite their 
> > faults, Python and Ruby have a lot of compelling features.
> >
> > On Aug 14, 2006, at 12:59 PM, Todd Cranston-Cuebas wrote:
> >
> > > While perl is very popular in LA, we should note that I'm hearing 
> > > that perl is being supplanted in a number of industries 
> by languages 
> > > like Python. For example, python used more and more for movie 
> > > industry "pipelining"
> > > applications where images are pipelined through image processors 
> > > until they are then consolidated again for the final production. 
> > > I've heard that this industry was mostly perl and now may 
> be as much 
> > > 50/50 perl/python.
> > > The perl
> > > foundation has to take this type of a shift seriously. I 
> think each 
> > > engineer thinks in terms of their own, individual needs (which is 
> > > understandable), but the perl foundation needs to see perl in the 
> > > context of a changing industry. I know that they are and do take 
> > > these points seriously. I recently met with two perl foundation 
> > > members to discuss this very point.
> > >
> > > I only mentioned ruby on rails in an earlier post since 
> many people 
> > > "stick"
> > > with the language that scratched their earliest itches. This was 
> > > clearly the case for many PHP people. If perl is the language of 
> > > choice only for ad-hoc automation scripts or large-scale, complex 
> > > solutions on the other extreme, then you run the risk of 
> having your 
> > > potential "new blood" siphoned off by other technologies 
> that allow 
> > > for the building of modest, but complete solutions with lower 
> > > learning curves. All groups/organizations/ entities need 
> to think in 
> > > terms of the overall "health" of the community (e.g., 
> maintaining a 
> > > flow of new members, satisfying the needs of existing members, 
> > > etc.).
> > >
> > > Todd
> > >
> > >> -----Original Message-----
> > >> From: losangeles-pm-bounces+tcc=ticketmaster.com at pm.org
> > >> [mailto:losangeles-pm-bounces+tcc=ticketmaster.com at pm.org] On 
> > >> Behalf Of Eric Hammond
> > >> Sent: Monday, August 14, 2006 12:26 PM
> > >> To: James Pitts
> > >> Cc: losangeles-pm at pm.org
> > >> Subject: Re: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
> > >>
> > >> James Pitts wrote:
> > >>> Perl seems to be a strong thread throughout the 
> Idealabs companies.
> > >>> For those of you who worked at Shopzilla, eToys, and 
> Citysearch, 
> > >>> do you know any of the history about how Bill Gross' companies 
> > >>> became perl shops? Was there a perl advocate from 
> Caltech or JPL 
> > >>> on the Idealabs staff?
> > >>
> > >> I am pretty sure I can take credit for being the first Perl 
> > >> advocate at the first Idealab company.  I was one of the first 
> > >> technology folks hired at Citysearch and was writing and pushing 
> > >> Perl there in July 1996.
> > >> I was previously coding Perl (and C, C++, etc) in 
> Cincinnati before 
> > >> Caskey (18 at the time) asked me to move to LA for Citysearch.
> > >>
> > >> Though the Citysearch development team was not able to 
> switch the 
> > >> front end to Perl until after I left, we did code large 
> chunks of 
> > >> the back end in Perl and ended up with quite a few Perl 
> lovers who 
> > >> spread out to other companies in the area.
> > >> In particular two groups of developers left Citysearch 
> and went to 
> > >> eToys (an Idealab company) and Rent.com (not an Idealab company).
> > >>
> > >> I don't know how Perl became popular at other Idealab 
> companies and 
> > >> the rest of LA.  I'm sure it wasn't any one person's influence 
> > >> unless you count Larry.
> > >>
> > >> --
> > >> Eric Hammond
> > >> ehammond at thinksome.com
> > >> _______________________________________________
> > >> Losangeles-pm mailing list
> > >> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> > >> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
> > >>
> > > _______________________________________________
> > > Losangeles-pm mailing list
> > > Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> > > http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
> > >
> > >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Losangeles-pm mailing list
> > Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> > http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
> >
> _______________________________________________
> Losangeles-pm mailing list
> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
> 

From Todd.Cranston-Cuebas at Ticketmaster.com  Tue Aug 15 12:37:55 2006
From: Todd.Cranston-Cuebas at Ticketmaster.com (Todd Cranston-Cuebas)
Date: Tue, 15 Aug 2006 12:37:55 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
Message-ID: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D403602@pasmail3.office.tmcs>

Nicholas,

As an organization, Ticketmaster has supported the growth of engineers. We
have a number of positions where people who are not "full-fledged" engineers
can join the organization and get exposure to our development teams, QA
groups, operations teams, etc. For instance, we have roles in our
application support group where you get a birds-eye view of the systems and
teams that come together to essentially become Ticketmaster.com. In this
role, the app support engineer can build their perl skills writing utilities
for their team while seeing how a very large, enterprise-wide system works.
A junior engineer has to be willing to spend some time in this role to learn
and grow and understand that they will not be heads down coding all day.
They will be learning and supporting a mission-critical application.

On the other hand, we do also bring in very bright junior engineers directly
into our engineering teams. Typically, these associate-level engineers are
really quite exceptional in terms of their drive, ambition, love of the
technology as a whole, etc., but clearly may lack real-world work
experience, skills, and knowledge. Basically, I do my best to keep my eyes
out for talent that can be groomed into a solid engineer. Drive, ambition,
and a proven ability to "create" through either open-source projects or even
part-time employment during school, all help. In our case, being solid in
perl is really a major plus. I can't always make these roles available, but
we do our best to accommodate the available market (i.e., if someone is
available with these basic traits, we'll do our best to make a role
available).

Todd

> -----Original Message-----
> From: losangeles-pm-bounces+tcc=ticketmaster.com at pm.org 
> [mailto:losangeles-pm-bounces+tcc=ticketmaster.com at pm.org] On 
> Behalf Of Nicholas Clark
> Sent: Tuesday, August 15, 2006 10:46 AM
> To: Duong Vu
> Cc: losangeles-pm at pm.org
> Subject: Re: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
> 
> I read this:
> 
> > On 8/15/06, Eric Gradman <ehgrad at yahoo-inc.com> wrote:
> 
> > > that he was learning Java.  I asked him why, and he 
> explained that 
> > > former colleagues at Idealab had complained that due to 
> the extreme 
> > > difficulty of finding competent Perl programmers, they were 
> > > increasingly starting new development projects in Java.  My jaw 
> > > dropped, and I spent the rest of the interview in shock.
> 
> And was about to write this very reply:
> 
> On Tue, Aug 15, 2006 at 10:32:53AM -0700, Duong Vu wrote:
> > One of the things I've observe in our industry, and not 
> just the Perl 
> > market, is that everyone wants seasoned veterans. No one 
> seems to be 
> > willing to hire junior anything in IT anymore.
> > 
> > In order for there more competent Perl developers with experience, 
> > Perl companies need to be willing to hire and train young 
> undeveloped 
> > talents. Young kids out of college will commit themselves 
> to what ever 
> > pays the bills more often than what suites their personal 
> interests or 
> > likes. And very often, these kids won't know what they like yet.
> > Java/.Net with its many more  jobs will be much more attractive to 
> > them.
> > 
> > In order for there to be more Perl shops, there need to be 
> more Perl 
> > developers. And if we want more Perl developers, we need to 
> recruit, 
> > train, and give them enough experiences so they are desirable.
> 
> (So now I'm guilty of the Usenet sin not trimming any of it)
> 
> The only thing I can add is that nowhere I've worked has had 
> any sort of process of mentoring junior perl programmers into 
> competent, senior perl programmers. Every firm seems to 
> expect to hire senior people straight out, which isn't 
> sustainable, as it gives no consideration to who is going to 
> train the next iteration.
> 
> This sort of naive policy *does* work with C, C++ or Java 
> programmers (for example, and for accountants, for that 
> matter), because there are degree courses churning them out, 
> and there are large consulting firms that recruit smart young 
> things straight out of university and indoctrinate them into 
> their way of doing things. Although based on a straw poll of 
> one at a previous job, whilst the C++ programmer we hired 
> ex-Logica was competent, he didn't have anywhere near the 
> breadth of knowledge that the self taught open source hacking 
> C++ programmer knew. So I'm not convinced that these mass 
> production factories are the answer either.
> 
> So, next question, how many recruiters/hiring managers on 
> this list are looking to recruit smart juniors and mentor them up?
> 
> Nicholas Clark
> _______________________________________________
> Losangeles-pm mailing list
> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
> 

