I have edited and edited and edited… Finally, last section; proficiencies. Huh, which proficiencies could a new graduate possibly have? Let’s make it the last part.¹ I scrolled through the dropdown of options to find Python and Django. No Python! Unsurprisingly no Django. But wait, the list doesn’t have Ruby, RoR, LISP either. But they included some programming languages I have never heard of; like HTML. What is this HTML programming language?

Basically I was left with the choices of Java and C. I couldn’t select them because neither is my main programming language. I can only select them after I select Python. So I left that section blank and sent them a contact form thing. It’s not cool not having an e-mail in your contact us section guys. If you are concerned about SPAM there are ways to evade e-mail harvesting bots. Please don’t be afraid of people who prefer using e-mail. I got a timely reply. From a nobody. Again, not cool. I am person and I’d like to communicate with another person. It’s OK to publish a generic e-mail on the site. But the reply should come from a employee e-mail and contain the employees name. I give you my name and e-mail when I contact you, right? You should have the decency to do the same when you reply.

Anyway, the reply I got was brief. In short it said “OK, we’ll do it.” Nice. Except they didn’t. I checked yesterday and they still had HTML programming language and not Python. Oh, well. So much for the orange ties. I deleted my account for the reason of being totally useless. It could be useful feedback if you asked why, when your users delete their accounts, you know?

In fact kariyerGENÇ is not doing it wrong. They’re just taking a picture of The Industry. The picture is correct, The Industry is doing it wrong. But that’s another topic for discussion². What was disappointing for me was the lack of agile in kariyerGENÇ. I don’t mean agile methodology here, I mean agile technology. Technology and infrastructure that changes and adopts fast. For instance; how long would it take to make the change in a Django project? Yes, Django. The framework most people ignore or haven’t even heard of. You would just log-in the admin, add a new proficiency, save, optionally run a custom management command. 10 minutes at most.

It doesn’t matter much even if they add new proficiencies now. First of all a fixed list of options doesn’t work well where there are virtually unlimited possibilities. Second of all that dropdown is hideous, and increasing the number of options will only make it worse. Instead they should just let people tag themselves, WordPress style. Django-tagging does that automagically. You know, Django, the framework you don’t list in your proficiencies.

What Most People Agree On Is Not Necessarily The Best

The language for web development in Türkiye is PHP. Java is on the rise, in a couple of years it will be as popular as PHP. I am not kidding myself; these two and that horrible propriety thing that I don’t even want to name are industry standart in the world. But they also use other technologies. At least they experiment. At least they know that other alternatives exist. Here those minorities doesn’t even exist.

I frequently hear people saying “Python is a toy language“. Because for them there are serious, proper programming languages for grown-ups and serious, proper frameworks for grown-ups as Cal Henderson said …and everything else is a toy. You can’t use Python/Django for anything professional. Well, Markafoni did, with much success.

Think about it for a second; if what the majority have generally chosen the best, wouldn’t we live in a better society & environment than this? Just think about it.

Meanwhile I’ll be playing with my toys.

1: Actually kariyerGENÇ got it right here; in reality most of the new graduates have no proficiency. So, they’ll pick I know Word and Excel here even though they aren’t really proficient.

2: …and flame wars.

Related posts:

1. My PyCon APAC 2011 Presentation: Optimizing Media Performance with django_compressor
2. Working with files in Django – Part 1
3. Working with files in Django – Part 2