CS101 Presentation

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CS101 Presentation
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About Me (so, who is this guy?)

• Tony Shuba
• Enterprise Solutions Manager _at_ BlueStorm
  Technologies, Inc.
• Experience
• Miller Aviation / Miller Information Technologies
  6 years
• Corning Data Services 4 years
• BlueStorm 6 years
• Education
• B.S. (Computer Science) Binghamton, Watson
  School 1994
• Multiple Industry Certifications (IBM, Microsoft,
  Sun Microsystems)

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Why am I here today

• First, Important to hear from the outside
• Focus on C.S. Graduates in Corporate I/T
• What a great time to be in Computer Science!

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What a great time to be in Computer Science

• What once cost 1,000s to 10,000s is now free
• Development Environments
• Servers
• Operating Systems
• Virtualization Software
• Truly a Mission-Critical component in todays
  enterprise
• Many, many career choices within the Industry
• Renewed focus on value of I/T (Post dot com
  world)
• Ability to change the world! (in a positive way)

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In context, CS today is not too shabby
When I was your age
Stand Alone Legacy Applications (Main Frame)
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(No Transcript)
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Eclipse
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But, at least I missed these
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• Agenda

1. Company Overview
2. CS Graduate Success in the Corporate World
3. Pace and Nature of Change in I/T Industry
4. Career-Long Learning
5. Trends and Directions in the I/T Industry
6. Conclusion and Questions
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BlueStorm Technologies
Company Overview
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BlueStorm Company Overview

• Incorporated in 1999
• Headquartered in Binghamton, NY
• Focused on Enterprise Solutions
• Customers across the U.S.
• Projects in countries such as
• Sweden
• Germany
• Brazil
• U.K.

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How we see ourselves

• BlueStorm is a Systems Integrator / Solutions
  Provider
• Focused on I/T Needs of an Organization
• Provide On-Demand Infrastructure
• Develop Enterprise-class solutions
• Provide secure, reliable, scalable solutions
• Integration, Integration, Integration
• We are a Services company
• Heavily focused on Java / JEE

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From our Vision Statement

• A Company that

1. Attracts and Retains Top People
2. Attracts and Retains Top Companies
3. Maintains High Standards and High Expectations
4. Is Respected by our Customers and partners
5. Fundamentally changes the way our
customers do business
6. Provides a Competitive Advantage to our
customers
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What we have achieved so far
Customers
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Our Primary Partnerships
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The Services Business

• I/T Services vs. Internal I/T
• Trends
• Excitement
• Customer, Customer, Customer
• Value, Value, Value
• If we arent significantly better, why hire us?
• Expected to keep up with the industry
• What is going on in our space and outside of our
  space
• Industry Certified Experts

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CS Graduates
Success in the Corporate World
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Skill Categories

• Hard Skills
• Traditional / Typical Computer Science skills
• Get you to the table
• Soft Skills
• Interpersonal skills how people relate to each
  other
• The skills you need to succeed
• Possibly more important over the longer term
• Get you in the door

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Hard Skills

• Get you to the table
• Employers Expected set of skills for CS Grad.
• Knowledge and base Proficiency
• Examples
• Programming Languages, Data Structures, Software
  Engineering, Operating Systems, etc.
• Are there Differentiators?
• Academic Grades, Project Work, etc.
• More important Additional knowledge and skills

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Hard Skills Additional Knowledge

• In My Experience Missing Skills
• Context Understand the bigger picture
• Move toward I/T Architect skills
• Application Applied and Demonstrated Skills
• Harder Skills
• Additional Concrete skills that tip the balance
  in your favor

Lets look at a few Concrete Skills that
employers look for
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Additional Skills Concrete Skills

• Database Development
• Knowledge and application of SQL
• Fundamental database design (Entity-Relationship
  Diagrams)
• Relational Theory and Normalization
• Web Development Skills
• Minimum HTML and JavaScript
• Web Programming Corporate Focus
• Java
• Language, API Basics, Web Development
• Higher Level Design
• e.g. Design Pattern Concepts