From perl.monger at yahoo.com  Tue Aug 15 13:18:01 2006
From: perl.monger at yahoo.com (Christian Bryant)
Date: Tue, 15 Aug 2006 13:18:01 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
Message-ID: <20060815201801.66088.qmail@web39811.mail.mud.yahoo.com>

Hehe ;)  That was a light-hearted prod, and I just
realized that I hadn't finished my thought with a
smile :)  The folks in the Thousand Oaks PM and guys
at Value Click are great ;)  Keep up the good work
guys ;)

This just happens to be where I get my most essential 
Perl info, so, hats off to Ticketmaster and the LA PM
for keeping us all on-topic, and always keeping the
information critical.

- CB

> 
> --- Todd Cranston-Cuebas
> <Todd.Cranston-Cuebas at Ticketmaster.com> wrote:
> 
> > Christian,
> > 
> > Glad to hear ;)
> > 
> > Todd 
> > 
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: Christian Bryant
> > [mailto:perl.monger at yahoo.com] 
> > > Sent: Monday, August 14, 2006 8:15 PM
> > > To: Todd Cranston-Cuebas
> > > Cc: losangeles-pm at pm.org
> > > Subject: Re: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
> > > 
> > > 
> > > On a completely side note, did Randal ever
> appear
> > at 
> > > Ticketmaster?  We had just wrapped up our Perl
> > training with 
> > > Mr. Sherer of the TO PM, when we learned
> Schwartz
> > was, then 
> > > wasn't showing up at Value Click. 
> > > Personally, I'd prefer Ticketmaster where all
> the
> > real Perl 
> > > elite work...
> > > 
> > > 
> > > Regards,
> > > 
> > > Christian Bryant
> > > A Los Angeles Perl Monger
> > > http://la.pm.org/
> > > Phone:  818-519-1880
> > > E-mail:  perl.monger at yahoo.com
> > > 
> > >
> __________________________________________________
> > > Do You Yahoo!?
> > > Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam
> > protection 
> > > around http://mail.yahoo.com 
> > > 
> > 
> 
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Christian Bryant
> A Los Angeles Perl Monger
> http://la.pm.org/
>
http://thousand-oaks-perl.org/bin/view/Main/ChristianBryant
> Phone:  310-479-3293
> E-mail:  perl.monger at yahoo.com
> 
> __________________________________________________
> Do You Yahoo!?
> Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam
> protection around 
> http://mail.yahoo.com 
> 


Regards,

Christian Bryant
A Los Angeles Perl Monger
http://la.pm.org/
http://thousand-oaks-perl.org/bin/view/Main/ChristianBryant
Phone:  310-479-3293
E-mail:  perl.monger at yahoo.com

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around 
http://mail.yahoo.com 

From apisoni at shopzilla.com  Thu Aug 17 11:18:03 2006
From: apisoni at shopzilla.com (Adam Pisoni)
Date: Thu, 17 Aug 2006 11:18:03 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D403602@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
References: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D403602@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
Message-ID: <93DEE264-D91F-4E79-B5E3-DEDB2FE9859F@shopzilla.com>

I gave up using knowledge of Perl as a filter for engineers a while  
ago.    I found that the vast majority of people responding to our  
add for Perl engineers did not have a firm enough grasp of OO  
architecture and design.   So now I basically use general engineering  
and OO proficiency as my main filter.  That said, people with a firm  
grasp of OO often use Perl as a way of filtering out us.   Obviously  
I have to tell them they will be learning and working with Perl.    
Its hard to find people who are passionate about OO, but are also  
interested in learning/using Perl.    The hardcore OO people moving  
away from Java or C++ tend to be moving towards languages like Python  
and Ruby.   I have no problem teaching someone Perl, but it takes far  
to long to turn a functional programmer into an OO programmer.

Thanks,
Adam


On Aug 15, 2006, at 12:37 PM, Todd Cranston-Cuebas wrote:

> Nicholas,
>
> As an organization, Ticketmaster has supported the growth of  
> engineers. We
> have a number of positions where people who are not "full-fledged"  
> engineers
> can join the organization and get exposure to our development  
> teams, QA
> groups, operations teams, etc. For instance, we have roles in our
> application support group where you get a birds-eye view of the  
> systems and
> teams that come together to essentially become Ticketmaster.com. In  
> this
> role, the app support engineer can build their perl skills writing  
> utilities
> for their team while seeing how a very large, enterprise-wide  
> system works.
> A junior engineer has to be willing to spend some time in this role  
> to learn
> and grow and understand that they will not be heads down coding all  
> day.
> They will be learning and supporting a mission-critical application.
>
> On the other hand, we do also bring in very bright junior engineers  
> directly
> into our engineering teams. Typically, these associate-level  
> engineers are
> really quite exceptional in terms of their drive, ambition, love of  
> the
> technology as a whole, etc., but clearly may lack real-world work
> experience, skills, and knowledge. Basically, I do my best to keep  
> my eyes
> out for talent that can be groomed into a solid engineer. Drive,  
> ambition,
> and a proven ability to "create" through either open-source  
> projects or even
> part-time employment during school, all help. In our case, being  
> solid in
> perl is really a major plus. I can't always make these roles  
> available, but
> we do our best to accommodate the available market (i.e., if  
> someone is
> available with these basic traits, we'll do our best to make a role
> available).
>
> Todd
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: losangeles-pm-bounces+tcc=ticketmaster.com at pm.org
>> [mailto:losangeles-pm-bounces+tcc=ticketmaster.com at pm.org] On
>> Behalf Of Nicholas Clark
>> Sent: Tuesday, August 15, 2006 10:46 AM
>> To: Duong Vu
>> Cc: losangeles-pm at pm.org
>> Subject: Re: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
>>
>> I read this:
>>
>>> On 8/15/06, Eric Gradman <ehgrad at yahoo-inc.com> wrote:
>>
>>>> that he was learning Java.  I asked him why, and he
>> explained that
>>>> former colleagues at Idealab had complained that due to
>> the extreme
>>>> difficulty of finding competent Perl programmers, they were
>>>> increasingly starting new development projects in Java.  My jaw
>>>> dropped, and I spent the rest of the interview in shock.
>>
>> And was about to write this very reply:
>>
>> On Tue, Aug 15, 2006 at 10:32:53AM -0700, Duong Vu wrote:
>>> One of the things I've observe in our industry, and not
>> just the Perl
>>> market, is that everyone wants seasoned veterans. No one
>> seems to be
>>> willing to hire junior anything in IT anymore.
>>>
>>> In order for there more competent Perl developers with experience,
>>> Perl companies need to be willing to hire and train young
>> undeveloped
>>> talents. Young kids out of college will commit themselves
>> to what ever
>>> pays the bills more often than what suites their personal
>> interests or
>>> likes. And very often, these kids won't know what they like yet.
>>> Java/.Net with its many more  jobs will be much more attractive to
>>> them.
>>>
>>> In order for there to be more Perl shops, there need to be
>> more Perl
>>> developers. And if we want more Perl developers, we need to
>> recruit,
>>> train, and give them enough experiences so they are desirable.
>>
>> (So now I'm guilty of the Usenet sin not trimming any of it)
>>
>> The only thing I can add is that nowhere I've worked has had
>> any sort of process of mentoring junior perl programmers into
>> competent, senior perl programmers. Every firm seems to
>> expect to hire senior people straight out, which isn't
>> sustainable, as it gives no consideration to who is going to
>> train the next iteration.
>>
>> This sort of naive policy *does* work with C, C++ or Java
>> programmers (for example, and for accountants, for that
>> matter), because there are degree courses churning them out,
>> and there are large consulting firms that recruit smart young
>> things straight out of university and indoctrinate them into
>> their way of doing things. Although based on a straw poll of
>> one at a previous job, whilst the C++ programmer we hired
>> ex-Logica was competent, he didn't have anywhere near the
>> breadth of knowledge that the self taught open source hacking
>> C++ programmer knew. So I'm not convinced that these mass
>> production factories are the answer either.
>>
>> So, next question, how many recruiters/hiring managers on
>> this list are looking to recruit smart juniors and mentor them up?
>>
>> Nicholas Clark
>> _______________________________________________
>> Losangeles-pm mailing list
>> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
>> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
>>
> _______________________________________________
> Losangeles-pm mailing list
> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm


