December 28, 2017 at 11:18 am
Ed Wagner - Thursday, December 28, 2017 11:09 AMLynn Pettis - Thursday, December 28, 2017 11:01 AMDavid.Poole - Thursday, December 28, 2017 10:40 AMAgain, the desire to avoid a subject lest you get shackled to it is an interesting point.
I find that to be good at something you have to immerse yourself in it. Time and energy being finite immersing yourself in an obscure or dieing niche is highly undesirable.
I know a few retired COBOL programmers who love being able to supplement their pensions with a skill where supply is dwindling faster than demandToo bad my COBOL skills aren't in the mainframe environment but the minicomputer environment. I don't know anything about CICS or JCL.
I know COBOL on a mainframe...from the 1980s. Granted, I don't know if the mainframe environment hasn't changed much since then, but I just don't have the interest or time to deal with it unless forced. It did come in handy a few years ago when I had to talk a company (we traded data with) through reading her JCL to prove the data file I delivered was valid and that it was their FTP program that was destroying it during the transfer. I must admit it was difficult to remember some of it, but we got through it. The sad part was that she couldn't do it herself on her own mainframe. I'm thankful I had the experience necessary to help, but I really don't want to work in that environment full time.
Did not say I would do it full time (did it for eleven years at a previous employer), but if it could supplement my income that might be worth some time outside of my normal job. I would need a little refresher probably as it has been twelve years since I last wrote any COBOL code.
December 28, 2017 at 1:06 pm
David.Poole - Thursday, December 28, 2017 10:40 AMAgain, the desire to avoid a subject lest you get shackled to it is an interesting point.
I find that to be good at something you have to immerse yourself in it. Time and energy being finite immersing yourself in an obscure or dieing niche is highly undesirable.
I know a few retired COBOL programmers who love being able to supplement their pensions with a skill where supply is dwindling faster than demand
Now for some advice from an old-timer who doesn't need to supplement my small pension. I'm a fortunate one who with SS and pension and savings growth will have nearly as much income this year as I did at the high point before I retired. (Many thanks for The Donald for stimulating the economy so well for us to get the growth) I'm siting at nearly a 15% return with one more day to go.
Here's the advice, which I myself did for a number of years. If you got a raise for next year, figure out the boost in your take-home, and increase your contribution to your retirement by that amount. I ASSUME you are smart enough to already be working on the retirement. You'll never miss it, because you never had it.
Also, you should increase your retirement contribution by any amount by which your withholding is reduced for next year.
Remember, you are going to be paying for the federal deficit for the rest of your life, even after retirement, so you might as well do it with the tax-free growth you can be getting NOW.
Rick
Disaster Recovery = Backup ( Backup ( Your Backup ) )
December 28, 2017 at 1:10 pm
skeleton567 - Thursday, December 28, 2017 1:06 PMDavid.Poole - Thursday, December 28, 2017 10:40 AMAgain, the desire to avoid a subject lest you get shackled to it is an interesting point.
I find that to be good at something you have to immerse yourself in it. Time and energy being finite immersing yourself in an obscure or dieing niche is highly undesirable.
I know a few retired COBOL programmers who love being able to supplement their pensions with a skill where supply is dwindling faster than demandNow for some advice from an old-timer who doesn't need to supplement my small pension. I'm a fortunate one who with SS and pension and savings growth will have nearly as much income this year as I did at the high point before I retired. (Many thanks for The Donald for stimulating the economy so well for us to get the growth) I'm siting at nearly a 15% return with one more day to go.
Here's the advice, which I myself did for a number of years. If you got a raise for next year, figure out the boost in your take-home, and increase your contribution to your retirement by that amount. I ASSUME you are smart enough to already be working on the retirement. You'll never miss it, because you never had it.
Also, you should increase your retirement contribution by any amount by which your withholding is reduced for next year.
Remember, you are going to be paying for the federal deficit for the rest of your life, even after retirement, so you might as well do it with the tax-free growth you can be getting NOW.
That is where extra money on the side would let me put more of my FTE income into my 401K. Of course I'll have more money once I stop paying spousal support and college.
December 28, 2017 at 1:27 pm
Lynn Pettis - Thursday, December 28, 2017 1:10 PMThat is where extra money on the side would let me put more of my FTE income into my 401K. Of course I'll have more money once I stop paying spousal support and college.
Lynn, I hear you on the current obligations. My wife and I helped three of four kids through college, thank goodness a number of years ago now. But, at the time I retired, I was contributing over $300 a month to my 401k.
Remember what President Reagan said, 'It CAN be done".
