Re: Certification

[Curt Smith <chsmith@speakeasy.net>]

> Think about the "desire to learn" part.  I would prefer to hire someone
> who has a constant fire in their person to learn new technologies in
> their spare time than someone that does just the 8-5 bit.

Dead on.  Too bad, but gone are the days of being a C programmer day
in and day out.  I judge the a candidate on the desire to learn
on their own time and initiative with questions like;  what books
have you read lately.  And by how _many_ certifications they have.

Some folks might be surprised there's a few more java and OO oriented
certs besides SCJP.  :)  Personally I need the carrot to get me through
all the books and study, so collecting certs is one of my hobbies.  ;-(
My credit card shows alot of good books have been bought, read and
an immediate good use put that info (more credit card hits for the
cert tests) and more tears.

I've found it to be almost as expensive as going to GA state.  Isn't
our industry forcing us through this type of re-education pratically
another degree every 2-3 years just to stay current?   BTW, the
JDJ mag / web site has a few comments about current state of complexity
and API breadth needed to be _called_ competent.  Hmmm.

For example, EJB / JMS is pase, now it's UDDI, WSDL, doc. centric etc.

Best of luck to all,

curt