Decision Time. Have your say....
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Background: Until the last 4-5 years, I was coding in C++ for living, even though I have jumped into the .NET wagon in the early beta time (early 2000 I guess), I stayed doing C++ while doing some small tasks in C#. The last 5 years I have been into solid C# work. Current Situation: I have been looking for jobs lately and now I am lucky to be presented with few prospects. I have made it all the way through the interview process and now I’m invited into second interview in couple of places. One place is inviting me to work in their C++ team, while the other is in C#. I love both of them and there is major difference between them C++ side: - Good company - Nice Team - Very exciting product - Challenging work - Lead position - C# - Good *new* company with lots of potential (so far no one has similar product) - Very small team, but potential for growth - - Not as challenging as the C++ product - Lead position. So my dilemma is, if I jump into the C++ wagon back again, am I inflicting harm to myself. I know C++ won't go away any time soon (Probably never), but in my current job search the positions I found for C# way way outnumber those for C++. I would assume this will be the same, say in 5 years. While I have no problem switching from C++ to C#, but employers will be looking into what one was doing recently when considering him/her. And I am not sure what that means falling back to C++ after solid 5 years in C#. Now, The C++ product will be ported into C#, I was told, but not any time soon (may be in the next 3-5 years). That is good but there is no guarantee that will happen as well. I have been working with C# backend, services and web applications. Recently I'm into WCF. I got no windows forms or WPF experience, but would love to venture into them down the road. So, if you were in similar situation, what would you do? Would you consider going back into a language that you have enjoyed at the risk of minimizing your potential C# learning and real world work progress? Or would you toss the C++ option at this stage and stick to C#?
Yusuf May I help you?
The new recession/slowdown is already fact and it could be worse than the previous one. Choose the more stable company considering that the newbies are usually laid out first.
There is only one Ashley Judd and Salma Hayek is her prophet! Advertise here – minimum three posts per day are guaranteed.
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Yusuf wrote:
There are a number of high stake and very visible projects still using C++.
There are, but the overall number of C++ positions is shrinking, especially for new development.
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Joe Woodbury wrote:
There are, but the overall number of C++ positions is shrinking, especially for new development.
That is based on what source(s) exactly? And I am presuming it is completely ignoring the embedded market.
I've been a C/C++ programmer for twenty-three years. This observation is based on the number of jobs advertised, talking to other engineers, speaking with recruiters and various other things. I see no other conclusion except that the number of C++ development positions is shrinking. The extent of this is debatable, but I honestly don't see how any other conclusion could be reached. I currently work in the embedded space and while most of my code is in C/C++, a lot more code in that space is being written in C#, Java and various other languages.
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Background: Until the last 4-5 years, I was coding in C++ for living, even though I have jumped into the .NET wagon in the early beta time (early 2000 I guess), I stayed doing C++ while doing some small tasks in C#. The last 5 years I have been into solid C# work. Current Situation: I have been looking for jobs lately and now I am lucky to be presented with few prospects. I have made it all the way through the interview process and now I’m invited into second interview in couple of places. One place is inviting me to work in their C++ team, while the other is in C#. I love both of them and there is major difference between them C++ side: - Good company - Nice Team - Very exciting product - Challenging work - Lead position - C# - Good *new* company with lots of potential (so far no one has similar product) - Very small team, but potential for growth - - Not as challenging as the C++ product - Lead position. So my dilemma is, if I jump into the C++ wagon back again, am I inflicting harm to myself. I know C++ won't go away any time soon (Probably never), but in my current job search the positions I found for C# way way outnumber those for C++. I would assume this will be the same, say in 5 years. While I have no problem switching from C++ to C#, but employers will be looking into what one was doing recently when considering him/her. And I am not sure what that means falling back to C++ after solid 5 years in C#. Now, The C++ product will be ported into C#, I was told, but not any time soon (may be in the next 3-5 years). That is good but there is no guarantee that will happen as well. I have been working with C# backend, services and web applications. Recently I'm into WCF. I got no windows forms or WPF experience, but would love to venture into them down the road. So, if you were in similar situation, what would you do? Would you consider going back into a language that you have enjoyed at the risk of minimizing your potential C# learning and real world work progress? Or would you toss the C++ option at this stage and stick to C#?
Yusuf May I help you?
