1. building Infrequently

The solution to painful dentist visits isn’t going less often, it’s going more often! The same is true of painful software integration events. Building frequently – preferably continuously – allows you to discover problems early on and nip them in the bud before they grow into big expensive disasters. Plus, building software is a critical validation step – you don’t know if something’s broken until you try putting it together. Build frequently gives you greater confidence that you know what the state of your software development project really is.

2. Not Validating Changes Against Target Environments

Customers usually aren’t too understanding when you tell them “Well, it worked on my machine.” The (often unconscious) assumption that the developer’s environment is an acceptable proxy for the “real world” is the hidden cause of many problems. It’s unrealistic to expect that developers will have the right setup on their desktops to fully validate their changes, especially when you need to build and test on multiple platforms or have test environments that require external resources. Changes should be regularly validated against all the appropriate target environments, preferably by an automated process.

3. Broken Builds

How many times have you (or one of your developers) been stuck waiting for someone to fix the build before you could continue work? For all the time developers save with visual editors and other coding productivity tools, ten times as much is wasted due to broken builds. Code needs to be successfully built before being integrated into the main code line where it can affect others. Ideally, work-in-progress should still be regularly checked into version control, but it should be kept isolated until it builds successfully.

4. Not Testing the Build

Many organizations fail to take advantage of the build process as an opportunity to test earlier and more consistently. Automated software inspection and build validation tests can help you detect regressions and other problems early, when they are easier to find and fix (not least of all because the changes in question will be recent enough for developers to remember what they were thinking when they wrote that piece of code).

5. Infrequent Check-ins

Making large, infrequent check-ins is not only a recipe for losing lots of work when you accidentally corrupt your hard drive or your laptop’s battery explodes, it also limits the value of other best practices like frequently executing and testing the build. Continuous integration is really only as continuous as the version control activity driving it – if you only commit your changes once a day, there’s no point in doing anything faster than daily builds (if you check-in your changes less than once a day, seek professional help immediately). Checking in smaller revisions more often also makes it easier to keep track of your work and track down the cause of any problems that are discovered.

6. Not Publishing Builds

Collaboration is the key to successful software projects and working code is the best artifact around which to collaborate. Giving other developers and QA engineers easy access to the latest builds helps keep everyone in sync. Make sure your build system can automatically publish successful builds so you don’t have to deal with managing distributions manually. And be sure to also archive your build configurations, so you can reliably reproduce customer issues on older versions of your software.

7. Interpreting Code Coverage in Isolation

The most frequently cited code coverage related blunder is probably “wasting time trying to get all the way to 100% coverage”, or “believing that very high coverage means your code works”. A commonly overlooked issue, however, is the importance of relative code coverage. If you can’t compare coverage between different projects, then you don’t know where scarce testing resources will be best spent. If you don’t know (or can’t remember) what your code coverage was last week, last month, or on the previous version of the software, it’s hard to evaluate today’s number. Code coverage is far more useful when you can view it in context.

8. Lack of Transparency

While it’s very common to see businesses adopt open source software today, it’s fairly rare to see those businesses adopt any of the practices that help make open source software successful. One key characteristic of open source development projects is transparency – everyone can see what everyone else is doing, fixing, or breaking – and this encourages bother peer accountability and recognition of individual contributions. This is especially important with distributed development teams where the right hand often doesn’t know what the left hand is doing (because it’s asleep when the other one’s working). commercial software development organizations would be well served by adopting practice to improve transparency among developers and, just as importantly, to give QA and management better and earlier visibility into development.

9. Relying Only on Unit Tests

Automating unit tests in your builds is a good start, but if you limit yourself to only doing unit testing, you’re missing an opportunity to catch a much wider range of potential problems. From simple static analysis tools like findbugs or checkstyle, to enterprise products for security analysis, license compliance audits, or functional testing, the build event provides and excellent opportunity for early detection of a variety of issues. Combined with a defect isolation mechanism, this can also become a valuable tool for enforcing software development policies or best practices.

