Wild speculations about the "other" factors
Simon Kissel
wild speculation, unlike other current threads that
are based on facts and conclusions drawn out of those.
This is about something we do not have data samples
about, and can only speculate. I'm not claiming that
anything in here is true or backed up with facts, and
I agree that those speculations don't need to be done
outside the newsgroups (IOW: No, nothing for my
roadmap document that's receiving so much public
attention right now).
Ok, I hope this is enough of an disclaimer.
We've meanwhile been told several times that neither us,
the community, nor QC numbers, the component market,
nor the Borland Technology Partners are representative
for Borland's revenue on IDE products. While in all those
sources, the customers using native code are a clear
majority (depending on the source taken, in the range of
80-90%, even more for community feedback), we are told
that there are "other" factors, possibly more important
than us.
Obviously Borland won't tell us what those other
factors are, so it's time for some wild speculation.
Jokingly, in another thread I already said I find it
very strange that Borland is claiming that there is a
very large group weighting more than those customers
represented in data samples mentioned, but that this
group is not leaving behind any traces whatsoever
somewhere, and therefore must be an Alien race shopping
directly in Scotts Valley, not leaving traces on earth
after that.
My thoughts were that if there is a bunch of customers
generating more revenue than "us", it must be visible
in one way or another.
I've come up with a few theories, maybe others can think
of more:
1.) Enterprise customers - maybe there are a few VERY
big enterprise customers that buy thousands worth of
Delphi copies through a direct channel at Borland.
What's strange about this theory is, that those still
should show some sign. Let's assume that those
enterprise customers exist - if they'd use Delphi
to create programs they then sell to the public, we
should know about it - after all, we've got a list
of "famous" Delphi-written programs. And while there
really are some impressive ones, like Skype (it's
cool the Win32 version is still did not get ported
away from Delphi even if they were in need for
versions for Linux and MacOS!), I'm not aware of
any real real big products by enterprise customers.
Say, Photoshop, Microsoft Office ;), Acrobat or
something of that size.
So, that would probably only leave in-house
and specialized development. Maybe there are big
enterprise customers using BDS with thousands of
developer seats to develop inhouse applications.
What I also find strange about it is that we should
have seen "We are looking for 100s of Delphi developers"
job adverts somewhere by big companies. I have never
seen something like this, Delphi job adverts I come
accross usually are for mid-size businesses.
I have to admit however, that indeed is quite a lot
of professional training available for .NET Delphi
developers. Input from that side would be interesting.
There is another thing: While stock market stuff
isn't exactly my cup of tea, from what I've read the
IDE products in total right now make up about 7% of
Borland's 300M yearly revenue (attention, very rough
numbers, if anyone with better ones could please step in,
thanks). So probably the revenue generated per Delphi
version is under 20M, and as it includes Java, possibly
much smaller. That's not much. That's not much at
all. It probably means the number of BDS copies sold
world-wide probably is a small 5-digit number. Actually
the number is so small that I'm now confused and first
wish someone else who has followed those earning calls
etc to step in ;)
Anyway. What I wanted to say is: The BDS sales numbers
are SO small that I absolutely don't see where the
enterprise customers fit in here. If there really
are enterprise customers buying gigantic numbers of
Delphi copies the revenue generated should be much
higher. Else there wouldn't be much copies left that
"we", the "normal" customers could be buying. ;)
Also, a real big enterprise customer could possibly
find it cheaper to simply buy instead DTG completely
instead of a few thousand Delphi copies ;)... which
leads us to..
2.) Warning, extremely unfunded wild thought without
any base whatsoever here:
What if it's an enterprise customer who is simply buying the
DTG right now so they can dictate their needs to them?
That indeed would be an "other" factor and a good reason
to no longer care about us customers.
3.) Vision. Borland may think that all we customers
don't know what we really want and are wrong, and that
each and everyone of us will in a few years thank them
that they've dropped native code and forced us to got
to .NET.
Well, thoughts on this? Could you think of more "other"
factors?
Simon
Dennis Landi
"Simon Kissel" <kis...@computerman.de> wrote in message
news:4533957b$1...@newsgroups.borland.com...
> Jokingly, in another thread I already said I find it
> very strange that Borland is claiming that there is a
> very large group weighting more than those customers
> represented in data samples mentioned, but that this
> group is not leaving behind any traces whatsoever
> somewhere, and therefore must be an Alien race shopping
> directly in Scotts Valley, not leaving traces on earth
> after that.
>
> My thoughts were that if there is a bunch of customers
> generating more revenue than "us", it must be visible
> in one way or another.
>
> I've come up with a few theories, maybe others can think
> of more:
>
> 1.) Enterprise customers - maybe there are a few VERY
> big enterprise customers that buy thousands worth of
> Delphi copies through a direct channel at Borland.
>
> What's strange about this theory is, that those still
> should show some sign. Let's assume that those
> enterprise customers exist -
Great Scott! I think you've hit upon something old boy!
Perhaps these customers are composed of Dark Matter.
For reference read:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_matter
;-)
- d
Simon Kissel
> Why? Only about 10% of the companies I have worked for wrote applications
> to sell, the others had an alternative main income and had applications
> written only to support their business. A good example of this is the
> banking industry, apparently they do a lot of in-house development. I
> worked for the airline industry, they do it too. These are exactly the type
> of customer that is likely to spend LOTS of money on licenses without
> leaving any evidence to the general public.
Agreed.
>> What I also find strange about it is that we should
>> have seen "We are looking for 100s of Delphi developers"
>
> Corporations rarely advertise themselves, they contact agencies. In
> addition to this they specify minimum requirements of their candidates so
> unless you have X years financial experience programming in Delphi you wont
> even hear about the vacancy.
I agree, didn't think of this.
>> 3.) Vision. Borland may think that all we customers
>> don't know what we really want and are wrong, and that
>> each and everyone of us will in a few years thank them
>> that they've dropped native code and forced us to got
>> to .NET.
>
> I think that's just rubbish.
I'm not too sure.
Simon
![Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]'s profile photo](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/a/default-user=s40-c)
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
> should show some sign. Let's assume that those
> enterprise customers exist - if they'd use Delphi
> to create programs they then sell to the public,
Why? Only about 10% of the companies I have worked for wrote applications
to sell, the others had an alternative main income and had applications
written only to support their business. A good example of this is the
banking industry, apparently they do a lot of in-house development. I
worked for the airline industry, they do it too. These are exactly the type
of customer that is likely to spend LOTS of money on licenses without
leaving any evidence to the general public.
