From: "Nathaniel S. H. Brown" Date: 2005-11-04T05:35:01+09:00 Subject: Re: Ruby Certification Taken from a JavaUG here in Vancouver written by Lydon Tiu: > 1) Forces you to learn things you otherwise won't. > 2) Allows you to put those important "keywords" on your resume > which gets you past HR and hence at the very least gets you that first interview. > 3) Icing on the cake - if you have the experience(the cake) plus the certification, > then you'd be better tasting to a potential employer. > 4) Marketing value - companies could use your certification on their corporate profile, > RFP submissions, bid submissions to list the qualifications of their employees. Moreover, having the certification definitely helps gain the confidence saying you know the language. As salesmen can attest to, having the confidence is what gets the product sold, and during an interview you are definitely the product. The most important thing about having certification is that it comes from a reputable source. Certifications coming from Ruby-lang.org, or RubyOnRails.com are far more credible than a shop in London which nobody has heard of. If you don't "trust" the issuer, then the certification's value doesn't extend farther than what you personally learned from studying for the test / course. I am personally pro-certification. Although I have no certifications in my bag at the moment, it does not preclude my hiring practices from recognizing, and trusting an applicant when they say they are ZDE (Zend Certified Engineer). I may not ask for their certification, but I still may understand that and question them based on that during the interviewing process. Warmest regards, Nathan. -------------------------------------------------------------- Nathaniel S. H. Brown Toll Free 1.877.4.INIMIT Inimit Innovations Phone 604.724.6624 www.inimit.com Fax 604.444.9942 > -----Original Message----- > From: Steven Arnold [mailto:stevena@neosynapse.net] > Sent: November 3, 2005 9:37 AM > To: ruby-talk ML > Subject: Re: Ruby Certification > > > On Nov 3, 2005, at 12:22 PM, gregarican wrote: > > > Someone who takes collegiate courses and earns a degree in computer > > programming should be judged based on such qualifications. > Someone who > > hasn't earned a degree in such a field could be judged on > sample code > > from their projects they have contributed to. If the sample code is > > owned by a former employer then some other self-maintained > portfolio > > could be presented. > > I've found it very valuable to give interviewees small programming > problems right there in the interview. For example, write a function > that prints all possible permutations of a string, or that translates > a string into Pig Latin, etc. It really can quickly distinguish the > great programmers from the good programmers from the pretenders. I > like to give the interviewee a laptop with the programming language > installed, and ideally they will quickly produce a working program. > Second best is slowly produce a working program. If they're not good > enough to write something that works, they are probably not good > enough for my purposes. Extra points for style, innovative approaches > and especially efficient algorithms. > > If the candidate can't actually write software, they're no good. So > you might as well establish that right up front. > > steve > >