Openforce

Posted on:May 06 2005

Imagine you are looking for a job, and reading an advertisement like this:

Java, Databases: provable project experience
J2EE: I already heard I know
Webservices, XML: I already heard I know
Unix, Linux: I already heard I know

So, maybe I'm a bit stupid. But WTF do they mean with 'I already heard I know'? The confusing part is that they don't use any punctuation. In the original text (german), this is even more confusing:

Java, Datenbanken: Nachweisbare Projekterfahrung
J2EE: schon gehört kenne ich
Webservices, XML: schon gehört kenne ich
Unix, Linux: schon gehört kenne ich

It sounds like they want to say something like 'I can't stand people who say they are experts but don't have any clue of this technology'. But I think they simply meant: 'We're searching for people who can at least pronounce XML correctly.'.
This is one perfect example of a very bad job advertisement. I've seen exactly this text from this company for years now in different job pages. Two weeks ago, I wrote an email, proposing to change the text so they would get some more job candidates. I also asked them to explain what they mean with the original text, because after these years, I have become a little bit curious. :) Today, two weeks later: No change in the text and no answer either. What a pity. [And to be sure: NO, I am not looking for a job currently. ;) ]

Comments:

Even with the translation, I have no idea what they are asking for. "I already heard I know" to mean means that someone "My friend told me that I know J2EE. I never learned J2EE but I guess my skills mean that I am able to do it."

Or maybe you mean "Must have at least heard of J2EE"?

Either way, that's polar to the way the hiring market was when I graduated. I remember all the companies demanding "5+ years of Java programming". Which was impossible for 99.9999999% of programmers as Java was only publicly available for a little less than a year and the only people in existence with 5 years of experience are the ones who wrote Java in the first place.

Saigumi

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2005-05-06 14:41:00

Haha, nice find. :) Please tell us what they answered, if they do.

Matthias

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2005-05-06 15:04:00

Ja, schon gehört kenne ich auch :)

Declassified

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2005-05-08 02:53:00

Maybe a "better" translation would be "already heard about know it". I think this would represent this nonsense more accurate in english :)

jox

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2005-05-08 17:09:00