> What I also find strange about it is that we should
> have seen "We are looking for 100s of Delphi developers"
Corporations rarely advertise themselves, they contact agencies. In
addition to this they specify minimum requirements of their candidates so
unless you have X years financial experience programming in Delphi you wont
even hear about the vacancy.
> What if it's an enterprise customer who is simply buying the
> DTG right now so they can dictate their needs to them?
> That indeed would be an "other" factor and a good reason
> to no longer care about us customers.
If they are 50% of the customer base then they will be considered by not
dictating. Commercially it makes more sense to satisfy the 50% made of up
millions of customers than it does to satisfy the 50% made up of hundreds.
However it makes more sense to try to keep both sides as happy as possible
*and* ensure that what you do now will make them happy in the future when
their needs change and you have predicted that event and have a solution for
it.
> 3.) Vision. Borland may think that all we customers
> don't know what we really want and are wrong, and that
> each and everyone of us will in a few years thank them
> that they've dropped native code and forced us to got
> to .NET.
I think that's just rubbish.
--
Pete
Blessed are the geek, for they shall public class GeekEarth : Earth {}
====
Audio compression components, DIB graphics controls, ECO extensions,
FastStrings
http://www.droopyeyes.com
====
Dennis Landi
> Peter,
>
>> Why? Only about 10% of the companies I have worked for wrote
>> applications to sell, the others had an alternative main income and had
>> applications written only to support their business. A good example of
>> this is the banking industry, apparently they do a lot of in-house
>> development. I worked for the airline industry, they do it too. These
>> are exactly the type of customer that is likely to spend LOTS of money on
>> licenses without leaving any evidence to the general public.
>
> Agreed.
>
>>> What I also find strange about it is that we should
>>> have seen "We are looking for 100s of Delphi developers"
>>
>> Corporations rarely advertise themselves, they contact agencies.
Agencies are the MAIN advertisers on DICE and Monster.com.
Last week I did a DICE "demo" for an esteemed TeamBer to show that there
were FIFTY (50) Delphi jobs and contracts in all of North America advertised
on Dice. Some of those would have been advertised by Agencies...
Here all quote my numbers from that message here:
<quote>
Here let me check DICE real quick: www.dice.com
Ok, If you type in "Delphi" with no other contrainsts DICE retrieves 186
hits. If you look through the list, you'll see that only the first 50 are
seeking Delphi Developers, the rest mention Delphi somewhere in their blurb,
but not primary. That's the lowest I've ever seen it. Ever, and the trend
has been steady and in one direction for the passed 4 years.
The same exercise for Java yields 13,986 hits.
For C#: 5,147
For VB/VB.NET: 2,456
For C++: 6,055
</quote>
Meaningless, right? If these large corporate entities wished to remain
hidden (ala Dark Matter) and hire anonymously through agencies then their
HIRING ACTIVITY would still SHOW UP on the radar.
Simon is absolutely right.
-d
Tom
Agencies however, locate their people by using Monster.com and the like.
You should still see signs of life when searching for Delphi on the
Internet.
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
>>> 3.) Vision. Borland may think that all we customers
>>> don't know what we really want and are wrong, and that
>>> each and everyone of us will in a few years thank them
>>> that they've dropped native code and forced us to got
>>> to .NET.
>>
>> I think that's just rubbish.
>
> I'm not too sure.
It's more likely that they know what we want and they realise that we know
what we want. I think that they have to balance what we want now with what
they believe we will want in the future, taking into account that in the
future we will want things "yesterday" rather than in the next release and
that we probably wont know that we wanted something until we were given the
option of having it.
For example, until I tried dotnet I had no idea I wanted
1) Reflection
2) Generics
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
> Meaningless, right? If these large corporate entities wished to remain
> hidden (ala Dark Matter) and hire anonymously through agencies then their
> HIRING ACTIVITY would still SHOW UP on the radar.
In what way would you expect an unadvertised job appear on a job advertising
website?
Felipe Monteiro de Carvalho
> <quote>
> The same exercise for Java yields 13,986 hits.
>
> For C#: 5,147
>
> For VB/VB.NET: 2,456
>
> For C++: 6,055
> </quote>
>
> Meaningless, right? If these large corporate entities wished to remain
> hidden (ala Dark Matter) and hire anonymously through agencies then their
> HIRING ACTIVITY would still SHOW UP on the radar.
WOW! The conclusions of this are scary.
Doesn't it seam like we are on a bus, where the driver forgot to make a
turn and is heading to a abysm???
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
I think it is too late to change the roadmap for the next release, so it is
pointless.
Atmapuri
> Well, thoughts on this? Could you think of more "other"
> factors?
I think there should be a public voting setup:
1.) Nick Hodges roadmap
2.) Simon Kissel roadmap
With BDN registered users only. And there
should be another vote:
1.) Nick Hodges remains the director planning.
2.) Simon Kissel takes his job <g>
Regards!
Atmapuri
Tom
Are you serious? Through an agency of course. The government, contractors
and large corporations do this to spare themselves of the massive amounts of
applications. So they use agencies that post to monster.com and the like.
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
This makes no sense to me. What sort of signs do you expect to see?
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
Yes.
> So they use agencies that post to monster.com and the like.
And those agencies are not allowed to post those vacancies publically unless
they enter a secondary stage (ie, post not filled for 3 months).
Atmapuri
> I think it is too late to change the roadmap for the next release, so it
> is pointless.
First rule of a winner: Never give up.
Besides 5 months is a lot of time also.
Regards!
Atmapuri
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
So when a job opening comes up, and the agency is not allowed to list it
publically, what exactly would you expect to see in this public website?
Tom
>
> This makes no sense to me. What sort of signs do you expect to see?
More job listings...
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
It's also the first sign of a nag :-)
Eric Grange
There could be a domino effect to explain the "aliens": in the old days,
Delphi copies sold must have been well over 100k copies, to reach the
million copies sold Borland claimed at Delphi 4 release
http://bdn.borland.com/article/10100
Let's assume that around those days, large customers represented 10% of
the sales (ie. not much), we would be talking 10k copies.
> So probably the revenue generated per Delphi version is under 20M,
> and as it includes Java, possibly much smaller.
Under the hypothesis that all those 20M are Delphi sales, and that the
average unit sell brings in 1k (less than Entreprise, big customers
probably have discounts), we're talking 20k copies (!???).