From ben_tilly at operamail.com  Thu Aug 17 15:49:35 2006
From: ben_tilly at operamail.com (Benjamin J. Tilly)
Date: Fri, 18 Aug 2006 06:49:35 +0800
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
Message-ID: <20060817224935.8CD673AA3D3@ws5-8.us4.outblaze.com>

"Adam Pisoni" <apisoni at shopzilla.com> wrote:
>
> I gave up using knowledge of Perl as a filter for engineers a while
> ago.    I found that the vast majority of people responding to our
> add for Perl engineers did not have a firm enough grasp of OO
> architecture and design.   So now I basically use general engineering
> and OO proficiency as my main filter.

We use general engineering and database instead.  Basically replace OO design questions with database design questions.  Same general goal.  Perl is a lot easier to teach than intelligence and good design sense.

>              That said, people with a firm
> grasp of OO often use Perl as a way of filtering out us.   Obviously
> I have to tell them they will be learning and working with Perl.
> Its hard to find people who are passionate about OO, but are also
> interested in learning/using Perl.    The hardcore OO people moving
> away from Java or C++ tend to be moving towards languages like Python
> and Ruby.

We are up front about using Perl so don't have any sense of how many get filtered out.  But we've been told that people who go through our interview wind up convinced that they will be working with a bright team that they will learn from.

>   I have no problem teaching someone Perl, but it takes far
> to long to turn a functional programmer into an OO programmer.

And this is the only thing I really wanted to respond to.

When you say "functional programmer", I think of someone who is used to using things like higher order functions.  Think MJD's Higher Order Perl.  I have yet to meet someone at that level of skill who had any problem using OO techniques.  The reverse is not true.

What I think you meant is that it is not easy to turn an imperative programmer into an OO programmer.  This I would agree with.  Furthermore I would say that there are lots of people who think that they are OO programmers but who are just doing imperative programming with a slight OO facade.  There isn't really anything wrong with this - it gets the job done - but it misses the point of what OO means.

Ah heck, since I'm responding, let's wander off to talk about a question that Nicholas raised.

About mentoring new programmers.  One problem with Perl in particular is that Perl is very well suited to working with small teams of very good people.  You want your team size to remain small enough that communication overhead doesn't destroy productivity, and also small enough that you can depend on everyone having enough personal discipline to avoid doing some of the spectacularly stupid things which Perl allows you to do.  However such teams have very little room for including and mentoring junior programmers.

By contrast a language like Java is geared towards having larger teams of less productive people.  In that kind of environment you simply cannot insist that each and every person be top notch.  And once you've accepted that fact, it is much easier to work junior programmers into your team, and therefore is easier to mentor them.  Oh, and a side benefit, there wind up being more Java jobs.

Incidentally this is not meant as a slam against Java - it seems to be a deliberate design decision.  If you're going to have a large team work together, you need to limit the damage that one bozo can do.  Those barriers also limit productivity, which in turn pushes team size up.  And, of course, once team size reaches a certain point, you need to organize it to avoid having too many lines of communication out of self-defence.  (Else, as Brooks noted, people wind up wasting more of each other's time than they can personally contribute.)  At which point productivity drops even further.  But now you can scale pretty well - add enough people and you can get a lot of throughput.

In Perl teams that I've worked on, by contrast, the goal is to get as much done as possible with a small team.  This philosophy is *great* for a startup since a good small team of highly paid people is a lot cheaper and faster than a large team of less well paid people.  I haven't personally experienced it in the context of a large company, but if I stay at Rent long enough, I'm sure I'll find out.

Cheers,
Ben

PS Like everyone else, we are looking to hire another Perl engineer and another QA person.

From perl.monger at yahoo.com  Fri Aug 18 11:30:43 2006
From: perl.monger at yahoo.com (Christian Bryant)
Date: Fri, 18 Aug 2006 11:30:43 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: [LA.pm] Perl Tk UML Requirements GUI
Message-ID: <20060818183043.4919.qmail@web39813.mail.mud.yahoo.com>


I'm about to do research on what existing projects
there are in the realm of requirements software
written in Perl Tk.  There are plenty in C++, Java and
the like, but I have a specific need for the
application to be Perl.

On the off chance someone here has already seen
something like this, here are my basic requirements:

1.  Allow Tk GUI creation of UML-based Use Cases.
2.  Generate Perl code from Use Case requirements
(anything from templates to actual scripts).
3.  Run on both GNU/Linux and UNIX flavors as well
as Win32 (via Cygwin or ActiveState).

If there is interest in this topic beyond this, when I
find something applicable I shall post the results of
the research.

Much thanks.


Regards,

Christian Bryant
A Los Angeles Perl Monger
http://la.pm.org/
http://thousand-oaks-perl.org/bin/view/Main/ChristianBryant
Phone:  310-479-3293
E-mail:  perl.monger at yahoo.com

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around 
http://mail.yahoo.com 

From naterajj at gmail.com  Fri Aug 18 11:55:09 2006
From: naterajj at gmail.com (Juan Jose Natera)
Date: Fri, 18 Aug 2006 11:55:09 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] Perl Tk UML Requirements GUI
In-Reply-To: <20060818183043.4919.qmail@web39813.mail.mud.yahoo.com>
References: <20060818183043.4919.qmail@web39813.mail.mud.yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <349627440608181155q4d65b430o1583baa8b2992db3@mail.gmail.com>

Hi,

I haven't seen anything exactly like you need it, however I have
played with following projects with Ok, results.

