Those in the computer field........
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Sinister Angel
Buh Bye !
Heh
IT is an interesting field. I thought I'd go to school for it or whatever. Nope. Although I want to start my own consulting business, I wouldn't actually want to work in it, just not enough money. If you can get good and work with the specialized shit like Cisco equipment and other stuff, you can pull some good money that way, but just working in the industry sucks dick.
IT is an interesting field. I thought I'd go to school for it or whatever. Nope. Although I want to start my own consulting business, I wouldn't actually want to work in it, just not enough money. If you can get good and work with the specialized shit like Cisco equipment and other stuff, you can pull some good money that way, but just working in the industry sucks dick.
The money doesn't concern me, just the education needed to get into the field. Someone recently told me that experience is more important than education in this field. If that's true, is it smarter to get certificates than a degree?
To some extent, yes. IT field is always on the cutting edge and books and what not won't necessarily make you a top candidate for companies. Degree might help you get your foot in the door, but when it comes down to it, what matters is what you can do, what you know, and how up to date you are.
IT isn't what it used to be say 4 or 5 years ago. Since a majoprity of my Eariler IT career was based off my own company doing consulting work I can tell you that nothing in college would prepair you for a job in the IT field. Unless you wanted to go to some technical school a just do unix administration all day.
I specialized in a Application caleld Citrix back in the 90's and worked for GM and the SOS here in Michigan. Made 150.00 a hour and then sold my clients off to another consulting company here in Michigan for a good chunk of change. I then spent gobs of money going to florida and buyin cars and motorcycles and nightly dinners at Ruth Chris's.
Experince is everything. I rarely conisdered and canidate based off of college. Colleges can't keep up with the amount of technology that circulates the world today. Any other job in the market, yes I would consider the fact you would need a BA or something to obtain a good position but not in IT.
Also programming is still a field you can't go wrong in. Stuff like Network infastructure is thinning out. Ford had a ton of people doing network work and then fired most of them and then loaded up everything on the various Admin's in house. HP still did alot of their Exchange and HP openview administration.
Certifications are Key. The only good ones right now to have are citrix and Cisco cert's.
Microsoft cert;s aren't based off of knowledge of the product but more or less just how microsoft "words" their test.
I've seen them ask the same question 4 times and just reword it to trip you up.
Location is also key. Right now key places for IT are texas and florida. Silcon valley and teh research trinagle are all drying up.
I specialized in a Application caleld Citrix back in the 90's and worked for GM and the SOS here in Michigan. Made 150.00 a hour and then sold my clients off to another consulting company here in Michigan for a good chunk of change. I then spent gobs of money going to florida and buyin cars and motorcycles and nightly dinners at Ruth Chris's.
Experince is everything. I rarely conisdered and canidate based off of college. Colleges can't keep up with the amount of technology that circulates the world today. Any other job in the market, yes I would consider the fact you would need a BA or something to obtain a good position but not in IT.
Also programming is still a field you can't go wrong in. Stuff like Network infastructure is thinning out. Ford had a ton of people doing network work and then fired most of them and then loaded up everything on the various Admin's in house. HP still did alot of their Exchange and HP openview administration.
Certifications are Key. The only good ones right now to have are citrix and Cisco cert's.
Microsoft cert;s aren't based off of knowledge of the product but more or less just how microsoft "words" their test.
I've seen them ask the same question 4 times and just reword it to trip you up.
Location is also key. Right now key places for IT are texas and florida. Silcon valley and teh research trinagle are all drying up.
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IT is a huge field. Truth is, as long as systems stay cumbersome, hard to set up, and still require managers and staff to upkeep, there will be high paying IT jobs. Time is money, and if your servers, or database goes kaput, you need to get it going as soon as possible. Companies don't care about salaries cause they know down time costs them far more than an inflated salary. I'm a network administrator for a large oncology group. I designed, implemted, and maintain our systems. If we go down, it costs us not only time, but in our case, cancer patients possibly not getting their chemo therapy on time. You just have to find a niche, and stick with it. I would recommend anyone interested in IT to start at a help desk. Yeah it is lowly but, you get to see the companies IT needs and expectations 1st hand. I am starting to make a few dollars on the side setting up home wireless networks, and cleaning out PC's full of spyware. There are always new things to explore in IT.
I majored in Math, then went to DeVry for IT. I've been doing IT work now for the past 2-3 years and make pretty good money. I work for a family business and do consulting on the side, which has its ups and downs.. (was at a place all day yesterday working on the nicest day of the year.) My friend just called me up and was asking me the same thing about how to get into the IT field. I told him his best bet would be to practice some networking at home (he has 4 computers), and then try to get an entry level tech job for a while. Tech jobs suck ass though, it's amazing how stupid some people really are. Then just go from there....
Now that the IT industry has "shaken out" and the dot com revolution has collapsed, IT is much tougher to get into.
It was only 4 years ago that anyone who could move a mouse could get into IT. It was a total joke.
It was amazing how many people would call themselves "computer consultants" and didn't have a clue. I still have occasional side jobs on the weekends cleaning up the messes that these people made at various companies.
Now, all those people who flooded the IT market are unemployed. If you want a job these days, you must have some real skill and potential. Only the best will survive.