Large entreprises usually have one form of automatic renewal of
software, either by contract or by their internal sales, and those
contracts are usually prolongated even when all that happens is
maintainance (ie. all the licenses may no longer be used, and they may
no longer be recruiting), so they could still be selling the 10k
licenses today.
Similar contracts kept large IT companies from the 70s alive (or at
least racking bucks) well into the late 90s, even though those companies
were no longer developing new products in the 80s. One particular case I
encountered with DEC comes to mind: they were still getting support
money 5 years after the hardware went off-line. The customer was a big
corp, accounting or IT must have messed up a paper or two, and then for
5 years the contract passed below the radar (and might have for longer,
if a budget slash hadn't triggered an audit).
In the case of Borland, some of these "Delphi contracts" may even be
dBase customers from Ashton Tate, whose automatic "migration path" was
Delphi+BDE.
In the end, these 10k contracts would represent 50% of today sales, and
being long term or maintainance contracts, may not result in much
visibility.
The people that bought the rest of the copies back then, even if many
moved to greener pastures, could outnumber (by far) and "out-noise" - by
even farer ;) - the big customers.
If recaptured, they may as well out-cash the big customers, but that
means having a recapturing strategy, and executing it well...
And if Borland management were to only looks at their figures, they
would only see a "stable" big customer basis, and a rapidly dwindling
small customer basis... hence a drive to focus on the cash cows -ooops-
entreprise customers, rather than to focus on the fickle small customers.
Eric
Tom
>
> So when a job opening comes up, and the agency is not allowed to list it
> publically, what exactly would you expect to see in this public website?
This does not happen.
Brian Moelk
> Ok, I hope this is enough of an disclaimer.
I hope so too. ;)
> My thoughts were that if there is a bunch of customers
> generating more revenue than "us", it must be visible
> in one way or another.
Agreed 100%.
> I've come up with a few theories, maybe others can think
> of more:
>
> 1.) Enterprise customers - maybe there are a few VERY
> big enterprise customers that buy thousands worth of
> Delphi copies through a direct channel at Borland.
I don't have any idea how many there are and how much they purchase.
But it seems to me that these people would show up somewhere. If
anything as a part of Borland's marketing materials/case studies..like
those listed here:
http://www.borland.com/us/customers/case_studies/index.jsp.
> What's strange about this theory is, that those still
> should show some sign. Let's assume that those
> enterprise customers exist - if they'd use Delphi
> to create programs they then sell to the public, we
> should know about it - after all, we've got a list
> of "famous" Delphi-written programs.
I agree with Peter Morris here, most enterprises are using these tools
for internal development. It's of high likelihood that we would not
hear of their applications.
> So, that would probably only leave in-house
> and specialized development. Maybe there are big
> enterprise customers using BDS with thousands of
> developer seats to develop inhouse applications.
Yes, and I suspect most of the Enterprise customers fall into this category.
> What I also find strange about it is that we should
> have seen "We are looking for 100s of Delphi developers"
> job adverts somewhere by big companies. I have never
> seen something like this, Delphi job adverts I come
> accross usually are for mid-size businesses.
I don't think you'd see advertisements quite like that.
A few years ago, I was in talks with a contractor that was employing
10-12 Delphi guys. That was the largest number of Delphi hires at one
time that I have heard of in the Washington DC area. IIRC, the
advertisement was pretty much like any other Delphi advertisement. But
they did advertise on Monster.com or CareerBuilder.com or one of those
sites.
Supposedly there are large Delphi shops in the DC area, but from what I
can tell, now most large contract work is done in Java or .NET.
> I have to admit however, that indeed is quite a lot
> of professional training available for .NET Delphi
> developers. Input from that side would be interesting.
Just out of curiosity, where is the Delphi for .NET training? I haven't
looked for it, so I don't know how much is actually out there.
> There is another thing: While stock market stuff
> isn't exactly my cup of tea, from what I've read the
> IDE products in total right now make up about 7% of
> Borland's 300M yearly revenue (attention, very rough
> numbers, if anyone with better ones could please step in,
> thanks).
It's tough to really say because the accounting can get very "creative"
as to how they recognize revenue. We'll be able to see more clearly
after the divestiture what the numbers actually shake out to be.
> Also, a real big enterprise customer could possibly
> find it cheaper to simply buy instead DTG completely
> instead of a few thousand Delphi copies ;)... which
> leads us to..
I doubt any enterprise customer would do that. They aren't in the
business of making tools, they have their own business to run.
IMO, if they were to be acquired by a non techie company, this would be
one of the worst situations for DevCo. Historically these kinds of
acquisitions don't work well at all.
> 2.) Warning, extremely unfunded wild thought without
> any base whatsoever here:
> What if it's an enterprise customer who is simply buying the
> DTG right now so they can dictate their needs to them?
> That indeed would be an "other" factor and a good reason
> to no longer care about us customers.
I hope that's not the case. I doubt it is, but we'll find out eventually.
> 3.) Vision. Borland may think that all we customers
> don't know what we really want and are wrong, and that
> each and everyone of us will in a few years thank them
> that they've dropped native code and forced us to got
> to .NET.
Possibly, but honestly I think it's probably more about pride and
stubbornness than that.
> Well, thoughts on this? Could you think of more "other"
> factors?
I believe there are many developers that lurk or don't participate or
just use Delphi for their day jobs and go home. There are many of them
that are "silent" from the outside.
But I'm not sure if these are the customers you really want to cater to.
IMO, the way you earn these customers in the first place is by winning
the hearts and minds of those that are passionate, who know what they
want and have the technical expertise to use your products successfully.
In my experience, these guys are generally followers and will leave you
as soon as the next big thing comes along. The challenge is to keep a
product moving forward and keep it cool enough for these guys to
continue following and recruit new guys. But all products have their
coolness lifetime so without reinvention or new products emerging,
things can stagnate.
--
Brian Moelk
Brain Endeavor LLC
bmo...@NObrainSPAMendeavorFOR.MEcom
Tom
>
> And those agencies are not allowed to post those vacancies publically
> unless they enter a secondary stage (ie, post not filled for 3 months).
You're fooling yourself if you believe that ALL Delphi jobs are not
advertised.
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
I was not aware of it either until I lost my Delphi job and spent 3 months
looking for a new one. The agency was local and I became very friendly with
the guy who ran it. Over time he explained the whole scenario to me.
According to his experience it occurs in various ways:
1) Sometimes the employer doesn't even raise any kind of record for the
vancancy unless the agency has suitable candidates.