Here's a for instance. Do you like Starbucks as much as I do? It's an addiction. But instead of stopping in to the store regularly, get yourself a Keurig single serve brewer, and make your own. (They're even on sale right now). Once you sign up online, you constantly get special deals for buying k-Cups, including most of the time free shipping. Then for every cup, put $1.00 additional in your retirement.
At the time I retired, I was putting over $300 a month into my retirement savings. This year my funds have grown twice as much as I needed to withdraw.
Rick
Disaster Recovery = Backup ( Backup ( Your Backup ) )
December 28, 2017 at 1:38 pm
Skeleton, looking at the topic of this thread, it sounds like you're talking about some old stuff that is most definitely worth learning. Cutting down on the daily expenses, saving for retirement and planning ahead all sound like very old lessons taught by grandparents years ago. Heck, I almost expect to hear you refer to saving by using the "envelopes" method. 😛
Now for some advice from an old-timer who doesn't need to supplement my small pension. I'm a fortunate one who with SS and pension and savings growth will have nearly as much income this year as I did at the high point before I retired. (Many thanks for The Donald for stimulating the economy so well for us to get the growth) I'm siting at nearly a 15% return with one more day to go.
Oh, and I did catch that you only have 1 day to go until retirement. Congratulations! Take the time to enjoy the time for the next phase of life.
December 28, 2017 at 1:41 pm
skeleton567 - Thursday, December 28, 2017 1:27 PMLynn Pettis - Thursday, December 28, 2017 1:10 PMThat is where extra money on the side would let me put more of my FTE income into my 401K. Of course I'll have more money once I stop paying spousal support and college.
Lynn, I hear you on the current obligations. My wife and I helped three of four kids through college, thank goodness a number of years ago now. But, at the time I retired, I was contributing over $300 a month to my 401k.
Remember what President Reagan said, 'It CAN be done".
Here's a for instance. Do you like Starbucks as much as I do? It's an addiction. But instead of stopping in to the store regularly, get yourself a Keurig single serve brewer, and make your own. (They're even on sale right now). Once you sign up online, you constantly get special deals for buying k-Cups, including most of the time free shipping. Then for every cup, put $1.00 additional in your retirement.
At the time I retired, I was putting over $300 a month into my retirement savings. This year my funds have grown twice as much as I needed to withdraw.
I have three daughters, first one paid for her college using the GI Bill, I paid for the second one, and am currently paying for the third. Looking forward to 2020!
December 28, 2017 at 2:23 pm
skeleton567 - Thursday, December 28, 2017 1:06 PMHere's the advice, which I myself did for a number of years. If you got a raise for next year, figure out the boost in your take-home, and increase your contribution to your retirement by that amount. I ASSUME you are smart enough to already be working on the retirement. You'll never miss it, because you never had it.
Also, you should increase your retirement contribution by any amount by which your withholding is reduced for next year.
Sounds very like the advice my Dad gave me. I got a big promotion almost a decade back and almost 30% boost in salary. I was used to living on my previous salary so simply switched the difference into a savings account minus a big jump in pension contribution. That savings strategy has meant that I have bought very little on credit so haven't been stung for interest payments. With the ultralow interest rates I've prioritised paying off the mortgage NOT going on a spending spree. In the UK we've got a shadow chancellor who believes the precise opposite. His strategy means that you will be at your most vulnerable when interest rates inevitably rise. My advice would be always take the opportunity to reduce your debt. Doing so will mean that everything you earn after tax is your own. I can spend it on training, helping my kids on the property ladder, supporting local charities rather than enriching money lenders.
The mental health benefits of being debt free can't be overstated. I still have to work but don't have poor financial health as a distraction
December 28, 2017 at 3:54 pm
Ed Wagner - Thursday, December 28, 2017 1:38 PMSkeleton, looking at the topic of this thread, it sounds like you're talking about some old stuff that is most definitely worth learning. Cutting down on the daily expenses, saving for retirement and planning ahead all sound like very old lessons taught by grandparents years ago. Heck, I almost expect to hear you refer to saving by using the "envelopes" method. 😛Now for some advice from an old-timer who doesn't need to supplement my small pension. I'm a fortunate one who with SS and pension and savings growth will have nearly as much income this year as I did at the high point before I retired. (Many thanks for The Donald for stimulating the economy so well for us to get the growth) I'm siting at nearly a 15% return with one more day to go.
Oh, and I did catch that you only have 1 day to go until retirement. Congratulations! Take the time to enjoy the time for the next phase of life.
