maarten-pi

vor 13 Jahrendiscuss

Contact details would be nice here as well...:

[email protected] or phone: +31 20 471 2111

vor 13 Jahrendiscuss

We're Pararius, leading rental property portal in the Netherlands. We're based in Amsterdam.

We're looking to expand our portal and keep the website as fast as possible. We're looking for

skilled PHP software developers in or around Amsterdam. Relocation can be discussed.

In this function you'll build new features, on the frontend and the backend.

About us:

Pararius works with the Scrummethod. Your code is visible within two weeks or writing

and will be used by over a million of visitors every month. Every two weeks we'll set new goals

with the team and with product development. Your feedback is more than welcome.

You'll be part of a passionate team. We work informally, but over the best working conditions for

our developers.

Our latest developments:

  - Develop API's for our new App
  - Replace the frontend with a new look and feel
  - Install memcached to get more speed out of the site.

About you:

  - You can design and program software systems
  - You have experience with working with high traffic websites
  - You have at least 3 years experience with PHP, OOP, jQuery and MySQL.
  - You like to working with new technologies
  - You have an IT-related education or a self-thaught programmer with hands-on experience.

We offer:

  - a job with growth possibility in a young, dynamic and innovative organisation
  - a good salary
  - a job on a good location near the A10 with a good view
  - possiblity to attend IT-conferences
  - secundary working conditions, like  a good pensionsettlement and an own laptop
  - we lunch together and have fun, on Friday's we have a drink

maarten-pi

vor 13 Jahrendiscuss

There seems to be a new Behind the Scenes video (unless I missed it before)

maarten-pi

vor 13 Jahrendiscuss

I agree, that the previous comment sounds extreme, there often is a middle ground. People can be reasoned with, otherwise the company you're working for doesn't sound like a good place to be.

Taking a better job is fine, but halfway a project it might kill the project when some of the top guys decide to leave. It might even be worse when the architect of the legacy-system decides to leave with knowledge of all the undocumented business rules.

It's so important, that a project is well managed, because a lot of the aspects of building something new are extremely satisfying to work on. However with mismanagement it's easy to demoralize the team.

maarten-pi

vor 13 Jahrendiscuss

You beat me to it ;) This is my list:

I'm in a similar situation and the pressure is mostly caused by a lack of management.

I've been appointed project leader halfway the project and I did my homework by reading the Software Project Survival Guide. We are also supposed to work in a scrum system, but on going business causes scrum to be just an extensive time management tool.

We're nearing the deadline and a few things I picked up are:

1) You need to have a hands on approach and come up with solutions yourself. Show a lot of initiative.

2) Have clear roles of who needs to do what.

3) Don't change roles halfway a project, it only causes confusion and someone needs to clean up the mess.

4) Be frank to your business owner about the current reality . You don't want to be the guy, who didn't say anything and pass the deadline. And don't wait too long with saying it.

5) Make it very clear to the business owner, all changes cause a delay. And whatever you do, do not let the business owner decide how long a change will take.

6) Don't fight with the external guys, even if they are trying to run the show. If they start pressing for decisions (framework/system/etc) without a good reason, other than their own comfort, be warned... Get ready for a sticky situation. If you can, stick together with your current team to have some counterbalance.

maarten-pi

vor 13 Jahrendiscuss

I've been to China a few times and I guess you start to get an understanding of why this happens when you're there.

The trend is that quite some people have little regard foreach other. It becomes really annoying when standing in line and someone trying to get ahead of you in the queue (there always is someone trying to do it, in crowded places). But don't forget that situations where someone cuts in line will be noticed and remarked upon quickly instead of all the other people who didn't cut in line.

I've felt great annoyance about this as well and at one point it turned into some weird kind of amazement where you are observing behaviour from another planet.

I've deduced it to a few things.

1) The rushed lives in the big cities. The streets are full of people, the roads are packed (it can take up to 1 hour just passing by the 500 meter in front of a busstation with a taxi). People work ridiculous hours there (well some of them) so they are really tired when they move around

2) Also taking into consideration the enormous amount of smog / sand storms which pollute the city, you get a place where people just want to get out of as soon as possible.

This kind of explains the cutting in line and the spitting.

3) The 'one child-policy'. Chinese people tend to take an extreme amount of care of their children and it's not uncommon for parents to go to great lengths just to provide their child with everything it needs. That also goes for spending just about everything they've saved, just so their kid can go abroad to study and find work.

In some cases it goes well, but there are a lot of completely spoiled kids around. They actually think they own the world. For a change, I've been to a few more exclusive restaurants and what I found there was obviously good food (they've got that covered), but also young people with an enormous sense of entitlement. Really young, chubby kids ordering waiters to recook their meal, because it wasn't tender enough and giving the waiter all kinds of orders or just people taking off their shoes and put their feet on the table.

4) The enormous amount of competition. It's part of Chinese culture for parents to show off their kids and that tradition is largely ingrained in the new generation. People strive to own 4 apartments, a new car, a beautiful wife and a respectable job. This of course doesn't happen to everyone one.

Live on campuses is equally hard. Students who want to get somewhere need to study nearly every waking hour of the day from when they are 12 until they graduate from university.

The competition leaves people feeling estranged from each other, since there is no time and mental space to actually care about someone else.

5) China is mostly a rural country. Almost all parents had something to do with the cultural revolution. That meant pretty much everyone had to do some labor on the country. What we see now is a transition from a rural society to a modern one.

Well, I'll stop here. It seems like to me there are a lot of factors in play on why the Chinese do the things they do.

I guess it's mostly a state of transition (and I hope), I've seen great things happen in China. And well, with that many people there not all goes well.

maarten-pi

vor 13 Jahrendiscuss

I've sit back and seen so many posts lately about gender-issues. Is it really necessary?

I understand that woman feel discriminated and I see some pretty aweful examples where guys are doing all the wrong things. In the case of the woman who got fired, I felt it was unjust from sendgrid. It shows how badly some guys copy with the issue. So that doesn't help.

The baseline should be that we're all equal. What are the arguments against that?

I feel it's kind of sexist to assume that an article might be offensive to woman, because well, they might just take offense. That implies that woman are very sensitive to these articles, which reinforces the stereotype... Doesn't that belittle woman infinitely more? It just reaches the opposite effect.

The original author didn't think: "Let's belittle woman as much as possible just for the fun of it", that thought (I am pretty sure) never crossed his mind. The article could also have referred to, my father or my cousin.

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