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I posted the question: Is it a bad idea for a company to take liberties with the truth in job specs for software developers? A few people have interpreted this as either a rant or a question that is not constructive to any degree.

This issue I raised was based on a past observation I found as a graduate and also based on my discussions with team mates. I thought it would be good to post the question to see if developers in other software houses have noticed this and if there was a reason why it was happening. In addition to this, I thought the answers would provide useful input for other graduates/junior developers who come here and may find this of some interest.

If the question can be salvaged, by rewording it, I'm happy to do so. If that's not possible, I'm happy for it to be closed. I'm not interested in evoking an argument.

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  • As addendum, another member has restructured the question to make it more useful to a software developer. I thought what he/she did was useful, but I was concerned that opening may have been too strong, but if it helps, then great.
    – Desolate Planet
    Sep 1, 2011 at 21:32
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    FWIW, feel free to re-word that if you think I was too aggressive. I like strong come-ons...
    – Shog9
    Sep 1, 2011 at 21:34
  • No no, you did a good job. I like it. I was originally going to write something similar, but I wasn't sure how it would be interpreted. It's more focused on feedback from developers :)
    – Desolate Planet
    Sep 1, 2011 at 21:39

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Please tell me what you hope to get constructively from this question? There is nothing.

I need to disagree with this statement by Chad. He asked some very specific questions that are relevant to programmers as a whole and the answers, while not new, certainly, can be eye-opening especially to entry level programmers who do look through ads like these frequently.

He asked the following, perfectly reasonable questions in his post:

is this common enough to where "migration" should be taken as a euphemism for "dead-end maintenance work" when reading job ads?

and

Is it a good idea to use this technique when posting job ads for developers?

He has taken a specific incident in his region of the world and he's looking for the collective knowledge of programmers world-wide to see if this is commonplace. Granted, I think that the question could have been formatted a little better but I truly do not see anything out of place here.

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This is one of the examples of a previous petition I stated about allowing topics that could deal with other professions but have a unique approach/viewpoint relative to software developers. Our profession, more so than most any other, is subject to companies lying or misleading the job description. It's not something that salespeople, HR, accountants, et all face regularly and certainly not in the contexts as presented by the OP in the original question - those circumstances are all but unique to programmers.

Therefore, I say the question is on topic (and in fact I was the first to cast a reopen vote).

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Are we just unlucky rubes, taken in by a handful of scandalous organizations?

Please tell me what you hope to get constructively from this question? There is nothing. Yes you are a rube who the company hopes will be to lazy to go find another job for a year or so. There are you happy? Of course not but that is the truth.

Or is this common enough to where "migration" should be taken as a euphemism for "dead-end maintenance work" when reading job ads?

No. migrations happen regularly and you probably should know this. And maintenance work is not dead end. But you provide the answer you want to hear in your question.

Is it a good idea to use this technique when posting job ads for developers?

This is bad subjective because it asks for an opinion about good or bad of something that is not about programming its about recruiting. While it has a tangental lead this technique is used across all industries to make boring jobs sound worth applying for. But what can you constructively learn about programming from the answer? ABOSLUTLY NOTHING.

Thats why this is a bad question for this SE. Take it to a forum and let them light it up like you want.

What may be on topic would be a question on how to detect if a job posting has the potential to be a legacy job, and how to determine if it is prior to accepting it.

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