I know we have a number of people heading out to lonestar ruby conf

this week, hope to see you there.  I'm going to attend the training

day from Thoughtbot tomorrow and then look forward to seeing the

sessions from our own "For the Wynn"!



Please let us know if there are any houston.rb gatherings planned

during the conference.



-Eric H

--- In Houston-RoR@yahoogroups.com, "tascx" <tascx@...> wrote:

> Please let us know if there are any houston.rb gatherings planned

> during the conference.



I'll tweet while I'm in Austin. Follow me at http://twitter.com/njonsson .



-- /\/. _/.

TMI Nils, TMI.





--- On Wed, 9/3/08, Nils Jonsson <nils@...> wrote:





>

> I'll tweet while I'm in Austin.



> -- /\/. _/.

Hello everybody, I met some of you at the meeting in August.  I'm considering

leaving my J2EE job at an investment bank for something more interesting to me,

so right now some possibilities that are on the table are a Java-related job,

.NET and Sharepoint consulting, and Openlink Endur (energy trading software

platform) consulting.  I only have experience with the first one.  Last week I

also whipped out a 10-hour Rails project as part of the application process for

these guys:



http://www.richappsconsulting.com/



I only started reading up on Rails and playing around with it in July, and

because my 5 years of programming experience since graduating from Rice have

been mostly focused on Java web apps, it seems like it could be hard to convince

employers to take me on as a Rails developer anytime soon.  Plus, Austin seems

to have more work than Houston.  I already tried to get Mumboe in Austin to give

me a telecommute position, but they aren't open to that sort of thing.



The Java-related position I mentioned above already made me an offer, and they

aren't the first company in recent months to make me an offer below what I make

now.  If it were something I was very excited about, pay wouldn't be as much of

an issue, but taking into account all aspects of the position, I'm just not sold

on it at this point.



So, I was just wondering if any of you have any suggestions for how to

transition into Rails development.  As I've pointed out, I've never changed

programming ecosystems before, and aside from scouring Craigslist and Guru.com,

I'm not sure of any better ways to go about it (aside from being open to

relocation).



Thanks,

Stephen

> aside from scouring Craigslist and Guru.com, I'm not sure of any

better ways to go about it



Try LinkedIn.com



--- In Houston-RoR@yahoogroups.com, Stephen Huey <stephenhuey@...> wrote:

>

> Hello everybody, I met some of you at the meeting in August.  I'm

considering leaving my J2EE job at an investment bank for something

more interesting to me, so right now some possibilities that are on

the table are a Java-related job, .NET and Sharepoint consulting, and

Openlink Endur (energy trading software platform) consulting.  I only

have experience with the first one.  Last week I also whipped out a

10-hour Rails project as part of the application process for these guys:

>

> http://www.richappsconsulting.com/

>

> I only started reading up on Rails and playing around with it in

July, and because my 5 years of programming experience since

graduating from Rice have been mostly focused on Java web apps, it

seems like it could be hard to convince employers to take me on as a

Rails developer anytime soon.  Plus, Austin seems to have more work

than Houston.  I already tried to get Mumboe in Austin to give me a

telecommute position, but they aren't open to that sort of thing.

>

> The Java-related position I mentioned above already made me an

offer, and they aren't the first company in recent months to make me

an offer below what I make now.  If it were something I was very

excited about, pay wouldn't be as much of an issue, but taking into

account all aspects of the position, I'm just not sold on it at this

point.

>

> So, I was just wondering if any of you have any suggestions for how

to transition into Rails development.  As I've pointed out, I've never

changed programming ecosystems before, and aside from scouring

Craigslist and Guru.com, I'm not sure of any better ways to go about

it (aside from being open to relocation).

>

> Thanks,

> Stephen

>

On Thu, Sep 4, 2008 at 1:33 AM, Stephen Huey <stephenhuey@...> wrote:



> So, I was just wondering if any of you have any suggestions for how to

transition into Rails development.  As I've pointed out, I've never changed

programming ecosystems before, and aside from scouring Craigslist and Guru.com,

I'm not sure of any better ways to go about it (aside from being open to

relocation).



Stephen,



here are a few other sites as well:



http://jobs.rubynow.com/

http://jobs.37signals.com/

http://lists.austinonrails.org/pipermail/jobs-austinonrails.org/

(austin jobs list)



in terms of transitioning....like you said maybe take less pay at

first...team up with someone who has an idea but not much money and

build something,  create a useful site/app and launch it if you have

some ideas of your own, share some code that you write up on an open

source site like http://github.com/ , find an open source project that

you are interested in and contribute patches, and finally...attend

user group meetings, participate in mailing lists and generally just

network within the Ruby community.  It really helps to get to know

people and have them know you and what you are interested in and

capable of.



Best,

-damon

Austin On Rails

--

http://twitter.com/damon

Stephen,



What might make sense is to take on a few lite-weight freelance

projects to learn Rails better and get more familiar/comfortable with

how it works. To me, it makes a lot of sense for you to work with a

group that knows Rails well for a bit so you can fast track with a

team that doing things the right way.



In the past both Josh and I have worked with "Rails" teams that used

Rails, but fought it tooth and nail because they didn't REALLY know

Rails, they just hacked the hell out of it.



If you are interested, I would be happy talk with you about working

with us on a project at Handcrafted (http://gethandcrafted.com).



Shoot an email to hello@...



Take care,



- Adam



--- In Houston-RoR@yahoogroups.com, Stephen Huey <stephenhuey@...> wrote:

>

> Hello everybody, I met some of you at the meeting in August.  I'm

considering leaving my J2EE job at an investment bank for something

more interesting to me, so right now some possibilities that are on

the table are a Java-related job, .NET and Sharepoint consulting, and

Openlink Endur (energy trading software platform) consulting.  I only

have experience with the first one.  Last week I also whipped out a

10-hour Rails project as part of the application process for these guys:

>

> http://www.richappsconsulting.com/

>

> I only started reading up on Rails and playing around with it in

July, and because my 5 years of programming experience since

graduating from Rice have been mostly focused on Java web apps, it

seems like it could be hard to convince employers to take me on as a

Rails developer anytime soon.  Plus, Austin seems to have more work

than Houston.  I already tried to get Mumboe in Austin to give me a

telecommute position, but they aren't open to that sort of thing.

>

> The Java-related position I mentioned above already made me an

offer, and they aren't the first company in recent months to make me

an offer below what I make now.  If it were something I was very

excited about, pay wouldn't be as much of an issue, but taking into

account all aspects of the position, I'm just not sold on it at this

point.

>

> So, I was just wondering if any of you have any suggestions for how

to transition into Rails development.  As I've pointed out, I've never

changed programming ecosystems before, and aside from scouring

Craigslist and Guru.com, I'm not sure of any better ways to go about

it (aside from being open to relocation).

>

> Thanks,

> Stephen

>