On Wed, 4/27/16, Sean Conner <s...@conman.org> wrote: > > The bracketed note in the second paragraph of content on > > http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/personality.html is exactly the sort of > > thing I'm talking about here; ESR taught himself TeX by the simple > > expedient of reading the TeXBook. > > You mean not everybody does this?
Alas, no, but that's really the point I was getting at with the comment about knowing multiple languages. It wasn't about the languages themselves or what value the variety itself brings. I pulled the half dozen number out of the air just because if I look back over any 6 to 12 month period of my career, I've used a good half dozen during that period. What's important to me isn't the effect on the candidate's programming; it's the independence, self-motivation, and curiosity that learning many languages represents. I also like to see evidence that the candidate recognizes that no skilled artisan's toolbox contains only a single tool. My biggest complaint about new grads is the view that all the world's a nail, because the only tool in their toolbox is a hammer. BLS