Guess I wasn't entirely clear on that post. I've actually been retired since 2010, will be 75 yeas old next spring, and loving every minute of it, because we did our sacrificing early. I meant there is only one day to go until the final market close for this year. That's my current best source of income. I never actually used physical 'envelopes', but with todays bank savings rates, you might as well.
And here's another tip for saving. I buy my wine by the case! Gets me at least one free bottle every time. Wife and I are just now dining after sharing a bottle along with crackers, cheese, and summer sausage, which is pretty much a daily routine we call 'merlot time'. Today we're looking out at the new fallen snow and watching the poor working stiffs in the neighborhood arriving home from work. Actually, we have wonderful neighbors who embarrass me by coming over and shoveling the snow on our driveway before I can get out there.
While I'm here, I wish all of you folks on here a Happy New Year and as good a new year as we've had in 2017. Thanks for putting up with a crotchety old guy. I think I only had two or three posts removed this year! Cheers.
Rick
Disaster Recovery = Backup ( Backup ( Your Backup ) )
January 2, 2018 at 9:59 am
First, understand how a specific technology (new or old) fits into the overall ecology. Often times the flashy new tools and frameworks are really just an abstraction layer for building, or running on top of, an established foundation of traditional technology like SQL, HTML, and JavaScript. The foundation tends to evolve and stick around, while 3rd party solutions tend to have a shorter lifespan, often times getting replaced overnight by newer and flashier solutions. It's only once per generation that there is a major upheaval at the foundational level (ex: DOS -> Windows, On-Prem -> Cloud). So, by learning the foundational stuff you actually are preparing for the future.Will dialects of C, SQL, and HTML still be the primary languages for enterprise application development a decade from now, even after we've move on to the cloud and globally distrubuted databases? Sure, at least I'm betting on it.Will Xamarin and Tableau still be counted among the top ten tools for mobile app and BI development a decade from now? Ummmm... good luck with that.
"Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise. Instead, seek what they sought." - Matsuo Basho
January 2, 2018 at 2:45 pm
Eric M Russell - Tuesday, January 2, 2018 9:59 AMFirst, understand how a specific technology (new or old) fits into the overall ecology. Often times the flashy new tools and frameworks are really just an abstraction layer for building, or running on top of, an established foundation of traditional technology like SQL, HTML, and JavaScript. The foundation tends to evolve and stick around, while 3rd party solutions tend to have a shorter lifespan, often times getting replaced overnight by newer and flashier solutions. It's only once per generation that there is a major upheaval at the foundational level (ex: DOS -> Windows, On-Prem -> Cloud). So, by learning the foundational stuff you actually are preparing for the future.Will dialects of C, SQL, and HTML still be the primary languages for enterprise application development a decade from now, even after we've move on to the cloud and globally distrubuted databases? Sure, at least I'm betting on it.Will Xamarin and Tableau still be counted among the top ten tools for mobile app and BI development a decade from now? Ummmm... good luck with that.
I'm thinking that's one of the major problems that a lot of people don't actually have and (very sadly) may never have the benefit of doing... learning the foundation/fundamentals, which now seems to be "old stuff" to many.
--Jeff Moden
Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.
January 2, 2018 at 3:11 pm
Jeff Moden - Tuesday, January 2, 2018 2:45 PMEric M Russell - Tuesday, January 2, 2018 9:59 AMFirst, understand how a specific technology (new or old) fits into the overall ecology. Often times the flashy new tools and frameworks are really just an abstraction layer for building, or running on top of, an established foundation of traditional technology like SQL, HTML, and JavaScript. The foundation tends to evolve and stick around, while 3rd party solutions tend to have a shorter lifespan, often times getting replaced overnight by newer and flashier solutions. It's only once per generation that there is a major upheaval at the foundational level (ex: DOS -> Windows, On-Prem -> Cloud). So, by learning the foundational stuff you actually are preparing for the future.Will dialects of C, SQL, and HTML still be the primary languages for enterprise application development a decade from now, even after we've move on to the cloud and globally distrubuted databases? Sure, at least I'm betting on it.Will Xamarin and Tableau still be counted among the top ten tools for mobile app and BI development a decade from now? Ummmm... good luck with that.I'm thinking that's one of the major problems that a lot of people don't actually have and (very sadly) may never have the benefit of doing... learning the foundation/fundamentals, which now seems to be "old stuff" to many.
