I have listened to the podcast on and off for some time, and Scala has always been a language/approach talked about with a great deal of passion. I was reminded of where I heard about it when listening to the discussion on the future of Java and Java programmers. I finally dusted off my Programming in Scala book about a month ago I guess, then I remembered it was 2011 and I had bought the eBook version as well, and I have a iPad sitting on my desk, so I put the book back on the shelf, and picked up my iPad.
In a few weeks, I have become thoroughly addicted. I would in no way classify myself as a functional programming expert yet, and I'm still learning what seems like basic syntax at times, though concepts like recursion, closures, and list comprehensions are things I get, and have quickly sucked me into the Scala world which is increasing my functional programming knowledge daily. I now have a very serious problem. I spend from 5pm on Friday till 9am on Monday coding in Scala (and I confess Grails a little too). Then I log on at work, and I have to write Java again (where it's more like 11am by the time I can face it). Monday is agony, pure agony, I want to run away screaming. It's like going from Zen calligraphy to paint by numbers with crayons. I finally decide after another pretty lousy year, I'm gonna nose around and find out what the job market is like. Searching for Scala jobs in my Area on Dice: 3, one of them is a typo, one lists it as a helpful extra-curricular interest. Searching for Scala jobs where I want to relocate to on Dice: 0. I switch to a nationwide search, and the results are in the low three digit range. Monster.com yields slightly better results but still pitiful. What have you done! I hate you! I will be subjected to daily torture at work until delivered from the prison that is Java syntax! I am beginning to understand now, why all the functional programmers have been staring down their noses at the mere mortals who inhabit regular cube-jobs (that sounded a bit wrong). I wrote AOP code last year, and was told off because no one else could understand AOP yet (srsly?), and so it couldn't be maintained (a fair point, but tragic, as it was made of win, and uncovered a massive bug). The number of other people I know in my division who could write the first year CompSci exercise to reverse a list using recursion by rote could likely be counted on the fingers of one hand, and it's possible Captain Hook's bad hand would cover it. Even if I could convince our management that Scala was the next step on the path to enlightenment, I can't imagine too many others would be lining up to join a project using it as the primary language. How the heck do you find a job working in Scala outside of the Bay Area or New York city? -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "The Java Posse" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/javaposse?hl=en.