2) The company only wants to interview candidates with X years experience in
the financial sector *and* an additional list of educational qualifications
(HnDs etc) and wont interview anyone else.
3) The company doesn't want the job listed because some people try to work
out who the employer is and contacts them directly.
4) The company might agree to listing the job if it hasn't been filled
within 3 or 6 months.
There are many variations, but basically there were jobs I couldn't apply
for due to my lack of suitability. These companies pay the employee a lot
of money (approaching double the average) and therefore the agency also gets
a lot more money. If the agency does not appease the company (and I don't
mean with a nice shrubbery) the company will no longer deal with them.
Apparently it is not uncommon at all. Believe or disbelieve if you like it
doesn't matter to me, this guy had no reason to lie to me and I really have
no reason to lie to you.
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
> advertised.
I'd say that you're fooling yourself if you think that ALL Delphi jobs are.
In addition, all "open" vacancies do not end up on Moster.com etc either.
Wayne Niddery [TeamB]
>
> We've meanwhile been told several times that neither us,
> the community, nor QC numbers, the component market,
> nor the Borland Technology Partners are representative
> for Borland's revenue on IDE products.
*In isolation*. That does not mean any of these groups are ignored, but that
they are only a part of total input.
> What's strange about this theory is, that those still
> should show some sign. Let's assume that those
> enterprise customers exist - if they'd use Delphi
> to create programs they then sell to the public, we
> should know about it - after all, we've got a list
> of "famous" Delphi-written programs. And while there
> really are some impressive ones, like Skype (it's
> cool the Win32 version is still did not get ported
> away from Delphi even if they were in need for
> versions for Linux and MacOS!), I'm not aware of
> any real real big products by enterprise customers.
> Say, Photoshop, Microsoft Office ;), Acrobat or
> something of that size.
> So, that would probably only leave in-house
> and specialized development.
For the *vast majority* of Enterprise-level companies, their primary line of
business is *anything but software*, thus they are not going to have
software products to sell to the public! For these companies, *by
definition*, they are going to be *consumers* of software and, for specific
needs, either contract out development or build their own IT departments -
and therefore all development done by these companies is either for in-house
purposes and/or for exclusive use of their direct customers or vendors. That
makes it virtually impossible for you or me to have any idea or be able to
make even an educated guess of how much Delphi is used in such companies. My
personal example at this level is a module used by (at least) two large
international banks to perform currency reconciliations. Not a large app,
but definitely targeting an Enterprise-level role.
The next most common development would be for vertical market apps, and
these are developed by companies of all sizes from 1-man shops to
software-based enterprises like IBM and MS, but again unless you have some
reason to know about that vertical market, you'll very likely have never
heard about the product. For example, my biggest, to-date, project was for
the Spa/Resort industry and is still used in 100s of installations
world-wide including many very well-known ones (screenshots:
http://www.spasoft.com/spasoft/spasoft-b.html - the custom calendar
component was my baby, based on a TDrawGrid <g>). But I'm sure you've never
heard of that program before.
The only project I've ever worked on in 11 years of pure Delphi work that
can be considered part of a shrink-wrap product were some add-ins, done in
Delphi 3, that shipped with Paradox 8. Every other fits into one of the
above two categories, mostly the vertical market category.
> What I also find strange about it is that we should
> have seen "We are looking for 100s of Delphi developers"
> job adverts somewhere by big companies.
Do you really think a company is going to typically hire that many in bulk?
Teams develop over time and usually start off small, so you would never
normally see a call for more than a few at a time.
> There is another thing: While stock market stuff
> isn't exactly my cup of tea, from what I've read the
> IDE products in total right now make up about 7% of
> Borland's 300M yearly revenue (attention, very rough
> numbers, if anyone with better ones could please step in,
> thanks).
Disclaimers aside, I can't imagine how you've managed to crunch such a
number. Borland's recent statements do not provide numbers specific to the
IDE products, but do provide numbers for license revenue - and a
*substantial* part of that revenue is from the IDE products.
--
Wayne Niddery - Winwright, Inc (www.winwright.ca)
"The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are
injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say
there are twenty gods, or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks
my leg." – Thomas Jefferson
Brian Moelk
> In what way would you expect an unadvertised job appear on a job advertising
> website?
IMO, the number of advertised jobs should proportionately indicate the
number of unadvertised jobs.
The only way you can make this argument is if you believe that Delphi
jobs have a significantly lower advertised rate than say, C# jobs. I
just don't think this argument holds weight.
Brian Moelk
> I think there should be a public voting setup:
I don't. Delphi product direction shouldn't be a pure democracy.
Eric Grange
many jobs, with so little transpiring on the wibbly web, this would have
to be the Manhattan Project...
And several Borlanders reported that there were multiple big customers,
so we would be talking CIA, NSA, etc., otherwise, they would certainly
have a visibility.
Eric
Tom
> it doesn't matter to me, this guy had no reason to lie to me and I really
> have no reason to lie to you.
I have relatives in the industry (hi-tech placement) and can tell you it is
far from the norm.
It's called denial, you'll get over it. :-)
Brian Moelk
> doesn't matter to me, this guy had no reason to lie to me and I really have
> no reason to lie to you.
I believe it but is this more common with Delphi jobs for some reason?
ISTM, that this would be the case with all jobs for various languages/tools.
Brian Moelk
> Still, the number of public job offers should tent to be proportional to
> the number of non-public job offers. Don't you agree?
>
> If not, what would make Delphi so special and different from everything
> else out there that it's jobs are always non-public?
I just said that too! ;)
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
> the number of non-public job offers. Don't you agree?
Yes, but you cannot judge how many are "invisible" based on how many visible
ones there are.
> If not, what would make Delphi so special and different from everything
> else out there that it's jobs are always non-public?
I don't expect it is specific to Delphi jobs.
Tom
What I am stating is that the VAST MAJORITY (99%) of the jobs are
advertised. A company wants to fill vacancies or find the most qualified
candidate, not sit and wait.
Most openings appear on the web now using either direct hire or agencies.
Your thoughts are simply wrong.
Nick Hodges (Borland/DTG)
> We've meanwhile been told several times that neither us,
> the community, nor QC numbers, the component market,
> nor the Borland Technology Partners are representative
> for Borland's revenue on IDE products.
That's not a fair statement.
Input from customers takes many forms and there are many different
"camps" that are part of the total input. Any one group, taken in
isolation, should not be considered "representative", merely part of
the whole story.