If you want to get into IT, you'd need to be very good. You need to really love working with computers. It has to be more than just a job. You have to live it, breathe it, and you have to be better than everyone else.
Work in IT is also VERY stressful. Be prepared.
It was only 4 years ago that anyone who could move a mouse could get into IT. It was a total joke.
It was amazing how many people would call themselves "computer consultants" and didn't have a clue. I still have occasional side jobs on the weekends cleaning up the messes that these people made at various companies.
Now, all those people who flooded the IT market are unemployed. If you want a job these days, you must have some real skill and potential. Only the best will survive.
If you want to get into IT, you'd need to be very good. You need to really love working with computers. It has to be more than just a job. You have to live it, breathe it, and you have to be better than everyone else.
Work in IT is also VERY stressful. Be prepared.
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The thing I prodomintly see with IT employment is Headhunters. The IT unemployeed's worst enemy. Headhunters are the bottom feeders of teh industry and do nothing but waste time. Mostly your time and not theirs.
Luckly enough when i was doing consulting everything I got was word of mouth and most of my clients were enterprise level.
So i always got to work with the really nice, big and new stuff.
I always enjoyed security myself. I'm the shiz on checkpoint and cisco pix stuff.
Luckly enough when i was doing consulting everything I got was word of mouth and most of my clients were enterprise level.
So i always got to work with the really nice, big and new stuff.
I always enjoyed security myself. I'm the shiz on checkpoint and cisco pix stuff.
Ya but do you understand the OSI chart? 
There can be argumentation for both, Experience or Degree. Without a doubt, experience is what will really teach you in whatever specific nitch of computers your aiming for. But I will say this.... as a general rule (of course there are exceptions), most major technical firms are not even going to look at you unless you have a degree! It better be on your resume! Granted... there are those few that have played on computers all there lives with no degree that can land jobs, but your percentages are far greater with a degree.
A degree doesn't necessarily tell the employer that you know your shit. It tells the employer that you have the ability to learn what they need you for and that you have the drive(just to get thru college). Now this idea refers to more entry level positions in which I assume your looking for.
By the way, I graduated from UCF with a bachelors in Computer Engineering. I'm currently working for the Department of Defense.
A degree doesn't necessarily tell the employer that you know your shit. It tells the employer that you have the ability to learn what they need you for and that you have the drive(just to get thru college). Now this idea refers to more entry level positions in which I assume your looking for.
By the way, I graduated from UCF with a bachelors in Computer Engineering. I'm currently working for the Department of Defense.
I've been to MSU. It wasn't for learning. Unless learning means drinking and sex and falling off bar stools onto your back.
I think their can be arguments for many positions in this field.
As a consultant all the big bucks came from the background and hands on knowledge. No college is going to tell you how to setup multiple cisco 2450 with 8 point to point connections each using OSPF and Rip2. Setting up your Nokia IP 650's and argue with SBC provisioning why they can't give you the IP address you need. I have given a name to my pain, that name is SBC!
I think their can be arguments for many positions in this field.
As a consultant all the big bucks came from the background and hands on knowledge. No college is going to tell you how to setup multiple cisco 2450 with 8 point to point connections each using OSPF and Rip2. Setting up your Nokia IP 650's and argue with SBC provisioning why they can't give you the IP address you need. I have given a name to my pain, that name is SBC!
No you need to go to a a place like "New horizons" where you take these computer test. They have camera's on you and you have to try your hardest at looking for answers on the bottom of your shoe
Or you can say your palm pilot is a calculator for working out subnetting and just program everything into there.
I mean theirs a test for everything nowadays. Many of them cost 50.00 and up depending on what it is.
Some are easy some are hard.
Or you can say your palm pilot is a calculator for working out subnetting and just program everything into there.
I mean theirs a test for everything nowadays. Many of them cost 50.00 and up depending on what it is.
Some are easy some are hard.
Sinister Angel
Buh Bye !
I totally agree that you almost have to live the industry. Although I am going to a Maritime Academy, I still live computers. I run a linux server that I'm constantly playing with just to learn. Hell, last night I stayed up till 3 just to upgrade from php 4.3.4 to 4.3.6 just because, and so that I could get GD support working, which ate up a bit of the time. Shit like that you don't learn in college or classes. Shit, most of the time was spent specifying locations for header files just so that libpng and jpeg would f*cking compile. That's more shit you don't learn from school. My cousin asked me how I learned all this. It's personal experience and it's also something you probably are born with. If you can't think outside of the box at times, you are useless in this field.
Getting into the field is tough. Once you are in and experienced you should be OK.
My 4 years in EE hasn't been used in forever. BUT, a BS is much more desirable than a 2 year degree. I would recommend getting a Computer Science degree of some sort. It will help.
:thumbsup:
My 4 years in EE hasn't been used in forever. BUT, a BS is much more desirable than a 2 year degree. I would recommend getting a Computer Science degree of some sort. It will help.
:thumbsup:
Although I am by no means greatly experienced in the field ... I am making my way into it as well ... A sophomore at SCU majoring in Computer Science... Like others have said experience is key and you should try to get all that you can before you graduate. I've got one internship under my belt with a large corporation and another lined up this summer. Most businesses require more than a fresh degree when hiring and anything you can do to make yourself stand out from the crowd is beneficial. Good luck :thumbsup:
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