Umbrello, a UML modeler for KDE that can generate Perl Code from
_class diagrams_.
glade, a GTK GUI Builder that can generate perl-GTK code.

If I wanted to write a Portable GUI application in Perl I think I
would use wxPerl rather than Tk, that's just me though.

JJ



On 8/18/06, Christian Bryant <perl.monger at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> I'm about to do research on what existing projects
> there are in the realm of requirements software
> written in Perl Tk.  There are plenty in C++, Java and
> the like, but I have a specific need for the
> application to be Perl.
>
> On the off chance someone here has already seen
> something like this, here are my basic requirements:
>
> 1.  Allow Tk GUI creation of UML-based Use Cases.
> 2.  Generate Perl code from Use Case requirements
> (anything from templates to actual scripts).
> 3.  Run on both GNU/Linux and UNIX flavors as well
> as Win32 (via Cygwin or ActiveState).
>
> If there is interest in this topic beyond this, when I
> find something applicable I shall post the results of
> the research.
>
> Much thanks.
>
>
> Regards,
>
> Christian Bryant
> A Los Angeles Perl Monger
> http://la.pm.org/
> http://thousand-oaks-perl.org/bin/view/Main/ChristianBryant
> Phone:  310-479-3293
> E-mail:  perl.monger at yahoo.com
>
> __________________________________________________
> Do You Yahoo!?
> Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
> http://mail.yahoo.com
> _______________________________________________
> Losangeles-pm mailing list
> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
>

From remarbach at yahoo.com  Fri Aug 18 12:01:44 2006
From: remarbach at yahoo.com (Randall Marbach)
Date: Fri, 18 Aug 2006 12:01:44 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: [LA.pm] Fwd: Re:  Perl Tk UML Requirements GUI
Message-ID: <20060818190144.69805.qmail@web39611.mail.mud.yahoo.com>



--- Randall Marbach <remarbach at yahoo.com> wrote:

> Date: Fri, 18 Aug 2006 11:37:08 -0700 (PDT)
> From: Randall Marbach <remarbach at yahoo.com>
> Subject: Re: [LA.pm] Perl Tk UML Requirements GUI
> To: Christian Bryant <perl.monger at yahoo.com>
> 
> Recently, there was an article on www.perl.com 
> 
> Generating UML and Interaction Diagrams
> 
>
<http://www.perl.com/pub/a/2006/08/03/sequence-diagrams.html>
> 
> I'd be interested in the results of your research..
> 
> HTH
> 
> Randy 
> 
> --- Christian Bryant <perl.monger at yahoo.com> wrote:
> 
> > 
> > I'm about to do research on what existing projects
> > there are in the realm of requirements software
> > written in Perl Tk.  There are plenty in C++, Java
> > and
> > the like, but I have a specific need for the
> > application to be Perl.
> > 
> > On the off chance someone here has already seen
> > something like this, here are my basic
> requirements:
> > 
> > 1.  Allow Tk GUI creation of UML-based Use Cases.
> > 2.  Generate Perl code from Use Case requirements
> > (anything from templates to actual scripts).
> > 3.  Run on both GNU/Linux and UNIX flavors as well
> > as Win32 (via Cygwin or ActiveState).
> > 
> > If there is interest in this topic beyond this,
> when
> > I
> > find something applicable I shall post the results
> > of
> > the research.
> > 
> > Much thanks.
> > 
> > 
> > Regards,
> > 
> > Christian Bryant
> > A Los Angeles Perl Monger
> > http://la.pm.org/
> >
>
http://thousand-oaks-perl.org/bin/view/Main/ChristianBryant
> > Phone:  310-479-3293
> > E-mail:  perl.monger at yahoo.com
> > 
> > __________________________________________________
> > Do You Yahoo!?
> > Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam
> > protection around 
> > http://mail.yahoo.com 
> > _______________________________________________
> > Losangeles-pm mailing list
> > Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> > http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
> > 
> 
> 
> __________________________________________________
> Do You Yahoo!?
> Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam
> protection around 
> http://mail.yahoo.com 
> 


__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around 
http://mail.yahoo.com 

From perl.monger at yahoo.com  Fri Aug 18 13:16:56 2006
From: perl.monger at yahoo.com (Christian Bryant)
Date: Fri, 18 Aug 2006 13:16:56 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: [LA.pm] Perl Tk UML Requirements GUI
In-Reply-To: <349627440608181155q4d65b430o1583baa8b2992db3@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <20060818201656.35915.qmail@web39808.mail.mud.yahoo.com>


I'm definitely moving forward with Randall's link to
the UML::Sequence module.  We'll see how that goes. 
I've also used Umbrello, but my last two companies are
Microsoft-oriented, alas, and StarUML for Windows
offers some nice output using MS Office formats.  Such
is life.

However, you remind me that I've seen some very nice
code that uses wxPerl.  I'd need to define some
technical reasons to go with that over Tk but it's
really not that big an issue.  As long as the whole
application is well managed and portable, I'm happy.

Appreciate the response.

Cheers.

--- Juan Jose Natera <naterajj at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi,
> 
> I haven't seen anything exactly like you need it,
> however I have
> played with following projects with Ok, results.
> 
> Umbrello, a UML modeler for KDE that can generate
> Perl Code from
> _class diagrams_.
> glade, a GTK GUI Builder that can generate perl-GTK
> code.
> 
> If I wanted to write a Portable GUI application in
> Perl I think I
> would use wxPerl rather than Tk, that's just me
> though.
> 
> JJ
> 
> 
> 
> On 8/18/06, Christian Bryant <perl.monger at yahoo.com>
> wrote:
> >
> > I'm about to do research on what existing projects
> > there are in the realm of requirements software
> > written in Perl Tk.  There are plenty in C++, Java
> and
> > the like, but I have a specific need for the
> > application to be Perl.
> >
> > On the off chance someone here has already seen
> > something like this, here are my basic
> requirements:
> >
> > 1.  Allow Tk GUI creation of UML-based Use Cases.
> > 2.  Generate Perl code from Use Case requirements
> > (anything from templates to actual scripts).
> > 3.  Run on both GNU/Linux and UNIX flavors as well
> > as Win32 (via Cygwin or ActiveState).
> >
> > If there is interest in this topic beyond this,
> when I
> > find something applicable I shall post the results
> of
> > the research.
> >
> > Much thanks.
> >
> >
> > Regards,
> >
> > Christian Bryant
> > A Los Angeles Perl Monger
> > http://la.pm.org/
> >
>
http://thousand-oaks-perl.org/bin/view/Main/ChristianBryant
> > Phone:  310-479-3293
> > E-mail:  perl.monger at yahoo.com
> >
> > __________________________________________________
> > Do You Yahoo!?
> > Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam
> protection around
> > http://mail.yahoo.com
> > _______________________________________________
> > Losangeles-pm mailing list
> > Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> > http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
> >
> 


Regards,

Christian Bryant
A Los Angeles Perl Monger
http://la.pm.org/
http://thousand-oaks-perl.org/bin/view/Main/ChristianBryant
Phone:  310-479-3293
E-mail:  perl.monger at yahoo.com

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around 
http://mail.yahoo.com 

From apisoni at shopzilla.com  Fri Aug 18 13:32:33 2006
From: apisoni at shopzilla.com (Adam Pisoni)
Date: Fri, 18 Aug 2006 13:32:33 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <20060817224935.8CD673AA3D3@ws5-8.us4.outblaze.com>
References: <20060817224935.8CD673AA3D3@ws5-8.us4.outblaze.com>
Message-ID: <D025468E-49C7-4A0C-B44E-06E3C2A7E15A@shopzilla.com>

Ben,

I concur on Perl being best for teams of really smart people.  In my  
experience, one junior programmer can more than do his/her weight in  
damage for a long time to come.   We just fixed a bug on our site  
last week caused by an engineer who was let go of 2 years ago.     
That's why its even MORE important when hiring Perl programmers that  
you hire very skilled engineers (even if their not Perl gurus).

