[TriLUG] L.A.M.P job market

David Rasch d.rasch at broadwick.com
Sat Apr 30 18:57:13 EDT 2005


Phillip Rhodes wrote:

> matt-nc wrote:
>
>
>> I have heard that L.A.M.P. is considered by some to be a skill set 
>> that will be coming into increasing demand.  Specifically, I am 
>> wondering if I would have realistic expectations of being able to get 
>> any significant jobs or freelance work if I would develop expertise 
>> in that area only.  
>
>
> I'm not sure how much demand there is, in terms of "permanent" 
> employment for those skills... maybe it depends a little on which
> language (Perl | Python | PHP) you're using for the "P" in LAMP.
> If you know all three, then so much the better.  I have seen a few
> job ads circulating on the local mailing lists and job boards
> mentioning PHP, so there is at least some demand.
>
> What you really might have some success doing is setting up shop
> as an independent consultant type, and do contract work custom
> building applications.  In which case you could pitch the use
> of L.A.M.P. to your prospective customers, and use the advantages
> of the platform to help sell your services.
>
Independent consulting is far from your only option.  There are local 
firms such as mine who hire people to work in our LAMP environment.  We 
use LAMP and a full object oriented development platform as a basis for 
the service we sell to our customers.  Large companies including those 
like Yahoo, Amazon, and Google do as well.

>> Or, would I find that it would still be necessary to have many other 
>> programming skills or a computer degree.  
>
>
> More skills are always good, and you should probably always try to
> continue learning new things if you want to stay competitive.  Degrees
> are important to some people, not so important to others.  If you're 
> good at what you do, you'll probably be able to find something, even 
> without a tech centric degree.

Degree is always a mixed bag, but I look for skills that are _supposed_ 
to be obtained in a degree (Data structures, OO programming, computing 
fundamentals like memory management, int vs. float vs. string, pointers) 
and more esoteric things like good coding practices, style, Design 
Patterns, Unit testing, and use of common external libraries like PEAR 
and PECL not to mention knowing how to use tools like CVS, Bugzilla, and 
Wiki's.

 From someone who'll be hiring someone to join my LAMP team shortly,
David Rasch
Broadwick Corp.
Lead Developer
(919)459-1445



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