An inventory of your toolbox

[Richard Kreiss]

There are states and other governments looking for programmers who know old languages and they have applications written in these languages and never had them 'modernized" as it cost too much.  Many of these languages would require hiring programmers over 70 years old and mostly retired as they are the only ones who know the language well enough to make modifications to the program.  This may require them to re-hire people they forces to retire to fired.  My suggestion would be to ask for a pay schedule and benefits to make it worth while to come out of retirement.

I have a friend who is a programmer on IBM mainframes and could get a job easily but she is retired and financially set so she does not want to go back to work. She is somewhat competent on a PC but does no programming any more. Her last stint as a programmer was with JCL on the mainframe.

When I was in the service, there was an induvial who worked for the government that was retired at age 65.  He kept looking for holes in their programming which would allow hackers in.  He would then advise the department involved of the problem.  Although he was continuing to do when he was employed, what he was doing was illegal.  After a few month, they gave him a consulting contract to make his snooping legal.  He kept doing this until he died, some 10 years later.  The department involved was the defense department whose system has been hacked a number of times.

Richard Kreiss
GCC consulting


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Filepro-list <filepro-list-bounces+rkreiss=verizon.net at lists.celestial.com>
> On Behalf Of Jose Lerebours via Filepro-list
> Sent: Friday, August 28, 2020 1:01 PM
> To: filepro-list at lists.celestial.com
> Subject: Re: An inventory of your toolbox
> 
> On 8/28/20 12:14 PM, Fairlight via Filepro-list wrote:
> >> While we cannot compare filePro to Python, PHP, JavaScript, C# or
> >> other popular languages out there has fpTech done too little too late
> >> for filePro to see another generation of developers carry it for the
> >> next 10+ years?
> > I think the pool of filePro programmers is well under 300 at this
> > point, and shrinking with each retirement or death.  There is little I
> > think they could do to change the fact that the community size and
> > market share are both dwindling.
> 
> http://pypl.github.io/PYPL.html
> 
> What if they go "Open Source"?
> 
> Some years ago I suggested a "free" copy of filePro be included with every
> LINUX distro ...  I truly believe that that would had given filePro a boost on user
> base.
> 
> I seem to remember you saying that following the open source concept would
> not work because it would rely on donations and most people will not donate a
> dime - you had based this on some personal experience with something you
> tried but I cannot recall exactly what it was (this post goes back years).
> 
> Of course, it is easy to give away what is not yours!  ;-)
> 
> The way I saw this approach was that may be, just may be, the next Ken will be
> attracted to filePro and look deeper into it and possibly grow a community of
> developers that would take it to the next level.  Of course, I am not talking
> about developers the likes of me, but more of the likes of Ken.
> 
> I think that there are bloggers making more $$$ on youtube.com monitizing
> videos on training courses than fpTech makes selling licenses. Not based on any
> fact ... just pure BS speculations!
> 
> 
> 
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