Already off to a bad start today, as Intuit (the makers of Quicken) have found some excuse to not give me the rebate that was advertised. I'll make one more try and then it's, "see you in court". Must be that American litigiousness others have been talking about.
In the "dread" department, I now have to make some big decisions, and quick. I've been thrown over to a 90-day project (can you say XP?). I received an email that indicated I should learn XML and either Java or C# (in addition to ASP & Visual Studio). Well, I already know some XML, but the point is that they've taken the .NET bait - hook, line and sinker.
So, what do I do now? Do I bite the bullet and learn Java & C# so I can add those languages to my resume (and bitch about how I could do everything in Perl or Ruby in 1/10 the code)? Do I whine about having to develop in the Windows environment? Or do I bid this dying company (Qwest) adieu and look for a job that uses Perl or Ruby (or doesn't care which language I use so long as I get it done).
PS - Will code for food
Given the market for jobs right now, and given that learning is a good thing, I'd say learn the new language(s). (Of course, this is assuming that you enjoy your work environment right now.) Neither Java nor C# are bad languages (as opposed to something like Visual Basic), and learning them may not only increase your ability to get jobs in the future but also your ability to think in and about Perl in different ways.
Additionally, you never know when Perl will come in useful for a project: I write Java in my day job, but I also created a nifty system in Perl to generate EJB code. Folks at work aren't prejudiced against Perl -- they just want to get things done.
