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I am trying to upgrade my skills. I would like opinions from you guys about which languages are in demand by employers.
I have been part of the "evil empire" (Microsoft), since GW Basic was their first product.
I am very good with Access, SQL, SQL Server but not really any others. I have a moderate acquaintance with C# and VB.Net. What other types of Software/Database skills do you think I need to learn that would help me find a job?
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It would depend on what ecosystem you're looking at. For some environments COBOL is still a big deal. In others it might be python, rust or C/C++. If you're staying in the MS world, then C# is probably a good place to start.
Keep Calm and Carry On
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I can talk in heavy detail about where the industry is headed, or I can give you the short version. To start... the short version. Either learn web development or machine learning with robotics or maybe IoT or AR/VR. This is the future. Web and desktop dev will eventually merge. AI/ML is going nowhere. AR/VR is coming. So pick one.
Web
In order...
- JavaScript - People pretend to know this but they couldn't tell you the difference between a closure and composition.
- TypeScript - Learn hard core JS first. Then put on your big boy pants and learn TS. Keep in mind though, TS is like JS and C# had a child. Unlike C# though, it supports a functional paradigm and an OOP paradigm, just like JS does. But, knowing C# will help the learning curve on this tremendously.
- Node - You need to know a good JS runtime engine even if you do nothing but client only, browser-specific code. There are a slew of build-time tools that become available once you do.
Also a good language that compiles down to WASM wouldn't hurt. Say Rust. But the world is still preparing for WASM. JS/TS is here now, so that would come first.
If you're from the C# camp this will round out your skillset.
AI/ML
Can't help much with this, but Python is king here. Big data is... well big. You'll always find a job here.
IoT or AR/VR/MR/XR
This is coming. No matter what, it's coming. So you could do something in these fields to prepare. Wearables will not stop at just smart watches. Smart homes will only get "smarter", etc.
Jeremy Falcon
modified 17-Jan-23 18:49pm.
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If I were you I would figure out where I wanted to live and then look at job ads in that area. That will give you a fairly good indication.
"They have a consciousness, they have a life, they have a soul! Damn you! Let the rabbits wear glasses! Save our brothers! Can I get an amen?"
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Oh and don't forget the blockchain. It's tech trying to find itself, but it's coming too. And for those that think it's not, the dotcom bust happened and yet we're still on a website. It's just the law of nature. We get something new, people freak out. Boom, bad stuff. Build it back up the way it should've been built the first time. Nobody used Windows 1.0 either, but blockchain is coming. Get on board or get left behind.
Jeremy Falcon
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Jeremy Falcon wrote: Build it back up the way it should've been built the first time.
Are you sure we have done this with the internet and the dotcoms...? 
M.D.V. 
If something has a solution... Why do we have to worry about?. If it has no solution... For what reason do we have to worry about?
Help me to understand what I'm saying, and I'll explain it better to you
Rating helpful answers is nice, but saying thanks can be even nicer.
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Touché 
Jeremy Falcon
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Annnnnnnd one more. 
If you want to just leverage your existing skills, you could do so in the context of a cloud provider. Sure, you've used SQL Server, but have you used Amazon's RDS on top of it? More and more companies are using the cloud for just about everything. It's like the franchising of the tech infrastructure world. Infrastructure in a box. There's AWS, Azure, and even Google now all have their own offerings.
So does Oracle, but they suck. 
Jeremy Falcon
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Based on your experience with SQL Server and C# I would suggest you stay within the Microsoft ecosystem. Namely - asp.net core. You can focus on Blazor because it doesn't require JavaScript. You will also need some accompanying stuff like CSS and HTML, but you probably already know that. And a piece of advice - don't buy the cheapest books on any of these subjects. They are cheap for a reason.
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I think this is really a great answer, building on the existing skillset in the question.
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could you recommend some that are not "cheap"?
ed
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I would stick with the big publishers like "Apress", "Murach" etc. and stay clear from self-published authors, college professors (especially those), pulp fiction like O'Reilly or Microsoft certification classes. Any professional book under 30 bucks is rather suspicious.
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I think that when planning skills upgrade in software development, it is also necessary to include skills related to Git, Github, Bitbucket and some basic use of Jira. Of course "it depends"  , in ecosystems which I experienced this was "a baseline" and I expect these to be quite common ...
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Don't forget soft skills such as conflict resolution and project and/or time management. Employers are always looking for these types of skills.
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obermd wrote: conflict resolution
Elephanting overrated! 
"If we don't change direction, we'll end up where we're going"
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Those and anger management classes. 
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become a scrum master and change career track to a project manager...
diligent hands rule....
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I would suggest you to leave your comfort zone and step away from the Microsoft backyard... There is so much more out there. Pick one!
For server side programming Golang, Python and C++
For Web/Client: NodeJS
For Client desktop For example: C++/Qt
For Client, apps: Kotlin
"If we don't change direction, we'll end up where we're going"
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megaadam wrote: For server side programming Golang, Python and C++
For Web/Client: NodeJS
Yes, I guess "leaving your comfort zone" is an appropriate description.
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When it comes to comfort zone, that's like going from being a passenger on a plane to standing on the wing, lol.
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IMHO jumping on C++ with just VB/C# background will be painful and not verry productive. This is not some new language, it's a different mindset. Unless you are in your early 20, I wouldn't recommend that.
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Are you implying that people past their early 20s are incapable of handling assembler code C/C++?
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To make such major transition you need a plenty of "buffer" time. Time that you don't have if you do this for a living. And unless you're doing something trivial like MFC you need accompanying knowledge of computer architecture (as a bare minimum), embedded systems, or electronics, or controllers or cryptography etc.. What are you using your C++ for?
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 Yep. Depends if you are taking blood pressure medication. And if you are not, you will be
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Based on existing skills, expand
some others pointed out, so like connecting with cloud services. Azure or Amazon
if like database work, then Linq (method or query syntax) and database as code stuff (code first) in either C# (i assume VP.Net has same support)
and then connecting and interacting with the various cloud storage solutions: Blob, Cosmos (if not renamed this week  ), and Tables (I like the Tables for small flexible working storage)
And then C# 11, and the very quick jumps of major versions in c#6 was 2015, now is c# 11. Syntactic sugar, some I am a bit nope, but some like returned named tuples, instead of creating yet another object or returning Item1,Item2
Figure out the WHAT not the HOW, what do you want to make, then look up what languages or features can help make. If an employer is demanding language X, but you can comfortably say well this language is better suited, better supported, and longer lasting, and I can start working on it today, or sure, take risk on that which young dev moves company in 6 months, and then you stuck hiring someone at x2 because no one wants to to that language.
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