--
Nick Hodges
Delphi/C# Product Manager - Borland DTG
http://blogs.borland.com/nickhodges
Felipe Monteiro de Carvalho
> looking for a new one. The agency was local and I became very friendly with
> the guy who ran it. Over time he explained the whole scenario to me.
> According to his experience it occurs in various ways:
Still, the number of public job offers should tent to be proportional to
the number of non-public job offers. Don't you agree?
If not, what would make Delphi so special and different from everything
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
> is far from the norm.
Maybe it differs depending on where you are. In addition to this I'd expect
that people being paid double what they get elsewhere aren't likely to move
jobs very often, and I know that these people do get paid very well because
I have seen job adverts.
> It's called denial, you'll get over it. :-)
Actually it's called passing on information that was given to me by someone
in the industry. Why your relatives have told you that something doesn't
happen is very strange behaviour. Do they also phone you to tell you that
it isn't Sunday? :-)
Tom
> someone in the industry. Why your relatives have told you that something
> doesn't happen is very strange behaviour. Do they also phone you to tell
> you that it isn't Sunday? :-)
I am not in denial. :-)
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
I didn't say you were, I was just saying that I see no reason why your
relatives would think to tell you about events that do not occur. Even if
they are unaware of these activities it wouldn't mean it doesn't happen, I
have no reason to doubt the information I was given.
I'm not attaching any weight to this other than that I don't believe all
vacancies will appear on Monster.com
1) Because I don't believe all jobs are publically advertised.
2) Because jobs many jobs are filled quickly.
3) Because some companies pay a lot of money and as a result get a very low
staff turnover.
Brian Moelk
> ones there are.
Ok, but we can still make a reasonable assessment based on the number of
visible jobs of the relative health of the Enterprise customer base.
I'm not sure what the point here is to consider "invisible" jobs?
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
1) The "other factors" do not exist or
2) The "other factors" are insignificant
I don't see the point. They are obviously significant otherwise DTG
wouldn't be paying attention to them.
Atmapuri
>> First rule of a winner: Never give up.
>
> It's also the first sign of a nag :-)
<g>
Coud be. It depends... It must be done in an appropriate
and cultivated manner taking in to account the personal
freedom of other people...
The Chinese politicans have one good approach:
They can only suggest, but never tell others what they
should do be doing...
Regards!
Atmapuri
Brian Moelk
> It does not imply a pure democracy. But democracy is one
> of the inputs that should be in the equation...
It's a silly thing to vote on and makes it unnecessarily personal, which
it's not.
Atmapuri
> I don't. Delphi product direction shouldn't be a pure democracy.
It does not imply a pure democracy. But democracy is one
of the inputs that should be in the equation...
Thanks!
Atmapuri
Wayne Niddery [TeamB]
>
Only if one drops context. Over the entire 11 years of Delphi history, the
small numbers of Delphi jobs seen in such databases has been held up as
evidence that Delphi is about to die. While there have been times,
especially at the very beginning, where such counts were a little higher,
they have always been but a very small percentage compared to that of C++,
VB, or Java. The same is already true for C# and not unexpected.
Because Delphi does hold a relatively smaller market share, it follows that
it will have a correspondingly smaller exposure at such sites, and it is
also a fact that exposure gets magnified in such databases for two reasons
(at least): 1) the same job tends to be advertised multiple times by
different recruiters, whcih multiplies the perceived different and, 2) for
the more popular languages it is common for recruiters to place many generic
ads to get people contacting them.
--
Wayne Niddery - Winwright, Inc (www.winwright.ca)
"At the apex of every great tragedy of mankind there stands the figure
of an incorruptible altruist." - Ayn Rand
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
The point is that you cannot assume that no large corporations buy lots of
Delphi licenses based on the fact that you don't see Delphi jobs advertised
to fill the seats that require those licenses.
Brian Moelk
> Delphi licenses based on the fact that you don't see Delphi jobs advertised
> to fill the seats that require those licenses.
Sure, there are some large corporations that do, but I think it's fair
to say that proportionately to some other tools/technologies they are
very small in number.
Brian Moelk
>
> 1) The "other factors" do not exist or
> 2) The "other factors" are insignificant
>
> I don't see the point.
There will be no proof here, and Simon said he was completely
speculating. We're just having a discussion, if you see no point, feel
free not to participate.
> They are obviously significant otherwise DTG
> wouldn't be paying attention to them.
I think that's the whole point, it's to figure out what these sources
could possible be.
Brian Moelk
> that's the general jist of what I am saying. You cannot work out what a
> number is if you do not have enough information to work out what the number
> is.
But we have the visible data?
You even admitted that proportionately they'd be the same. I don't see
why we it makes sense to say the visible numbers mean nothing simply
because there are other numbers that we don't see.
Brian Moelk
> Because Delphi does hold a relatively smaller market share, it follows that
> it will have a correspondingly smaller exposure at such sites, and it is
> also a fact that exposure gets magnified in such databases for two reasons
> (at least): 1) the same job tends to be advertised multiple times by
> different recruiters, whcih multiplies the perceived different and, 2) for
> the more popular languages it is common for recruiters to place many generic
> ads to get people contacting them.
Even if you cut the numbers by 1/3, it's still "scary".
Lucian
Where are they? I don't expect their CEO's to visit these ngs, so,
where are those Delphi developers?? Not just one developer from these
large corps showing up here and say "I work in a 100/500/1000 Dev team"?
I do not believe there is a 500-1000 Delphi developers team out there
(unlesss I hear or see some evidence about it)
Lucian
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
> to say that proportionately to some other tools/technologies they are
> very small in number.
I don't think its fair to say anything without data to support it, and
Felipe Monteiro de Carvalho
> That's not a fair statement.
>
> Input from customers takes many forms and there are many different
> "camps" that are part of the total input. Any one group, taken in
> isolation, should not be considered "representative", merely part of
> the whole story.
And who is buying lot's of BDS's and using them for .NET?
We've seen it's not the people in this newsgroup.
It's not the people writting components for Delphi either.
It's also not people that advertise jobs for Delphi programmers on Dice.
Just who are those misterious guys that are so interrested on .NET, and
give so much profit to Borland that they make the guys that want a
native development environment be considered less numerous, profitable,
or otherwise less important?
And yes, it's fair statement considering the current Roadmap.
Brian Moelk
> Where are they? I don't expect their CEO's to visit these ngs, so,
> where are those Delphi developers?? Not just one developer from these
> large corps showing up here and say "I work in a 100/500/1000 Dev team"?