I can remember decades ago working as a Senior Computer Operator for Data General. Coworker and I were training a couple of Junior Computer Operators. We forced them to use the full commands when doing things on the systems even though we used the "finger savers" to do the same things. We wanted them to understand what was going on behind the scenes with them before we allowed them to use them. There was another Senior Computer Operator on another shift also training a Junior Computer Operator, and he just taught this person the "finger savers" without even bothering to teach what was going on behind the scenes. I had to work with this person for a while and I almost gave them a heart attack when I yelled at them to stop when the nearly relabeled a backup tape that would have caused us to restart the entire backup of the database. This person had actually taken the tape off the drive, looked at the write-enable ring in the back of the tape and remounted the tape for the verification. Had this person removed the write-enable ring I wouldn't have yelled and then asked this person why the command failed.
You need to understand the foundations if you really want to succeed.
January 2, 2018 at 3:18 pm
Eric M Russell - Tuesday, January 2, 2018 9:59 AMFirst, understand how a specific technology (new or old) fits into the overall ecology. Often times the flashy new tools and frameworks are really just an abstraction layer for building, or running on top of, an established foundation of traditional technology like SQL, HTML, and JavaScript. The foundation tends to evolve and stick around, while 3rd party solutions tend to have a shorter lifespan, often times getting replaced overnight by newer and flashier solutions. It's only once per generation that there is a major upheaval at the foundational level (ex: DOS -> Windows, On-Prem -> Cloud). So, by learning the foundational stuff you actually are preparing for the future.Will dialects of C, SQL, and HTML still be the primary languages for enterprise application development a decade from now, even after we've move on to the cloud and globally distrubuted databases? Sure, at least I'm betting on it.Will Xamarin and Tableau still be counted among the top ten tools for mobile app and BI development a decade from now? Ummmm... good luck with that.
It's funny, because even those "major upheaval" examples you have are purely repackaging the "old way". It's not like at any point in the Wintel evolution that we've actually removed the ugly underbelly we were dealing with directly back in the dark ages (say - 1990 or so), or that we've magically removed hardware and software concerns. We've just outsourced it or obfuscated that old green screen, but it's still there 😛
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Your lack of planning does not constitute an emergency on my part...unless you're my manager...or a director and above...or a really loud-spoken end-user..All right - what was my emergency again?
January 3, 2018 at 5:42 am
Matt Miller (4) - Tuesday, January 2, 2018 3:18 PMEric M Russell - Tuesday, January 2, 2018 9:59 AMFirst, understand how a specific technology (new or old) fits into the overall ecology. Often times the flashy new tools and frameworks are really just an abstraction layer for building, or running on top of, an established foundation of traditional technology like SQL, HTML, and JavaScript. The foundation tends to evolve and stick around, while 3rd party solutions tend to have a shorter lifespan, often times getting replaced overnight by newer and flashier solutions. It's only once per generation that there is a major upheaval at the foundational level (ex: DOS -> Windows, On-Prem -> Cloud). So, by learning the foundational stuff you actually are preparing for the future.Will dialects of C, SQL, and HTML still be the primary languages for enterprise application development a decade from now, even after we've move on to the cloud and globally distrubuted databases? Sure, at least I'm betting on it.Will Xamarin and Tableau still be counted among the top ten tools for mobile app and BI development a decade from now? Ummmm... good luck with that.It's funny, because even those "major upheaval" examples you have are purely repackaging the "old way". It's not like at any point in the Wintel evolution that we've actually removed the ugly underbelly we were dealing with directly back in the dark ages (say - 1990 or so), or that we've magically removed hardware and software concerns. We've just outsourced it or obfuscated that old green screen, but it's still there 😛
Now that's an interesting perspective. It brings to mind the "new" concept of the cloud. I learned COBOL on an IBM and then later classes on the PR1ME, both mainframes. Then came the PC revolution, putting all that computing power on the desktop. Just think, people could do work without a central server (well, except the database) being up and connected all the time. On some systems, you could even work locally before dialing the phone and syncing your data. Things then moved back in the other direction with the advent of web servers. Now, things are moving farther in that direction, becoming even more centralized. Maybe not as new as the term "cloud" term suggests after all.
January 3, 2018 at 12:01 pm
We have come full circle, sharing time on massive regionally centralized computing infrastructures and working with databases that are way to large and impractical to install on our desktop PC or local network.
"Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise. Instead, seek what they sought." - Matsuo Basho
January 3, 2018 at 12:29 pm
Eric M Russell - Wednesday, January 3, 2018 12:01 PMWe have come full circle, sharing time and the same decades old problems on massive regionally centralized computing infrastructures and working with databases that are way to large and impractical to install on our desktop PC or local network.
So true. Thought I'd add the rest of it.
--Jeff Moden
Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.
Viewing 15 posts - 31 through 44 (of 44 total)
You must be logged in to reply to this topic. Login to reply