CS101 Presentation

November, 9 2009

About Me (so, who is this guy?):

 Tony Shuba  Enterprise Solutions Manager @ BlueStorm Technologies, Inc.

 Experience  Miller Aviation / Miller Information Technologies – 6 years   Corning Data Services – 4 years BlueStorm – 6 years  Education  B.S. (Computer Science) – Binghamton, Watson School 1994  Multiple Industry Certifications (IBM, Microsoft, Sun Microsystems)

Why am I here today

 First, Important to hear from the outside  Focus on C.S. Graduates in Corporate I/T  What a great time to be in Computer Science!

What a great time to be in Computer Science

 What once cost $1,000’s to $10,000’s is now free   Development Environments Servers  Operating Systems  Virtualization Software  Truly a Mission Critical component in today’s enterprise  Many, many career choices within the Industry  Renewed focus on value of I/T (Post dot com world)  Ability to change the world! (in a positive way)

Stand Alone Legacy Applications (Main Frame) Windows Applications – Stand Alone Windows Applications – “Client Server” Windows Applications – “N-Tier” Windows Applications – Collaborative Apps Web Applications – Stand Alone (Simple Sites) Web Applications – Portals Web Applications – Java Enterprise Web Applications – Distributed Web Services / SOA Web Applications – Web 2.0, Mobile, etc… And it won’t stop there…. What’s next?

Eclipse

But, at least I missed these…

Agenda 1. Company Overview 2. CS Graduate Success in the Corporate World 3. Pace and Nature of Change in I/T Industry 4. Career-Long Learning 5. Trends and Directions in the I/T Industry 6. Conclusion and Questions

BlueStorm Company Overview

 Incorporated in 1999  Headquartered in Binghamton, NY  Focused on Enterprise Solutions  Customers across the U.S.  Projects in countries such as:     Sweden Germany Brazil U.K.

How we see ourselves

 BlueStorm is a

Systems Integrator

/

Solutions Provider

 Focused on

I/T Needs

of an Organization  Provide On-Demand Infrastructure  Develop Enterprise-class solutions  Provide secure, reliable, scalable solutions 

Integration, Integration, Integration

 We are a

Services

company  Heavily focused on Java / JEE

From our Vision Statement

A Company that… 1. Attracts and Retains

Top People

2. Attracts and Retains

Top Companies

3. Maintains

High Standards

and

High Expectations

4. Is Respected by our Customers and partners 5. Fundamentally changes the way our customers do business 6. Provides a Competitive Advantage to our customers

Customers What we have achieved so far:

Our Primary Partnerships

The Services Business

 I/T Services vs. Internal I/T  Trends  Excitement  Customer, Customer, Customer 40h  Value, Value, Value  If we aren’t significantly better, why hire us?

 Expected to keep up with the industry  What is going on in our space and outside of our space  Industry Certified Experts

Skill Categories

 Hard Skills  Traditional / Typical Computer Science skills 

Get you to the table

 Soft Skills  Interpersonal skills – how people relate to each other  The skills you need to succeed  Possibly more important over the longer term 

Get you in the door

Hard Skills



“Get you to the table”

 Employers:

Expected set of skills for CS Grad

.

 Knowledge and base Proficiency  Examples: ○ Programming Languages, Data Structures, Software Engineering, Operating Systems, etc.

 Are there Differentiators?

 Academic:

Grades, Project Work, etc.

 More important:

Additional knowledge and skills

Hard Skills – Additional Knowledge

 In My Experience… Missing Skills: 

Context

– Understand the bigger picture ○ Move toward I/T Architect skills 

Application

– Applied and Demonstrated Skills  “

Harder

” Skills: ○ Additional “

Concrete

” skills that tip the balance in your favor Let’s look at a few Concrete Skills that employers look for…

Additional Skills – Concrete Skills

 Database Development    Knowledge and application of SQL Fundamental database design (Entity-Relationship Diagrams) Relational Theory and Normalization  Web Development Skills   Minimum: HTML and JavaScript Web Programming – Corporate Focus  Java  Language, API Basics, Web Development  Higher Level Design  e.g. Design Pattern Concepts