I understand and for the most part agree with you, but I do imagine
there are large Delphi shops out there.
If you look at some of Borland's published case studies there are some
there; it's unclear as to how big they actually are, but hey, I'm
willing to give a little latitude here.
> I do not believe there is a 500-1000 Delphi developers team out there
> (unlesss I hear or see some evidence about it)
I think that's a rare size team even for other tools/languages.
geikelite
"Simon Kissel" <kis...@computerman.de> wrote in message
>
> Jokingly, in another thread I already said I find it
> very strange that Borland is claiming that there is a
> very large group weighting more than those customers
> represented in data samples mentioned, but that this
> group is not leaving behind any traces whatsoever
> somewhere,
What about military users, missile defense systems, space shuttles, nuclear
power plants? Maybe the US military has a heavy investment in Delphi.
Just a thought. I have absolutely no info that would suggest this is the
case.
Lucian
> If you look at some of Borland's published case studies there are some
Sure there are big corporations using Delphi, but than, why would they
pay thousands of licenses if all they have is a 20 developers team?
> I think that's a rare size team even for other tools/languages.
Same here. I also believe it is rare to find shops having more than 20
Delphi developers team, thus paying for Delphi tools 20k-30k anually.
Multiply such shop by 100 ... where are these at least 2000 developers?
Shouldn't they be the majority in these ngs, if there are so many big
Delphi shops?
Lucian
somebody
> We've meanwhile been told several times that neither us,
> the community, nor QC numbers, the component market,
> nor the Borland Technology Partners are representative
> for Borland's revenue on IDE products.
I don't think Borland is entirely wrong there. I cannot say for Delphi since
nobody I know uses it anymore, but from my experience, in a lot of
(especially larger) companies, programmers tend to work like manual
laborers, 9 to 5, with little time to go online to newsgroups, with little
or no direct or indirect contact with tool vendors and leave work at work
and are not the least bit passionate about their tools. Come to think of it,
that's the way it should be, I guess. The religious but vocal ones are in
the minority.
Wayne Niddery [TeamB]
>
> to the number of non-public job offers. Don't you agree?
No. Far more jobs are filled without ever being advertised publically.
> If not, what would make Delphi so special and different from
> everything else out there that it's jobs are always non-public?
It's not different, this applies generally and to most industries as well -
more jobs are filled without public advertising. However, the way it can
result in a perceptual difference in such databases as monster.com is other
conequences of (in our industry) a language's popularity - the more popular
a langauge, the more a *single* position will be advertised, and the more
there will also be a tendency of recruiters to engage in generic
advertising - an advertised position that isn't really for a specific
placement but attracts applicants that can be sent on interviews for similar
enough actual placements - this is a factor of competition between
recruiters.
--
Wayne Niddery - Winwright, Inc (www.winwright.ca)
"Light is faster than sound, which is why some folks appear bright
before they speak."
marc hoffman
> I was not aware of it either until I lost my Delphi job and spent 3 months
> looking for a new one. The agency was local and I became very friendly with
> the guy who ran it. Over time he explained the whole scenario to me.
> According to his experience it occurs in various ways:
and this, magically, only applies to /Delphi/ job vacancies, not to
C#/C++/Java ones?
--
marc
geikelite
"Felipe Monteiro de Carvalho" <fel...@nospam.com> wrote
>
> In the past US Military software was standarized to be only on the ADA
> programming Language (it was created just for that). At some point they
> dropped this requirement.
>
> It's a possibility. But if so, why is the military so interrested on
> Delphi for .NET ?
Security, of course :)
Without Vista and .NET 2, we are all doomed. Haven't you heard :)
Wayne Niddery [TeamB]
>
> IMO, the number of advertised jobs should proportionately indicate the
> number of unadvertised jobs.
In *general* that will be true. But there can be other factors that can
cause differences that I've posted in other messages already.
--
Wayne Niddery - Winwright, Inc (www.winwright.ca)
"We've all heard that a million monkeys banging on a million
typewriters will eventually reproduce the entire works of Shakespeare.
Now, thanks to the Internet, we know this is not true." - Robert
Wilensky
Felipe Monteiro de Carvalho
> What about military users, missile defense systems, space shuttles, nuclear
> power plants? Maybe the US military has a heavy investment in Delphi.
>
> Just a thought. I have absolutely no info that would suggest this is the
> case.
In the past US Military software was standarized to be only on the ADA
Wayne Niddery [TeamB]
>
> What I am stating is that the VAST MAJORITY (99%) of the jobs are
> advertised.
That has never been true in *any* industry. The conventional wisdom is that
about 25% of all vacanices are filled via public job ads, the others are
filled through other means, typically networking. This is one of the
benefits of user groups - allowing people to connect. I've had several past
clients contact me asking if I know anyone looking for a job or a contract
and, when I can, pass them a name or two of people I think highly of and
might be interested. Employers will often first ask their own employees for
references.
--
Wayne Niddery - Winwright, Inc (www.winwright.ca)
"We've all heard that a million monkeys banging on a million
typewriters will eventually reproduce the entire works of Shakespeare.
Now, thanks to the Internet, we know this is not true." — Robert
Wilensky
Felipe Monteiro de Carvalho
> and this, magically, only applies to /Delphi/ job vacancies, not to
> C#/C++/Java ones?
He is stating that the number jobs being applied and filled that don't
show publicly is so much bigger then public job listings (99% - 1%),
that all data we get from Dice is completely irrelevant.
He does not explain why Delphi is proportionally so much smaller. One
can imagine that Dice is under a constant distortion field which makes
us think there are much less Delphi jobs then there really is.
Nick Hodges (Borland/DTG)
> And who is buying lot's of BDS's and using them for .NET?
All different sorts of people and organizations.
--
Nick Hodges
Delphi/C# Product Manager - Borland DTG
http://blogs.borland.com/nickhodges
Simon Kissel
>> We've meanwhile been told several times that neither us,
>> the community, nor QC numbers, the component market,
>> nor the Borland Technology Partners are representative
>> for Borland's revenue on IDE products.
>
> That's not a fair statement.
Well, I think it is? If those are one part of the whole story,
there must be other parts.
An the other parts obviously must be terribly strong, much
much stronger than all the customers represented through the
data samples.
Because: If the other part would have the same "weight", we'd
be roughly in a 50:50 situation.