Do we know anyone who's worked in a team of Ruby, Python and/or PHP  
engineers to see if they have similar sentiments?

Thanks,
Adam


On Aug 17, 2006, at 3:49 PM, Benjamin J. Tilly wrote:

> "Adam Pisoni" <apisoni at shopzilla.com> wrote:
>>
>> I gave up using knowledge of Perl as a filter for engineers a while
>> ago.    I found that the vast majority of people responding to our
>> add for Perl engineers did not have a firm enough grasp of OO
>> architecture and design.   So now I basically use general engineering
>> and OO proficiency as my main filter.
>
> We use general engineering and database instead.  Basically replace  
> OO design questions with database design questions.  Same general  
> goal.  Perl is a lot easier to teach than intelligence and good  
> design sense.
>
>>              That said, people with a firm
>> grasp of OO often use Perl as a way of filtering out us.   Obviously
>> I have to tell them they will be learning and working with Perl.
>> Its hard to find people who are passionate about OO, but are also
>> interested in learning/using Perl.    The hardcore OO people moving
>> away from Java or C++ tend to be moving towards languages like Python
>> and Ruby.
>
> We are up front about using Perl so don't have any sense of how  
> many get filtered out.  But we've been told that people who go  
> through our interview wind up convinced that they will be working  
> with a bright team that they will learn from.
>
>>   I have no problem teaching someone Perl, but it takes far
>> to long to turn a functional programmer into an OO programmer.
>
> And this is the only thing I really wanted to respond to.
>
> When you say "functional programmer", I think of someone who is  
> used to using things like higher order functions.  Think MJD's  
> Higher Order Perl.  I have yet to meet someone at that level of  
> skill who had any problem using OO techniques.  The reverse is not  
> true.
>
> What I think you meant is that it is not easy to turn an imperative  
> programmer into an OO programmer.  This I would agree with.   
> Furthermore I would say that there are lots of people who think  
> that they are OO programmers but who are just doing imperative  
> programming with a slight OO facade.  There isn't really anything  
> wrong with this - it gets the job done - but it misses the point of  
> what OO means.
>
> Ah heck, since I'm responding, let's wander off to talk about a  
> question that Nicholas raised.
>
> About mentoring new programmers.  One problem with Perl in  
> particular is that Perl is very well suited to working with small  
> teams of very good people.  You want your team size to remain small  
> enough that communication overhead doesn't destroy productivity,  
> and also small enough that you can depend on everyone having enough  
> personal discipline to avoid doing some of the spectacularly stupid  
> things which Perl allows you to do.  However such teams have very  
> little room for including and mentoring junior programmers.
>
> By contrast a language like Java is geared towards having larger  
> teams of less productive people.  In that kind of environment you  
> simply cannot insist that each and every person be top notch.  And  
> once you've accepted that fact, it is much easier to work junior  
> programmers into your team, and therefore is easier to mentor  
> them.  Oh, and a side benefit, there wind up being more Java jobs.
>
> Incidentally this is not meant as a slam against Java - it seems to  
> be a deliberate design decision.  If you're going to have a large  
> team work together, you need to limit the damage that one bozo can  
> do.  Those barriers also limit productivity, which in turn pushes  
> team size up.  And, of course, once team size reaches a certain  
> point, you need to organize it to avoid having too many lines of  
> communication out of self-defence.  (Else, as Brooks noted, people  
> wind up wasting more of each other's time than they can personally  
> contribute.)  At which point productivity drops even further.  But  
> now you can scale pretty well - add enough people and you can get a  
> lot of throughput.
>
> In Perl teams that I've worked on, by contrast, the goal is to get  
> as much done as possible with a small team.  This philosophy is  
> *great* for a startup since a good small team of highly paid people  
> is a lot cheaper and faster than a large team of less well paid  
> people.  I haven't personally experienced it in the context of a  
> large company, but if I stay at Rent long enough, I'm sure I'll  
> find out.
>
> Cheers,
> Ben
>
> PS Like everyone else, we are looking to hire another Perl engineer  
> and another QA person.


From jleader at alumni.caltech.edu  Fri Aug 18 18:05:54 2006
From: jleader at alumni.caltech.edu (Jeremy Leader)
Date: Fri, 18 Aug 2006 18:05:54 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] [JOB] Perl Hacker, SQL (in Sunnyvale)
Message-ID: <44E663F2.3040100@alumni.caltech.edu>

I don't usually do this, but it seems somewhat relevant to the recent 
discussions about Perl jobs, though it's up North in Sunnyvale.  Besides, if you 
mention my name, and you get hired, I could get a bonus ;)

-- 
Jeremy Leader
jleader at alumni.caltech.edu
leaderj at yahoo-inc.com (work)

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Job No.: RX1000013194
Location: US - Sunnyvale
Job Function: ENGINEERING / INFO. SYSTEMS

Are you a motivated perl hacker?
... a self starter needing little supervisions?
... interested in developer support tools?
Then the platform engineering team is looking for you!

Come join us and build the next generation of host configuration,
package management, and release engineering tools used by Yahoo!
developers worldwide.  Ideal candidates should be able to develop
working relationships with members of the various engineering teams at Yahoo!
Basic Qualifications:
Perl and Unix is required.

Preferred Qualifications:
A BS/MS in Computer Science or equivalent and 4+ years experience
Experience with SQL, PHP, Subversion, CVS,
Perforce, and Makefiles a plus
Yahoo! Inc is an equal opportunity employer. For more information or to search 
all of our openings, please visit
http://careers.yahoo.com
HJIIT10


From ben_tilly at operamail.com  Fri Aug 18 18:07:26 2006
From: ben_tilly at operamail.com (Benjamin J. Tilly)
Date: Sat, 19 Aug 2006 09:07:26 +0800
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
Message-ID: <20060819010726.E1D8D3AA3D3@ws5-8.us4.outblaze.com>

"Adam Pisoni" <apisoni at shopzilla.com> wrote:
>
> Ben,
> 
> I concur on Perl being best for teams of really smart people.  In 
> my  experience, one junior programmer can more than do his/her 
> weight in  damage for a long time to come.   We just fixed a bug on 
> our site  last week caused by an engineer who was let go of 2 years 
> ago.     That's why its even MORE important when hiring Perl 
> programmers that  you hire very skilled engineers (even if their 
> not Perl gurus).

I think our policy is to blame all bugs on the person who
most recently left the team.  Right, Eric? :-)

Based on lots of theory, I believe that a good solution to
both problems is to use lots of code reviews - don't let
any code go into production without having it reviewed.
This both limits damage from junior programmers and causes
lots of mentoring to happen.  Which also means that junior
people don't remain junior for long.  There are other
benefits, for instance IBM's research indicates that code
reviews are the most cost effective form of QA.

