Old dogs that learn new tricks have an obvious advantage: a larger repertoire. If we move this metaphor to the entertainment industry, it becomes somewhat more lucid. Don't you enjoy going to a concert of someone who's been around for years, whose oldies are classics, and who has managed to move along with the times creating new, good tunes? (Paul Simon comes to my mind.). Do you think such artists have more to offer than the latest and greatest "smash"? I do.

I see an analogy here to mainframe programmers who have managed to latch onto the new technologies while retaining their hard-earned wisdom of system design and development. I'm not talking about older COBOL programmers who have learned a few Unix commands or who have managed to add REXX to their resumes. The "Paul Simons" of the data processing industry that I'm talking about are the boomers who have managed to dive into the new stuff and bring their expertise with them into the depths. Their reportoir now includes things such as C or C++, Oracle or Sybase, HTML 3.0, Java, DB2/6000 and CICS/6000, Delphi, VB, and so on. They're the programmers for whom a PC is much more than a platform on which to run PC/3270...

Experience that straddles the development of major systems on mainframes and more esoteric LAN or server-based applications seems to produce some of the better implementations I've seen. Sure, the newbies recently off the campus and into the business world have much to offer, especially in the way of enthusiasm and fresh ideas, but their lack of experience with users and with business applications shows in their final products. An article in the business Section of The New York Times on May 6, 1996 highlighted the new wave of teenagers who are designing web pages, writing PERL scripts etc. for local businesses. I admit that for relatively simple, 2-dimensional applications, their $25./hour rate can be very attractive to a small shop with limited funds. However, I've found that documentation, ease of subsequent support, intuitive front-end design all suffer at the hands of inexperience. The old-timer has more likely learned the value of these things along with the syntax of the language they code with.

And the old dogs who haven't come out of the doghouse recently? Well, I suppose there will be work for them for a while. However, as is the case with most technology-based professions, I believe we should always try to be in touch with as much new development (while retaining our well-tuned experience) as possible, or risk career obsolescence.

Thanks for stopping by. I update this column a few times each month to discuss various issues ranging from software development to the meaning of life. Please check back soon.