Soft Skills

 “

Get you in the door

”  For many: The Missing Piece  Many students are unprepared – foreign concepts  For Employers:  Provide ROI (Return on Investment) ○ ○ To bring you onboard an employer is making a

significant investment

(Money, Time, Effort, …) “New” employees vs. “Seasoned” employees  Revelation: 

Writing code is a small part of what you will do day-to-day

Soft Skills Examples

  Documentation Skills Presentation Skills      Problem Solving Skills Self Management Time Management Team Building Participation    Motivation Respect Responsible

Work on the Soft Skills

  Take the Next four years to work on these skills If you are motivated, you’ll find a way      Every document, every project is important!

* Take a public speaking class * Take a technical writing class Yes, it’s painful, but worth it Take courses that have group assignments and presentations Participate in projects outside normal coursework (Research)  Industry / Corporate Experience:  Co-op  Internship  Part-time

Two More…

 Business Skills  General business knowledge  Business Acumen  Helps with: ○ Business Application Development ○ ○ Conversing with Customers Sound Project Decisions  Research Skills  Surprisingly Lacking  Many, many, many sources of information today

Ability to Research

 The Greatest Thing to happen to the I/T World:

Change

 A Constant in this field  Need to analyze new technologies  What is the longevity?

 How does it fit within the organization?

 How to introduce?

 Agent of Change  Balance today’s organizational needs with technology needs  Always reading, always researching, …

My Observations



The best embrace change

  To them change doesn’t seem like “change” Already “up” on what’s going on  Have strong foundational elements in place already 

The best have the concept of “Play”

 “I’m playing around with…”  Don’t lose the initiative of Play  Try things ○ ○ ○ Write code Build things Try out new technologies 

The best develop opinions on new technology

 Within the context of organizational needs

Learning



Life-time Learning!

 Formal and Informal training  Most of it will fall on you  Responsibility  Often no formal training available  Utilize Books, Play, Google, etc.

 The best:  Are in a constant state of learning  Never let themselves fall behind

Challenges

 Everything is Speeding up…  Number of Development requests  Timeframe to complete  Critical nature  Complexity is increasing  Complexity  Application and System Complexity  Development environment complexity ○ Example: Java

Complexity Example: Java

                 Java the Programming Language Object Oriented Programming Java the Virtual Machine Java the Standard Edition API’s (Java SE) Java the Enterprise Edition API’s (Java EE) HTML JavaScript JavaServer Pages Java Servlets JavaServer Faces (JSF) Enterprise Java Beans 3.0 (EJB3) Java Persistence API (JPA) ORM Web Services XML Ajax Web Framewoks (ADF, Seam, Spring, etc.) etc., etc., etc.

“Do we need to

know Java?

”

-- anonymous

At the same time…

 The number of resources available is unprecedented:  Google  Blogs  Wikis  White Papers  Books  Free, open source, downloadable software  If you have the initiative, it’s a great time to be in C.S.!!!

Moving Forward – Some thoughts…

         Less Focus on Writing Code  More Focus on: ○ ○ ○ ○ Component Reuse Services and API’s (Service Oriented Architecture - SOA) Visual Modeling and Design Visual Development of Systems Developer and Team Productivity  E.g. Eclipse Mylyn Project Scripting Language Components  e.g. Jython, Ruby, etc.

Improved Application Frameworks  e.g. Oracle ADF Framework Security Integration  Web Services, SOA, Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) Web 2.0 Concepts Mobility (again) Virtualization

Final Thoughts

 Be ready for the amount of work required  It’s like writing a term paper or project all the time  Be prepared for the speed and amount of change  Don’t be afraid to ask for help…   … but do the research first You are not expected to be the expert… yet.

 And finally…

Be Passionate – Do something you love to do!

Questions?

BlueStorm Technologies, Inc.

20-24 Wall Street Binghamton, NY 13901 http://www.bluestormtech.com

Contact: Tony Shuba [email protected] 607-762-5401