But as great as the theory is, I don't have much practical
experience with that approach.  And there are drawbacks.
Primary among them being the fact that many programmers
will get upset when their code is reviewed by someone else
in detail.  Plus the visible overhead is hard for a lot of
people to swallow.  Still I'd like that environment.

> Do we know anyone who's worked in a team of Ruby, Python and/or PHP 
>   engineers to see if they have similar sentiments?

Important caveat.  Do we know anyone GOOD who has worked
in those languages to see what their sentiments are?
There are lots of programmers out there.  Most aren't
very good.  I'm only really interested in the opinions of
the good minority.

PHP in particular attracts lots of bad programmers.  Not
their fault - it comes with being the most popular entry
language for non-programmers who want to do cool stuff.
A few years ago Perl suffered from the same phenomena.
(Still does to some extent, but not as badly.)  That
isn't to say that there aren't some really, really good
PHP people out there.  There are.  But I'm going to
discount anything I hear from a PHP programmer until I
get convinced that they know what they are doing.

In fact we do have someone who can offer an opinion.
Robert, speak up.  I understand that you've been working
in Python at Google.  That's relevant experience.  Say
something. :-)

> Thanks,
> Adam

Cheers,
Ben

> On Aug 17, 2006, at 3:49 PM, Benjamin J. Tilly wrote:
[...]
> > Ah heck, since I'm responding, let's wander off to talk about a  
> > question that Nicholas raised.
> >
> > About mentoring new programmers.  One problem with Perl in  
> > particular is that Perl is very well suited to working with small 
> >  teams of very good people.  You want your team size to remain 
> > small  enough that communication overhead doesn't destroy 
> > productivity,  and also small enough that you can depend on 
> > everyone having enough  personal discipline to avoid doing some 
> > of the spectacularly stupid  things which Perl allows you to do.  
> > However such teams have very  little room for including and 
> > mentoring junior programmers.
> >
> > By contrast a language like Java is geared towards having larger  
> > teams of less productive people.  In that kind of environment you 
> >  simply cannot insist that each and every person be top notch.  
> > And  once you've accepted that fact, it is much easier to work 
> > junior  programmers into your team, and therefore is easier to 
> > mentor  them.  Oh, and a side benefit, there wind up being more 
> > Java jobs.
> >
> > Incidentally this is not meant as a slam against Java - it seems 
> > to  be a deliberate design decision.  If you're going to have a 
> > large  team work together, you need to limit the damage that one 
> > bozo can  do.  Those barriers also limit productivity, which in 
> > turn pushes  team size up.  And, of course, once team size 
> > reaches a certain  point, you need to organize it to avoid having 
> > too many lines of  communication out of self-defence.  (Else, as 
> > Brooks noted, people  wind up wasting more of each other's time 
> > than they can personally  contribute.)  At which point 
> > productivity drops even further.  But  now you can scale pretty 
> > well - add enough people and you can get a  lot of throughput.
> >
> > In Perl teams that I've worked on, by contrast, the goal is to 
> > get  as much done as possible with a small team.  This philosophy 
> > is  *great* for a startup since a good small team of highly paid 
> > people  is a lot cheaper and faster than a large team of less 
> > well paid  people.  I haven't personally experienced it in the 
> > context of a  large company, but if I stay at Rent long enough, 
> > I'm sure I'll  find out.
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Ben
> >
> > PS Like everyone else, we are looking to hire another Perl 
> > engineer  and another QA person.

>


From geoff at modperlcookbook.org  Fri Aug 18 20:52:15 2006
From: geoff at modperlcookbook.org (Geoffrey Young)
Date: Fri, 18 Aug 2006 23:52:15 -0400
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <20060819010726.E1D8D3AA3D3@ws5-8.us4.outblaze.com>
References: <20060819010726.E1D8D3AA3D3@ws5-8.us4.outblaze.com>
Message-ID: <44E68AEF.4090007@modperlcookbook.org>


> Based on lots of theory, I believe that a good solution to
> both problems is to use lots of code reviews - don't let
> any code go into production without having it reviewed.
> This both limits damage from junior programmers and causes
> lots of mentoring to happen.  Which also means that junior
> people don't remain junior for long.  There are other
> benefits, for instance IBM's research indicates that code
> reviews are the most cost effective form of QA.
> 
> But as great as the theory is, I don't have much practical
> experience with that approach.  And there are drawbacks.
> Primary among them being the fact that many programmers
> will get upset when their code is reviewed by someone else
> in detail.  Plus the visible overhead is hard for a lot of
> people to swallow.  Still I'd like that environment.

I worked for a few years at andersen consulting (which has since been
renamed accenture) and we did just that - _every_ piece of code went
through a _formal_ code review process before it hit production, where
we all got packets (sometimes very large packets) and went over the code
line by line, discussing lesser things like style and conformity, to
drawing on people's experience, both as just plain coders as well as
people who understood the systems we were integrating with.

yeah, it was an intensive process, but we were consultants so we just
billed for it :)  but the culture was there from the get-go for me, so I
never saw a programmer get upset by the things that came out of the code
reviews, and never got upset myself.  but I can see how trying to
enforce that kind of environment where one doesn't exist currently could
be, um, difficult.

then again, much of the open source project world works like a never
ending code review, with people sometimes being far less "corporate"
about their opinions.  so if you are already of the mind to hire people
with open source experience, people used to sending in patches and
reworking them and, in general, fitting in with a project and whatnot,
then it shouldn't be that hard to figure out how to institute some kind
of code review.  personally, I see commit emails as a very simple way to
go about this, since it's a format lots of people are used to and the
review and discussion can happen naturally... for those willing to take
the time to read the diffs :)

anyway, just some random thoughts late on a friday night :)

--Geoff

From ben_tilly at operamail.com  Fri Aug 18 22:18:29 2006
From: ben_tilly at operamail.com (Benjamin J. Tilly)
Date: Sat, 19 Aug 2006 13:18:29 +0800
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
Message-ID: <20060819051829.BE9F13AA3D3@ws5-8.us4.outblaze.com>

"Kevin Scaldeferri" <family at scaldeferri.com> wrote:
> 
> On Aug 18, 2006, at 1:32 PM, Adam Pisoni wrote:
> 
[...]
> >   We just fixed a bug on our site
> > last week caused by an engineer who was let go of 2 years ago.
> 
> Hey, if you didn't notice the bug for 2 years, how bad can it be?  
> (Tongue in cheek --  a bug that costs an imperceptible fraction of 
> a percent of revenue for years is much more expensive than one that 
> costs 10% and is, therefore, noticed and fixed in hours.)

I wouldn't be confident that a bug that costs 10% of revenue
is fixed in hours.  In fact we had one in recent memory which
went undetected for over half a year!  In our defense, our
business has such long lead times that it can be very hard to
figure out what the connection is between action and reaction.
So it really was hard to track down that THIS change caused
THAT result.

Furthermore I cannot count how many simple changes we've found
that produce more than a 5% increase in revenue.  We're not
talking rocket science.  In one case removing obvious
instructions from a form made it look simpler, so more people
completed it.  In another example adding the right graphics
did the trick.  Not doing those things isn't really a *bug*,
but it goes to show how hard it can be for an organization to
notice money left on the table.