The current products and roadmap however do not reflect a
50:50 situation. According to the past, and the roadmap, there
will be 5 releases in a row (Delphi 8-Delphi 2008) with their
*primary* focus on .NET. In a 50:50 situation between native
code and .NET customers, one would expect alternating
focusses. After all, switching focus between .NET and Win32
phases only every 7 years won't make sense, as one of the
two platforms will fall behind 7 years each time then, which
probably kills it. Also, in the past, whenever you had
to focus on several targets, you did alternating releases
(Delphi/C++Builder/Kylix) of those.
Ok, so the "other" factors can't have the same weight. They
must be much much stronger. And that's what we are now
speculating about, because you can't name us those factors.
And in case those "other" factors aren't really that much
stronger, the conclusion must be that your roadmap is flawed,
which is what I'm suspecting.
Simon
Lucian
I was ready to ask you how is that possible, than I thought at myself.
In 2 cases I was contacted directly by companies which I than worked
for. But also in these cases, one company also used an agency while the
other one had its own opportunities web-site.
I tend to agree, but I am skeptical it's "far more".
Lucian
Felipe Monteiro de Carvalho
>>And who is buying lot's of BDS's and using them for .NET?
>
> All different sorts of people and organizations.
Considering the two groups: People buying BDS to use for .NET and people
buying .NET to use for native development.
Which do you consider to be bigger (in number of sales)?
And if they all use it for both, try to identify which one they use more.
Brian Moelk
> In *general* that will be true.
Then in general, we can make that judgment.
> But there can be other factors that can
> cause differences that I've posted in other messages already.
Sure, and my reply to yours indicates that even if you allow for 1/3 of
a difference (which IMO is far too generous), Delphi is still way off
the mark for employment opportunities.
Ingvar Nilsen
> 1.) Nick Hodges roadmap
> 2.) Simon Kissel roadmap
Nope. I'll use my GPS
--
Ingvar Nilsen
http://www.ingvarius.com
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
Yes, you have "some" data but not all of it and no way of knowing if you
even have enough of it.
> You even admitted that proportionately they'd be the same
I can't admit something I don't know, I may have supposed it though.
Brian Moelk
> What about military users, missile defense systems, space shuttles, nuclear
> power plants? Maybe the US military has a heavy investment in Delphi.
I live in DC and am a government contractor. I personally do not work
for any kind of military use, but my friends that have were C++ guys.
One of them actually wrote an ADA -> C++ converter.
I don't know of anyone that attends the Delphi user group in DC that
work in the defense area either.
I am directly aware of one DoD contract that is using Java. I vaguely
remember another DoD contract actually being Delphi, but my knowledge is
skewed because I interviewed for a position at that firm.
> Just a thought. I have absolutely no info that would suggest this is the
> case.
All of my experience is anecdotal. But since I live in an area with a
large presence of US military contracts, etc. it would seem that I would
be more likely to hear of such things as others. I will admit that I
don't actively keep on top of US military opportunities. Perhaps Thomas
or Dennis will chime in here.
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
> (unlesss I hear or see some evidence about it)
Nor do I. I do believe that there are companies out there that you do not
know about that are worth lots of money to DTG and Delphi. Maybe not
because of how many licenses they purchase but probably because other
sources of revenue such as Platinum support or maybe other revenue sources
that we aren't even aware of.
They don't have to have lots of licenses to be worth lots of money, which is
another reason why using job postings as a source of estimating how much
they are worth is useless. Even if you work out how many there are + how
many coders they have you probably still wont work out how much the contract
is worth.
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
> C#/C++/Java ones?
No, please read my other posts before talking down to me.
Ingvar Nilsen
> What's strange about this theory is, that those still
> should show some sign. Let's assume that those
> enterprise customers exist - if they'd use Delphi
> to create programs they then sell to the public, we
> should know about it
I believe most, I repeat *most* Delphi applications non of us will hear
about because they are in-house applications, or applications for the
vertical market.
The software industry is much much much much more than applications
written for the public. THAT is where the money is, Borland with its
ALM products are going after that market, if I am not completely wrong.
I have been in this industry now for about 10 years, I have worked for
several companies, written a zillion lines of code - practically
nothing of what I have made has been sold to the public market. It is
all business to business applications, sold by knocking on the door,
some of these apps hundreds of thousands of $$ because they are not
apps the way we understand it, they are part of *solutions*.
I am not alone here, I know quite a few Delphi developers, and almost
none of them write apps intended for the public.
Now, being a consultant and using both Delphi and VS 2005 and C#, I
still am not writing anything that ever will be publicly known.
The first chance for that, is when my new web site goes on air in a
couple of weeks, then I want public attention :)
Brian Moelk
> Yes, you have "some" data but not all of it and no way of knowing if you
> even have enough of it.
Of course, nothing is for certain, but is it really likely that all of
the non-visible jobs add up to a slew of large enterprise customers
using Delphi? I find that very unlikely/improbable.
> I can't admit something I don't know, I may have supposed it though.
Ok, "admit" is the wrong word, but you did say:
"I don't expect it is specific to Delphi jobs. "
So you don't have any expectations that it would be different for
different technologies. ISTM, you expect the percentages to be the same
for non-visible jobs then?
If so, I'm not sure if you would expect to find the data in disagreement
with my original statement:
"I think it's fair to say that proportionately to some other
tools/technologies [Enterprises using Delphi] are very small in number."
Although you replied with "I don't think its fair to say anything
without data to support it...".
I guess I'm just not really following the logic of your argument beyond:
"It's impossible to know anything for certain, so it's not fair to say
anything about anything."
Felipe Monteiro de Carvalho
> Although you replied with "I don't think its fair to say anything
> without data to support it...".
>
> I guess I'm just not really following the logic of your argument beyond:
> "It's impossible to know anything for certain, so it's not fair to say
> anything about anything."
And that statement can be proven wrong.
Statistics is a science that proves that a small sample *can* be
representative of the whole group.
Lucian
> how many there are + how many coders they have you probably still
> wont work out how much the contract is worth.
maybe. I just can't believe these folks worth more than the rest. and
even if we know, it still won't matter because we don't know what .NET
means for them.
Lucian
Nick Hodges (Borland/DTG)
> Which do you consider to be bigger (in number of sales)?
Sorry, we can't talk about that kind of thing in public.
Jon Robertson
>Sorry, we can't talk about that kind of thing in public.
Or in private, I'd imagine. ;)
Ingvar Nilsen
lol
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
> could possible be.
And at the end the best you can say is
"Congratulations everyone, I think we have it! I wonder if we are right?"
