sc0rb

You seem to relying on wearing the same clothes in order to make yourself stand out and / or differentiate yourself from other people. Why not do that by being good at what you do and friendly to everyone instead?

The whole same clothes thing you have going on is just odd. You don't need it and it just makes you strange rather than cool and interesting.

You're not a fictional character.

It doesn't matter if it's bundled or not. How would any grandparent know how to set up a mail client?

Most computer illiterate people I know have always used hotmail or yahoo mail (slowly changing to gmail) rather than setting up pop3 or imap access to a mail server....

and my mother has been using yahoo mail forever... I still doubt most home users actually use outlook (most home users wouldn't even know how to set it up).

It's very much an enterprise / business thing for the most part.

I don't think many home users are using Outlook.

I'm in the UK. I change my sheets every week. I did this even when I didn't live with my girlfriend.

You're telling me that some people don't change their bed sheets for three months!!!!!!

If I wore the same clothes everyday (steve jobs style), I'm pretty sure my girlfriend would start to complain and people would start to notice. I don't think it's a good reputation.

You're that uninteresting guy from the office that always wears the same clothes.....

wtf?

I'm right, he's clearly a try hard with no idea what he's talking about.

Seriously, buy some different clothes...

Some of the best software engineers I've ever worked with have PhD's (selection bias).

Just like mine, your experience is not necessarily indicative of the world at large. There's a reason google love hiring PhD's, there's a reason why a well known startup in London (dealing with high performance java tooling) prefer PhD candidate, there's a reason Jane Street is full of PhD's and there's a reason why half the hedge funds in London are full of math and comp sci PhD's

Take your Node and RoR skills home kid.

Just like I didn't start my Computer Science degree thinking I would end up working with large ecommerce platforms that power some of the worlds most recognisable brands websites.

But here I am.

Most PhD people I've met (selection bias) don't do work that's too closely related to their degree (just like I don't, Enterprise Java dev != comp sci). They do all make a lot of money though.

You wear the same clothing everyday so you are more recognisable?

That's not normal and is certainly not required.

Why wouldn't you for a few years with an exceptionally good salary and immense technical challenges to overcome?

Maybe that's one reason. I think there are other reasons too.

Why do people want degree graduates? Because it shows they can finish things, because it shows they are smart? because it shows they have drive? Many reason are given for hiring grads.

Somebody with a PhD in comp sci would have pretty much proven they are good with very difficult problems and have the drive to see things through to completion.

What qualities do you think it takes to finish a PhD? Some employers seek out those qualities and a PhD is a good indication that you have those qualities.

Plenty of word class trading systems are running Java.

No. That's got nothing to do with anything though. My wife has a degree in maths and works as a project manager at a big consultancy, I have a degree in comp sci and write Java all day. How many people really work in areas closely aligned with what they studied? I've used to no discrete math or graphs where I work...

I'm just showing you how it's possible to do a PhD then get a good paying job at the end. This removed the worry of missing out on 5 years of salary.

I know of three PhD's in comp sci that went straight into Goldman Sachs (and one hedge fund) where they immediately started earning far more than those of us that left Uni with our Bachelors.

They work in high frequency trading mainly using Java.

"Honestly [sic] I don't know why people keep using anything from google"

Because gmail is one of the best email services around?

I generally only add people in Linkedin that I have a personal or professional interest in. I try and make sure that I actually meet, in person, the most important contacts on my Linkedin. I try and add people who are high up in the companies I want to work for WHERE they are also connected to people that I personally know.

You need to get out there and grow your network in person as well as online. Online should supplement what you do in real life.

I also only add recruiters that work in the specific technologies that I use, I also try and call these recruiters for a casual chat about the state of the market. Only recruiters that I get a good vibe from remain on my list.

This has resulted in me never being out of contract work for a few years now and my network now includes CEO's and MD's at very good companies who I have personally developed relationships with.

You're an idiot, I'm talking about the accessibility of a data entry portal. There's no reason to not make it work in sub optimal conditions if ANY (not just your main) of your user base are likely to be in those conditions.

This has very little to do with data protection laws. I'm not talking about making your data secure, using ssl, redundancy in your database etc. These are all requirements but this is not what I'm talking about.