We notice these things because we've learned to look for them.
My sense is that very few organizations even measure what
they'd need to to find them.  Let alone make looking for
improvements a standard procedure.

Cheers,
Ben

From mackenziemikebus at yahoo.com  Sat Aug 19 22:59:22 2006
From: mackenziemikebus at yahoo.com (Mike MacKenzie)
Date: Sat, 19 Aug 2006 22:59:22 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <20060815174541.GA5342@plum.flirble.org>
Message-ID: <20060820055922.47192.qmail@web52201.mail.yahoo.com>



--- Nicholas Clark <nick at ccl4.org> wrote:

> 
> So, next question, how many recruiters/hiring managers on this list are
> looking to recruit smart juniors and mentor them up?
> 

We (at Language Weaver) recently hired a 'junior programmer' -- pretty much
fresh out of college, and I've been mentoring him in Perl.  It turns out,
though, that I'm spending at least as much time helping him think through
design issues that are general in nature and not specific to Perl as I am
actually teaching him Perl.  He gets most of the Perl knowledge (though not
all) from books and looking at existing code.

Mike MacKenzie

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From lapm at veggiechinese.net  Tue Aug 22 16:00:35 2006
From: lapm at veggiechinese.net (William Yardley)
Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2006 16:00:35 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] Fwd: PriceGrabber.com Sr. Software Engr
Message-ID: <20060822230035.GF16551@mitch.veggiechinese.net>

We're apparently hiring as well...

***************

PriceGrabber.com

Senior Software Engineer

Located in Los Angeles, PriceGrabber.com is a leading online comparison
shopping service that helps over 18 million consumers quickly and
effectively find the items they are seeking along with researching products,
services, sellers, and prices prior to making a purchase decision.
PriceGrabber.com, a rapidly growing, highly profitable, private Internet
company founded in 1999, was recently named the 5th fastest growing
technology company nationwide by the Deloitte Fast 500 and has received
numerous other industry awards.

Our systems are the core of the PriceGrabber.com enterprise - we build the
engine that drives a great user interface and experience!  Our success is
based on hiring talented people and we are seeking a full time Senior
Software Engineer to help us develop innovative applications.

Responsibilities:

*	Design and implement new solutions, or refine and optimize existing
code in the core layer of the system
*	Develop and maintain applications written in Perl and PHP, operating
in a Linux, Apache, and MySQL environment

Required skills:

*	Thorough software engineering experience (minimum 6 years) designing
and implementing large scale distributed systems
*	Expert knowledge of Perl (minimum 5 years)
*	Expert knowledge of SQL and relational database experience (minimum
5 years)
*	Thorough knowledge of Linux
*	Good knowledge of Apache and HTML
*	Good software architecture and debugging skills
*	Ability to work collaboratively in a shared code environment
*	Ability to work effectively with evolving requirements and minimal
supervision
*	Good communication skills

To express interest in this position, please send resume and code samples to
jobs at pricegrabber.com and write "Senior Software Engineer" in the subject
line.


From rspier at pobox.com  Sun Aug 27 19:17:26 2006
From: rspier at pobox.com (Robert Spier)
Date: Sun, 27 Aug 2006 19:17:26 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] contrasting London and LA
In-Reply-To: <20060819010726.E1D8D3AA3D3@ws5-8.us4.outblaze.com>
References: <20060819010726.E1D8D3AA3D3@ws5-8.us4.outblaze.com>
Message-ID: <m38xl9eh8p.wl_rs@pobox.com>


> In fact we do have someone who can offer an opinion.
> Robert, speak up.  I understand that you've been working
> in Python at Google.  That's relevant experience.  Say
> something. :-)

What was the question again?

We do have enforced code reviews and style guides.  But they're not
onerous.  All of these things help to make our much codebase better
than it would be without them.  It helps bring changes out into the
open (as most reviews are CC'ed to some group list or another) and
I've never seen anyone have a problem with a review -- because they're
always happening (and usually good natured) nobody seems to get
bothered.

This isn't just for Python.  Same thing for Java, C++, and every other
language we use.

-R

From Todd.Cranston-Cuebas at Ticketmaster.com  Mon Aug 28 13:10:12 2006
From: Todd.Cranston-Cuebas at Ticketmaster.com (Todd Cranston-Cuebas)
Date: Mon, 28 Aug 2006 13:10:12 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] LA.pm Tech Talk-09-06-06-Luke Kanies - Why You Should Use	
	Ruby
Message-ID: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D40375E@pasmail3.office.tmcs>

 Time to stir things up at the LA.pm! 

 Luke Kanies will present...

  Why You Should Use Ruby
Plan to stay afterward to get a bite in a local restaurant. 

We have a special speaker this month! Luke Kanies stirred things up with a
recent article (USENIX, April 2006) "Why You Should Use Ruby." With Luke's
heavy experience in perl and recent work in Ruby, he's a great person to
talk about what he sees as the strengths and weaknesses of both
languages/platforms. Remember, this isn't a celebrity roast! It's an open
discussion on our favorite language and a recent contender!

Date / Time :
 Wednesday, September 6th, 2006; 7:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m
Luke has a very tight schedule
and he's been nice enough to squeeze us in during a trip to LA so
please arrive on time if possible.

Location:
Ticketmaster's Movie Theater 
8800 W. Sunset Blvd.
West Hollywood, CA 90069

Practical information you should know....

Please arrive a few minutes early if you can. I realize that traffic can be
difficult in LA but we're going to start as close to 7:00 p.m. as possible.
Ticketmaster is located on the southeast corner of Sunset Blvd. and Palm
Avenue. At night, it is hard to see the 8800 number on our red brick
building so be careful you don't drive past. Parking is off of Palm Avenue.
Please see the map link below for our location. When you arrive, please pull
into our parking structure below our building unless you like getting
parking tickets ;)

http://www.google.com/maps?f=q
<http://www.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&q=8800+w.+sunset+blvd.+west+hollywood,
+ca&ie=UTF8&om=1&ll=34.092934,-118.380542&spn=0.025482,0.054245>
&hl=en&q=8800+w.+sunset+blvd.+west+hollywood,+ca&ie=UTF8&om=1&ll=34.092934,-
118.380542&spn=0.025482,0.054245

RSVP Please

Finally, if you plan to attend, please RSVP to the link below. It is very
helpful for us to know how many people will arrive so we can make the
necessary plans.

 <http://www.evite.com/app/publicUrl/tcc at ticketmaster.com/techtalk-090606>
http://www.evite.com/app/publicUrl/tcc at ticketmaster.com/techtalk-090606 

If you have any other questions, you can contact me directly.

Todd Cranston-Cuebas
310-360-2436
 <mailto:tcc at ticketmaster.com> tcc at ticketmaster.com

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From smawhoo at yahoo.com  Tue Aug 29 12:50:54 2006
From: smawhoo at yahoo.com (Chris)
Date: Tue, 29 Aug 2006 12:50:54 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: [LA.pm] LA.pm Tech Talk-09-06-06-Luke Kanies - Why You Should
	Use Ruby
In-Reply-To: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D40375E@pasmail3.office.tmcs>
Message-ID: <20060829195054.51199.qmail@web53209.mail.yahoo.com>

I, probably like many of the members, can not
participate the talk. But can some one please give a
quick summary on,

"why should we use Rudy, or learn Rudy"?

