The term "senior developer" is an unfortunate one because it can mean a really good, skilled and experienced developer. But it usually means 20 years of experience (1yr exp * 20) or they've just been around so long that the "senior" part refers to age.
Too many times I've been in a technical interview where they asked me to define design patterns, but never ask me when/how to actually use them. I usually decline their offers.
When I interview candidates, I look for a good foundation for what they will be working with like do they know the difference between class and struct and the implications of using them (day 1 kind of stuff).
Then I ask them about how they would go about solving a problem they were unfamiliar with. Google-foo is a skill that must be learned and honed. I don't care if you can spit off all sorts of acronyms, I want to know if you are capable of using common sense to solve a problem.
Last but not least, how do they stay up-to-date and relevant. Not looking for the 8 to 5 developers and not interested in those cutting-edge guys either.
Must have good understanding of the basics, principals and skills in problem solving. Telling a block of code that you have a masters in CS will NOT make the bug go away.
I wrote an automated task back in 2002 to send a love note via email to my wife at random times during the week to make it look like I was thinking about her. Unfortunately the code had an issue and it flooder her with email and she knew what I had done >:(
lol! I too spent hours tweaking modem params to get the best speeds. Sometimes having to disconnect and reconnect because the ISP connected me at 33.6 instead of 56k (or more commonly 48.8).
HP is cutting telecommuting to improve collaboration. What do you think the result will be? When I'm bored at the office I go and mess around with co-workers or find ways to leave early.
Interesting article. I actually have a talk that I give about this exact issue. I laugh at anyone [developers] who calls themselves an "expert" unless it's followed by a very specific, narrow topic.
I dislike the title "Senior" when discussing developers because it's usually just a title given to those who have 1) been there there at least 3 years or 2) Have n years of development related experience on their resume. The problem is, the title is associated with level of assumed expertise. As the article says, these guys can barely answer a basic question.
However, that's not to say that they don't know how to be productive or produce quality results.
It wouldn't be so bad if developers just went out and read someone else's code or attended a code camp or user group, but they don't.