Simple accessibility in sub-optimal conditions. Stop trying make your small minded opinions the focus of this. Do you even own a passport?

Maybe there's a data protection law in one American state that has nothing to do with the conversation that you would like to refer too?

bubble.....

I've found linkedin to be massively useful when looking for new contracts. I'm a contractor based in the UK.

All I'm saying is... websites and portals that are accessed from devices and connections, in emergency-ish situations, should really have fallback modes so they work when I'm stuck in immigration in a third world country (or hospital).

long haul airline sites and medical insurance sites fall under this category. I'm not talking about this from any other perspective than accessibility under less than desirable conditions.

I don't really see how this has anything to do with American state laws. Accessing a portal that tells an insurance company that I need treatment abroad is a simple. Can you please burst your god damn bubble. We're talking about JS and CSS fallback not the united states of americas various laws in regards to medical records.

Have you ever left the US?

Are you kidding me? Both sites have users that need to access various portals from foreign countries. That's the basic similarity between the two sites.

Wait for a better connection... oh yeah sure, I'll just go look for another internet cafe in the middle of nowhere on my travels.... Seriously, you're an idiot.

So many companies get this right. A few don't. I serioulsy hope you suffer

EDIT: I'm specifically referring to people that travel here. As you live in a bubble, I doubt this applies to you or the sort of work you do.

Maybe you live in a bubble where you never book alirline tickets and medical insurance, then use those airline tickets to go abroad and then use the medical insurance when you hurt yourself.. You are the sterotype american silicon valley bubble boy.

They can still have all of that for most of their users. Users that can't use these newer features should be offered a simpler more basic experience. Just because it's a minority of users that want to access your medical claims portal from abroad (who'd have guessed that this would be a valid use case for someone who has bought world wide health cover?) this doesn't mean that you should lock them out.

You are very short sighted. I hope you end up in a position where you need minor surgery in Vietnam during your gap year and can't enter the claim in the insurance companies system because they insist that ALL user must be able to see their fancy drop down menus with rounded corners OR not being able to book an onward flight from Cambodia therefore being refused entry because you can't prove that you plan to leave in the next 3 weeks all because the internet kiosk you're using is blocking the CDN that pushes some crap JS that adds nothing other than eye candy.

What's wrong with creating an alternate UX without all the overhead?

I hope you suffer the consequences of your own short shortsightedness.

Also, FYI, horses are still allowed on roads.

EDIT (can't reply) I think you'll find that medical insurance sites and travelling / booking sites are very similar and attract a very similar userbase. People book flights ticket and medical insurance, people fly then use the medical insurance when they have too. You seriously do live in a bubble, i have a feeling you are an American who isn't very well traveled outside of his own country and only uses medical sites in the context of your non state health insurance. You probably aren't the kind of person that would use any of the services I care about.

SECOND EDIT.. I spoke about my two target services from the offset and did not switch context. Do you not realise how these two sites / services go hand in hand?

I just got back from skiing. I used an airline site and medical insurance site for the same trip.

If any of your target audience may use your service from a less than desirable connection or device then you should try and make it as accessible as possible. Falling back to non fancy CSS and JS is vital.

It seems that a lot of services don't really understand their target audience, why would an airline or online travel insurance firm make JS mandatory?

I don't know why you're being down voted? Obviously your employer can look at your work email at any point in time.

I'm not sure if this is right or wrong. I have a gut feeling that this may be right though. I'd like to be able to look through my teams emails if I have a good enough reason (sexual discrimination etc)

It's annoying when you're using a different device in a locked down environment to have to deal with pages braking because some JS (or other) won't load on whatever piece of junk browser or device I have to use. I had this issue a lot when traveling through Asia, I never realise how bad accessibility was until I had to use crap phones and dodgy computers to access airline websites.

For the love of god please provide a BASIC fall back!

Slightly adhomien edit, but I think you're ignorant and live in a bubble. Not everyone uses their computer, or has the same level of access, like you do.

I use Java in the browser. The way you use your computer is not the same other people may use theirs.

We have a web based VPN tool that has to use Java.