Thanks.

c

--- Todd Cranston-Cuebas
<Todd.Cranston-Cuebas at Ticketmaster.com> wrote:

>  Time to stir things up at the LA.pm! 
> 
>  Luke Kanies will present...
> 
>   Why You Should Use Ruby
> Plan to stay afterward to get a bite in a local
> restaurant. 
> 
> We have a special speaker this month! Luke Kanies
> stirred things up with a
> recent article (USENIX, April 2006) "Why You Should
> Use Ruby." With Luke's
> heavy experience in perl and recent work in Ruby,
> he's a great person to
> talk about what he sees as the strengths and
> weaknesses of both
> languages/platforms. Remember, this isn't a
> celebrity roast! It's an open
> discussion on our favorite language and a recent
> contender!
> 
> Date / Time :
>  Wednesday, September 6th, 2006; 7:00 p.m. to 9:00
> p.m
> Luke has a very tight schedule
> and he's been nice enough to squeeze us in during a
> trip to LA so
> please arrive on time if possible.
> 
> Location:
> Ticketmaster's Movie Theater 
> 8800 W. Sunset Blvd.
> West Hollywood, CA 90069
> 
> Practical information you should know....
> 
> Please arrive a few minutes early if you can. I
> realize that traffic can be
> difficult in LA but we're going to start as close to
> 7:00 p.m. as possible.
> Ticketmaster is located on the southeast corner of
> Sunset Blvd. and Palm
> Avenue. At night, it is hard to see the 8800 number
> on our red brick
> building so be careful you don't drive past. Parking
> is off of Palm Avenue.
> Please see the map link below for our location. When
> you arrive, please pull
> into our parking structure below our building unless
> you like getting
> parking tickets ;)
> 
> http://www.google.com/maps?f=q
>
<http://www.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&q=8800+w.+sunset+blvd.+west+hollywood,
>
+ca&ie=UTF8&om=1&ll=34.092934,-118.380542&spn=0.025482,0.054245>
>
&hl=en&q=8800+w.+sunset+blvd.+west+hollywood,+ca&ie=UTF8&om=1&ll=34.092934,-
> 118.380542&spn=0.025482,0.054245
> 
> RSVP Please
> 
> Finally, if you plan to attend, please RSVP to the
> link below. It is very
> helpful for us to know how many people will arrive
> so we can make the
> necessary plans.
> 
> 
>
<http://www.evite.com/app/publicUrl/tcc at ticketmaster.com/techtalk-090606>
>
http://www.evite.com/app/publicUrl/tcc at ticketmaster.com/techtalk-090606
> 
> 
> If you have any other questions, you can contact me
> directly.
> 
> Todd Cranston-Cuebas
> 310-360-2436
>  <mailto:tcc at ticketmaster.com> tcc at ticketmaster.com
> 
> > _______________________________________________
> Losangeles-pm mailing list
> Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm


__________________________________________________
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Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around 
http://mail.yahoo.com 

From Todd.Cranston-Cuebas at Ticketmaster.com  Tue Aug 29 13:03:51 2006
From: Todd.Cranston-Cuebas at Ticketmaster.com (Todd Cranston-Cuebas)
Date: Tue, 29 Aug 2006 13:03:51 -0700
Subject: [LA.pm] LA.pm Tech Talk-09-06-06-Luke Kanies - Why You Should	
	Use Ruby
Message-ID: <71D28C8451BFD5119B2B00508BE26E640D40378D@pasmail3.office.tmcs>

I'll see if I can get hand-outs in a format that we can get up on the web.
It would be good to get some of the arguments in favor of Ruby out there for
review. It will also be interesting to see if some of these differences are
addressed by Perl 6.

Todd 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Chris [mailto:smawhoo at yahoo.com] 
> Sent: Tuesday, August 29, 2006 12:51 PM
> To: Todd Cranston-Cuebas; losangeles-pm at pm.org
> Subject: Re: [LA.pm] LA.pm Tech Talk-09-06-06-Luke Kanies - 
> Why You Should Use Ruby
> 
> I, probably like many of the members, can not participate the 
> talk. But can some one please give a quick summary on,
> 
> "why should we use Rudy, or learn Rudy"?
> 
> Thanks.
> 
> c
> 
> --- Todd Cranston-Cuebas
> <Todd.Cranston-Cuebas at Ticketmaster.com> wrote:
> 
> >  Time to stir things up at the LA.pm! 
> > 
> >  Luke Kanies will present...
> > 
> >   Why You Should Use Ruby
> > Plan to stay afterward to get a bite in a local restaurant.
> > 
> > We have a special speaker this month! Luke Kanies stirred things up 
> > with a recent article (USENIX, April 2006) "Why You Should 
> Use Ruby." 
> > With Luke's heavy experience in perl and recent work in 
> Ruby, he's a 
> > great person to talk about what he sees as the strengths and 
> > weaknesses of both languages/platforms. Remember, this isn't a 
> > celebrity roast! It's an open discussion on our favorite 
> language and 
> > a recent contender!
> > 
> > Date / Time :
> >  Wednesday, September 6th, 2006; 7:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m Luke 
> has a very 
> > tight schedule and he's been nice enough to squeeze us in during a 
> > trip to LA so please arrive on time if possible.
> > 
> > Location:
> > Ticketmaster's Movie Theater
> > 8800 W. Sunset Blvd.
> > West Hollywood, CA 90069
> > 
> > Practical information you should know....
> > 
> > Please arrive a few minutes early if you can. I realize 
> that traffic 
> > can be difficult in LA but we're going to start as close to 
> 7:00 p.m. 
> > as possible.
> > Ticketmaster is located on the southeast corner of Sunset Blvd. and 
> > Palm Avenue. At night, it is hard to see the 8800 number on our red 
> > brick building so be careful you don't drive past. Parking 
> is off of 
> > Palm Avenue.
> > Please see the map link below for our location. When you arrive, 
> > please pull into our parking structure below our building 
> unless you 
> > like getting parking tickets ;)
> > 
> > http://www.google.com/maps?f=q
> >
> <http://www.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&q=8800+w.+sunset+blvd.+w
est+hollywood,
> >
> +ca&ie=UTF8&om=1&ll=34.092934,-118.380542&spn=0.025482,0.054245>
> >
> &hl=en&q=8800+w.+sunset+blvd.+west+hollywood,+ca&ie=UTF8&om=1&
> ll=34.092934,-
> > 118.380542&spn=0.025482,0.054245
> > 
> > RSVP Please
> > 
> > Finally, if you plan to attend, please RSVP to the link 
> below. It is 
> > very helpful for us to know how many people will arrive so 
> we can make 
> > the necessary plans.
> > 
> > 
> >
> <http://www.evite.com/app/publicUrl/tcc at ticketmaster.com/techt
> alk-090606>
> >
> http://www.evite.com/app/publicUrl/tcc at ticketmaster.com/techta
> lk-090606
> > 
> > 
> > If you have any other questions, you can contact me directly.
> > 
> > Todd Cranston-Cuebas
> > 310-360-2436
> >  <mailto:tcc at ticketmaster.com> tcc at ticketmaster.com
> > 
> > > _______________________________________________
> > Losangeles-pm mailing list
> > Losangeles-pm at pm.org
> > http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/losangeles-pm
> 
> 
> __________________________________________________
> Do You Yahoo!?
> Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection 
> around http://mail.yahoo.com 
>