From a technology perspective, I think you should decide based on which project is the more interesting, rewarding etc. I guess you are concerned that your C++ skills might isolate you from future prospects. You can easily compensate for that, jump into an Opensource project for the other skill and start contributing code. From a career perspective, you really need to give consideration to security of employment. The rate of failure for startups is really high so I would research the employers pretty thoroughly - these are difficuly times and personally I would give a lot of weight to the security factor. Hope it helps :)
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Background: Until the last 4-5 years, I was coding in C++ for living, even though I have jumped into the .NET wagon in the early beta time (early 2000 I guess), I stayed doing C++ while doing some small tasks in C#. The last 5 years I have been into solid C# work. Current Situation: I have been looking for jobs lately and now I am lucky to be presented with few prospects. I have made it all the way through the interview process and now I’m invited into second interview in couple of places. One place is inviting me to work in their C++ team, while the other is in C#. I love both of them and there is major difference between them C++ side: - Good company - Nice Team - Very exciting product - Challenging work - Lead position - C# - Good *new* company with lots of potential (so far no one has similar product) - Very small team, but potential for growth - - Not as challenging as the C++ product - Lead position. So my dilemma is, if I jump into the C++ wagon back again, am I inflicting harm to myself. I know C++ won't go away any time soon (Probably never), but in my current job search the positions I found for C# way way outnumber those for C++. I would assume this will be the same, say in 5 years. While I have no problem switching from C++ to C#, but employers will be looking into what one was doing recently when considering him/her. And I am not sure what that means falling back to C++ after solid 5 years in C#. Now, The C++ product will be ported into C#, I was told, but not any time soon (may be in the next 3-5 years). That is good but there is no guarantee that will happen as well. I have been working with C# backend, services and web applications. Recently I'm into WCF. I got no windows forms or WPF experience, but would love to venture into them down the road. So, if you were in similar situation, what would you do? Would you consider going back into a language that you have enjoyed at the risk of minimizing your potential C# learning and real world work progress? Or would you toss the C++ option at this stage and stick to C#?
Yusuf May I help you?
If you've been doing C# for 5 years (and done it well) then that will already tick the box on your CV. I don't think you need to worry about that. Take the job that looks more fun, or requires less commuting, or other 'fluffy' criteria that we can't possibly judge for you.
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Background: Until the last 4-5 years, I was coding in C++ for living, even though I have jumped into the .NET wagon in the early beta time (early 2000 I guess), I stayed doing C++ while doing some small tasks in C#. The last 5 years I have been into solid C# work. Current Situation: I have been looking for jobs lately and now I am lucky to be presented with few prospects. I have made it all the way through the interview process and now I’m invited into second interview in couple of places. One place is inviting me to work in their C++ team, while the other is in C#. I love both of them and there is major difference between them C++ side: - Good company - Nice Team - Very exciting product - Challenging work - Lead position - C# - Good *new* company with lots of potential (so far no one has similar product) - Very small team, but potential for growth - - Not as challenging as the C++ product - Lead position. So my dilemma is, if I jump into the C++ wagon back again, am I inflicting harm to myself. I know C++ won't go away any time soon (Probably never), but in my current job search the positions I found for C# way way outnumber those for C++. I would assume this will be the same, say in 5 years. While I have no problem switching from C++ to C#, but employers will be looking into what one was doing recently when considering him/her. And I am not sure what that means falling back to C++ after solid 5 years in C#. Now, The C++ product will be ported into C#, I was told, but not any time soon (may be in the next 3-5 years). That is good but there is no guarantee that will happen as well. I have been working with C# backend, services and web applications. Recently I'm into WCF. I got no windows forms or WPF experience, but would love to venture into them down the road. So, if you were in similar situation, what would you do? Would you consider going back into a language that you have enjoyed at the risk of minimizing your potential C# learning and real world work progress? Or would you toss the C++ option at this stage and stick to C#?
Yusuf May I help you?
It's a tough choice, but I'd definitely go for the first. I'm saying this because: 1 - There's a possibility to go back to C# 2 - C++ job offers may be slowing down, but so are the number of skilled C++ programmers. If you keep your C++ skills fresh you might just end up being the rare resource on the market. 3 - You can always keep learning C# on your free time. 4 - You get to remember what pointers are all about. 5 - Oh challenges, how can you turn them down? 6 - And of course, there is the reputation. C++ is to C# what the seals are to the rest of the navy. :)
"To alcohol! The cause of, and solution to, all of life's problems" - Homer Simpson
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Background: Until the last 4-5 years, I was coding in C++ for living, even though I have jumped into the .NET wagon in the early beta time (early 2000 I guess), I stayed doing C++ while doing some small tasks in C#. The last 5 years I have been into solid C# work. Current Situation: I have been looking for jobs lately and now I am lucky to be presented with few prospects. I have made it all the way through the interview process and now I’m invited into second interview in couple of places. One place is inviting me to work in their C++ team, while the other is in C#. I love both of them and there is major difference between them C++ side: - Good company - Nice Team - Very exciting product - Challenging work - Lead position - C# - Good *new* company with lots of potential (so far no one has similar product) - Very small team, but potential for growth - - Not as challenging as the C++ product - Lead position. So my dilemma is, if I jump into the C++ wagon back again, am I inflicting harm to myself. I know C++ won't go away any time soon (Probably never), but in my current job search the positions I found for C# way way outnumber those for C++. I would assume this will be the same, say in 5 years. While I have no problem switching from C++ to C#, but employers will be looking into what one was doing recently when considering him/her. And I am not sure what that means falling back to C++ after solid 5 years in C#. Now, The C++ product will be ported into C#, I was told, but not any time soon (may be in the next 3-5 years). That is good but there is no guarantee that will happen as well. I have been working with C# backend, services and web applications. Recently I'm into WCF. I got no windows forms or WPF experience, but would love to venture into them down the road. So, if you were in similar situation, what would you do? Would you consider going back into a language that you have enjoyed at the risk of minimizing your potential C# learning and real world work progress? Or would you toss the C++ option at this stage and stick to C#?