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Soft Skills

• Get you in the door
• For many The Missing Piece
• Many students are unprepared foreign concepts
• For Employers
• Provide ROI (Return on Investment)
• To bring you onboard an employer is making a
  significant investment (Money, Time, Effort, )
• New employees vs. Seasoned employees
• Revelation
• Writing code is a small part of what you will do
  day-to-day

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Soft Skills Examples

• Documentation Skills
• Presentation Skills
• Problem Solving Skills
• Self Management
• Time Management
• Team Building
• Participation
• Motivation
• Respect
• Responsible

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Work on the Soft Skills

• Take the Next four years to work on these skills
• If you are motivated, youll find a way
• Every document, every project is important!
• Take a public speaking class
• Take a technical writing class
• Take courses that have group assignments and
  presentations
• Participate in projects outside normal coursework
  (Research)
• Industry / Corporate Experience
• Co-op
• Internship
• Part-time

Yes, its painful, but worth it
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Two More

• Business Skills
• General business knowledge
• Business Acumen
• Helps with
• Business Application Development
• Conversing with Customers
• Sound Project Decisions
• Research Skills
• Surprisingly Lacking
• Many, many, many sources of information today

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Ability to Research

• The Greatest Thing to happen to the I/T World

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Change
Change in the I/T Industry
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Change

• A Constant in this field
• Need to analyze new technologies
• What is the longevity?
• How does it fit within the organization?
• How to introduce?
• Agent of Change
• Balance todays organizational needs with
  technology needs
• Always reading, always researching,

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My Observations

• The best embrace change
• To them change doesnt seem like change
• Already up on whats going on
• Have strong foundational elements in place
  already
• The best have the concept of Play
• Im playing around with
• Dont lose the initiative of Play
• Try things
• Write code
• Build things
• Try out new technologies
• The best develop opinions on new technology
• Within the context of organizational needs

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Learning
A Career-long Requirement
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Learning

• Life-time Learning!
• Formal and Informal training
• Most of it will fall on you
• Responsibility
• Often no formal training available
• Utilize Books, Play, Google, etc.
• The best
• Are in a constant state of learning
• Never let themselves fall behind

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Challenges

• Everything is Speeding up
• Number of Development requests
• Timeframe to complete
• Critical nature
• Complexity is increasing
• Complexity
• Application and System Complexity
• Development environment complexity
• Example Java

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Complexity Example Java

• Java the Programming Language
• Object Oriented Programming
• Java the Virtual Machine
• Java the Standard Edition APIs (Java SE)
• Java the Enterprise Edition APIs (Java EE)
• HTML
• JavaScript
• JavaServer Pages
• Java Servlets
• JavaServer Faces (JSF)
• Enterprise Java Beans 3.0 (EJB3)
• Java Persistence API (JPA) ORM
• Web Services
• XML
• Ajax
• Web Framewoks (ADF, Seam, Spring, etc.)
• etc., etc., etc.

Do we need to know Java?-- anonymous
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At the same time

• The number of resources available is
  unprecedented
• Google
• Blogs
• Wikis
• White Papers
• Books
• Free, open source, downloadable software
• If you have the initiative, its a great time to
  be in C.S.!!!

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Trends
Where is Corporate I/T Headed?
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Moving Forward Some thoughts

• Less Focus on Writing Code
• More Focus on
• Component Reuse
• Services and APIs (Service Oriented Architecture
  - SOA)
• Visual Modeling and Design
• Visual Development of Systems
• Developer and Team Productivity
• E.g. Eclipse Mylyn Project
• Scripting Language Components
• e.g. Jython, Ruby, etc.
• Improved Application Frameworks
• e.g. Oracle ADF Framework
• Security
• Integration

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Conclusion
Conclusion and Questions
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Final Thoughts

• Be ready for the amount of work required
• Its like writing a term paper or project all the
  time
• Be prepared for the speed and amount of change
• Dont be afraid to ask for help
• but do the research first
• You are not expected to be the expert yet.
• And finally

Be Passionate Do something you love to do!
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Questions?
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BlueStorm Technologies, Inc. 20-24 Wall
Street Binghamton, NY 13901 http//www.bluestorm
tech.com Contact Tony Shuba tshuba_at_bluestormte
ch.com 607-762-5401