:-)
Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software]
> different technologies. ISTM, you expect the percentages to be the same
> for non-visible jobs then?
I wouldn't expect Delphi to be special, although the percentages may vary
depending on the technology for some reason not known to me.
> I guess I'm just not really following the logic of your argument beyond:
> "It's impossible to know anything for certain, so it's not fair to say
> anything about anything."
My argument in summary is
1) Not all jobs are posted on Monster, therefore it's not a good way to work
out how many people use the tool.
2) Not all jobs posted on Monster are real, therefore (as above).
3) Not all income for Delphi is based on licenses, so how many individual
licenses sold is irrelevant anyway.
4) If DTG say that there are significant other factors then I believe them
because I see no reason for them to lie. If the people in this NG + using
QC were the only people to take into account I expect DTG would be having a
whale of a time having 100% of the information they need all in once place,
discussed and agreed on, so that they can then go ahead and implement it.
I'm not saying we know nothing about anything, I'm saying that we don't know
all the facts and that if we do guess them all we'd still have no way of
knowing that we had. I see it a bit like arguing whether or not there is
life after death, personally I think we'll all find out when we are dead so
why waste our lives guessing?
Pete
David Erbas-White
> Felipe Monteiro de Carvalho wrote:
>
>
>>Which do you consider to be bigger (in number of sales)?
>
>
> Sorry, we can't talk about that kind of thing in public.
>
OK.
Let's meet behind the oak tree at midnight... <G>
David Erbas-White
Brian Moelk
> :-)
That's what speculation is...
ram...@bigpond.net.au
> If not, what would make Delphi so special and different from
> everything else out there that it's jobs are always non-public?
Spin by Team B :-)
ram...@bigpond.net.au
>
>> Nick Hodges (Borland/DTG) wrote:
>> > Sorry, we can't talk about that kind of thing in public.
>>
>> Or in private, I'd imagine. ;)
Good old Inprise.
Never changes.
Nick Hodges (Borland/DTG)
> Good old Inprise.
> Never changes.
As much as I am loathe to engage you in a conversation about this sort
of thing, I'll add that wise companies don't publish proprietary sales
information and other such information that would benefit the
competition of said wise company.
marc hoffman
> No, please read my other posts before
i read tens of posts from you in this thread, and none explained it.
--
marc
Bob Dawson
> Peter Morris [Droopy eyes software] wrote:
> > "Congratulations everyone, I think we have it! I wonder if we are
right?"
> > :-)
>
> That's what speculation is...
Well, that's what idle speculation is at least ...
bobD
marc hoffman
>> and this, magically, only applies to /Delphi/ job vacancies, not to
>> C#/C++/Java ones?
>
> He is stating that the number jobs being applied and filled that don't
> show publicly is so much bigger then public job listings (99% - 1%),
> that all data we get from Dice is completely irrelevant.
yes, i understood that part. What i don't get is why this should only
apply to Delphi jobs, and not to C++ and Java ones that supposedly show
in the thousands.
> He does not explain why Delphi is proportionally so much smaller. One
> can imagine that Dice is under a constant distortion field which makes
> us think there are much less Delphi jobs then there really is.
Again - why would such a distortion only affect Delphi?
--
marc hoffman
Chief Architect
RemObjects Software
http://www.remobjects.com
and the fifty-two daughters of the revolution
turn the gold to chrome
Chris Burrows
news:4533957b$1...@newsgroups.borland.com...
>
> 1.) Enterprise customers - maybe there are a few VERY
> big enterprise customers that buy thousands worth of
> Delphi copies through a direct channel at Borland.
>
From a post by Tim Jarvis (DTG) in this newsgroup last Sunday:
<quote>
I personally have been working on
something this weekend for one of these customers, and I have been
dealing directly with Nick and some of the R&D team on their issue, but
then when you measure one custs purchases in 000,000's rather than
000's thats what you sometimes have to do
</quote>
--
Chris Burrows
CFB Software
http://www.cfbsoftware.com/gpcp
Bob Dawson
>
> We've meanwhile been told several times that neither us,
> the community, nor QC numbers, the component market,
> nor the Borland Technology Partners are representative
> for Borland's revenue on IDE products.
Or, simply that what you think you know about those groups isn't the full
picture.
> While in all those
> sources, the customers using native code are a clear
> majority (depending on the source taken, in the range of
> 80-90%, even more for community feedback),
Even assuming that to be the case (which I wouldn't), what facts do you have
indicating that none of those currently still using win32 don't want DTG
working hard on .NET?
bobD
Tom
> apply to Delphi jobs, and not to C++ and Java ones that supposedly show in
> the thousands.
Agreed, it makes no sense at all.
Dr. Nick Riviera
> <ram...@bigpond.net.au> wrote:
>
> > Good old Inprise.
> > Never changes.
>
> wise companies don't publish proprietary sales
> information and other such information that would benefit the
> competition of said wise company.
But Borland isn't a wise company..
Johnnie Norsworthy
news:4534251a$1...@newsgroups.borland.com...
> Felipe,
>
>>> and this, magically, only applies to /Delphi/ job vacancies, not to
>>> C#/C++/Java ones?
>>
>> He is stating that the number jobs being applied and filled that don't
>> show publicly is so much bigger then public job listings (99% - 1%), that
>> all data we get from Dice is completely irrelevant.
>
> yes, i understood that part. What i don't get is why this should only
> apply to Delphi jobs, and not to C++ and Java ones that supposedly show in
> the thousands.
>
>> He does not explain why Delphi is proportionally so much smaller. One can
>> imagine that Dice is under a constant distortion field which makes us
>> think there are much less Delphi jobs then there really is.
>
> Again - why would such a distortion only affect Delphi?
I sure would like to know where to look for Delphi jobs that are secretly
being filled.
-Johnnie
Brian Moelk
> Well, that's what idle speculation is at least ...
What about "wild speculation"? ;)
Brian Moelk
Bob Dawson
>
> What about "wild speculation"? ;)
I suppose that that would be speculating poorly. Did you have something else
in mind?
bobD
Brian Moelk
> I suppose that that would be speculating poorly. Did you have something else
> in mind?
I was simply reminding you of the subject of the thread that you're
replying to. ;)
Bruce McGee
Perhaps your individual opinion is a single data point and isn't
necessarily representative of the entire customer base. After all, you
can only reliably speak for yourself. This doesn't mean people
(including myself) won't agree with at least some points. It means
that I can speak just fine for myself, thanks.
--
Regards,
Bruce McGee
Glooscap Software