Yusuf May I help you?
Check out the people and the atmosphere you'll be working in. I can do pretty much and job if the people I work with and the person I report to are quality people. If all things are equal be sure that the team you're joining enjoys working with each other.
Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend; inside of a dog, it's too dark to read. -- Groucho Marx
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Background: Until the last 4-5 years, I was coding in C++ for living, even though I have jumped into the .NET wagon in the early beta time (early 2000 I guess), I stayed doing C++ while doing some small tasks in C#. The last 5 years I have been into solid C# work. Current Situation: I have been looking for jobs lately and now I am lucky to be presented with few prospects. I have made it all the way through the interview process and now I’m invited into second interview in couple of places. One place is inviting me to work in their C++ team, while the other is in C#. I love both of them and there is major difference between them C++ side: - Good company - Nice Team - Very exciting product - Challenging work - Lead position - C# - Good *new* company with lots of potential (so far no one has similar product) - Very small team, but potential for growth - - Not as challenging as the C++ product - Lead position. So my dilemma is, if I jump into the C++ wagon back again, am I inflicting harm to myself. I know C++ won't go away any time soon (Probably never), but in my current job search the positions I found for C# way way outnumber those for C++. I would assume this will be the same, say in 5 years. While I have no problem switching from C++ to C#, but employers will be looking into what one was doing recently when considering him/her. And I am not sure what that means falling back to C++ after solid 5 years in C#. Now, The C++ product will be ported into C#, I was told, but not any time soon (may be in the next 3-5 years). That is good but there is no guarantee that will happen as well. I have been working with C# backend, services and web applications. Recently I'm into WCF. I got no windows forms or WPF experience, but would love to venture into them down the road. So, if you were in similar situation, what would you do? Would you consider going back into a language that you have enjoyed at the risk of minimizing your potential C# learning and real world work progress? Or would you toss the C++ option at this stage and stick to C#?
Yusuf May I help you?
Seems like a no-brainer to me. Challenging work, good team. C++ FTW! I think the question you're really asking is which of C++ and C# has the best future. In 2005, things looked pretty dark for C++, and I was asking myself that question too. But in 2011, I think the answer has become clear; C++ is the language of mobile development. It's the language of server development anyplace big where the cost of server hardware is an issue. It's the language of system development, and embedded development (or C is). And it's the language of browser plugins where performance matters. C# is a lovely and useful tool, but it didn't take over the world the way Microsoft hoped. If you want to program fat clients for business, or lightweight UI apps on Windows, I'm sure it's a fine tool. But it's not The Future, the way it looked 5 years ago. As someone else pointed out, with 5 years C# experience, you've already got that checkbox on your resume marked. Same thing with C++. You can do what feels good.
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I've been a C/C++ programmer for twenty-three years. This observation is based on the number of jobs advertised, talking to other engineers, speaking with recruiters and various other things. I see no other conclusion except that the number of C++ development positions is shrinking. The extent of this is debatable, but I honestly don't see how any other conclusion could be reached. I currently work in the embedded space and while most of my code is in C/C++, a lot more code in that space is being written in C#, Java and various other languages.
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I use the following. http://www.tiobe.com/index.php/content/paperinfo/tpci/index.html[^] Only one that I have seen that publishes the methodology and it also has an extensive history of data.
That site has serious problems which I've laid out before (the primary of which is that it doesn't differentiate between sustaining positions and new development positions. I've also found that it overemphasizes obscure languages. It also doesn't seem to reflect actual hiring demand--as I've said, I encounter far more positions for C# developers than C++ developers, which is reflected somewhat on dice.com.) Regardless, it shows C++ demand has fallen over time and given the direction of software development, I see no reason it wouldn't continue to drop (again, I love C++ and I only take jobs where C++ is the primary language, but I'm realistic about where it's going.)
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It's a tough choice, but I'd definitely go for the first. I'm saying this because: 1 - There's a possibility to go back to C# 2 - C++ job offers may be slowing down, but so are the number of skilled C++ programmers. If you keep your C++ skills fresh you might just end up being the rare resource on the market. 3 - You can always keep learning C# on your free time. 4 - You get to remember what pointers are all about. 5 - Oh challenges, how can you turn them down? 6 - And of course, there is the reputation. C++ is to C# what the seals are to the rest of the navy. :)
"To alcohol! The cause of, and solution to, all of life's problems" - Homer Simpson
Fabio Franco wrote:
4 - You get to remember what pointers are all about.
Quite frankly when working on C#, I didn't miss them.
Fabio Franco wrote:
there is the reputation. C++ is to C# what the seals are to the rest of the navy
;)
Yusuf May I help you?