10. Ignoring History

If you regularly build and test your software, but don’t persist the results in a database, you’re missing out on the opportunity to gain valuable insights into your development process and software projects. There’s a wealth of information in the form of build reports, test output, and other artifacts just waiting to be mined if only they were stored in a convenient way. Even relatively simple queries could uncover previously unknown relationships or dependencies – finding out that half of your build failures occurred after someone touched an obscure configuration file would give you a pretty simple way to optimize your build process!

Then, how to overcome these blunders? Borland offers whole bunch of tools to help. No kidding, from Lifecycle Quality Management to Performance Testing, Borland’s development tools are still the best.

Computer-Aided Software Engineering (CASE) tools are used by system analysts, designers, and developers to capture information about business requirements, create a design for the data structures to fulfill those requirements, and generate front-end and server program code. CASE tools can automate much of the manual, repetitive, and error-prone work needed for system development, and can greatly increase the productivity, accuracy of the design, and robustness of the implementation.

System Development Life-Cycle

CASE Application Development Method (CADM) – 7 phases:
1. Strategy
2. Analysis
3. Design
4. Build
5. Test
6. Implementation
7. Maintenance

1. Strategy

The purpose of the Strategy phase is to formulate a basic description of the overall scope of the project and how the project will proceed. The entire focus is on the business. The goal is to gain a clear understanding of the business area’s goals, objectives, processes, direction, and needs in order to structure and document the vision of project. Results of this phase include strategy ERD, process flows, strategy document, cost-benefit analysis, and workplan.

Strategy Document is also referred as project charter, project definition document, and scope document. Strategy document outlines the scope of a project and defines an agreement about what the project is committed to deliver. It also includes the estimated budget, time frame, resources, controls, and standards within which the project must be completed.

2. Analysis

The analysis phase breaks logically into two parts: information gathering and requirement analysis.

Within the information gathering portion, techniques for getting at user requirements include interviews, questionnaires, and joint application development (JAD) sessions, along with reviews of the current system, the report audit, and user and system documentation.

In requirements analysis, we extract the system requirements form the information gathered and place them in an organized structure. This can be done at both the unit level and, ultimately, at the system level.

3. Design

The Design phase includes two broad subphases:
- Database Design
- Application Design

You should already have a complete ERD from the Analysis phase, but need to do the physical database design. The basic strategy of database design is to map entities to tables, making adjustments fo subsets, denormalization, aggregation, and summary tables.

At the simplest level, application design is the design of software, including the creation of structures that address modules, programs, procedures, navigation, internal controls, and security.

4. Build

In the Build phase, you build the database and application. The Build phase deliverables consist of the following:

- Unit tested application system
- Populated databases
- System documentation
- User documentation
- Help system and online documents

5. Test

In the Test phase, you develop a test plan that should describe not only test to be run but also how test failures or variances will be handled. Tests include unit testing, system testing, user acceptance tests, and training and documentation. Through this phase, the new system is formally tested.

6. Implementation

In this phase, the project team will rollout a system to production environment and provide adequate user support. The rollout/migration process involves transition period where the system is closely monitored and support is transferred from the project team to the system operation group.

7. Maintenance

Maintenance is a process that continues throughout the life of the system. A predefined process must be put into place to handle ongoing problems, modifications, and enhancements.

Siebel skills could be built on one of the following major Siebel applications:

• Siebel Call Center
• Siebel eSales
• Siebel eServices
• Siebel Analytics

Siebel Call Center is the most popular and commonly used Siebel application.

In addition, Siebel has several industry-specific applications:

• Siebel Consumer Sector
• Siebel eAutomotive
• Siebel eCommunications
• Siebel eEnergy
• Siebel Financial Services
• Siebel Life Sciences
• Siebel Travel and Transportation

With Siebel skills and experience, you are expected to perform the following high level Siebel task functions:

• Implementation planning
• Installation/upgrade
• System administration
• Application Integration
• Application development
• Application administration

In workplace, the following Siebel job roles could be found:

• Application Integration Specialist – People who integrate Siebel software, internally and with third-party products.
• Siebel Consultant – People who planning a new Siebel implementation, or are planning changes to an existing Siebel implementation. Install Siebel software for initial user or upgrade to new product releases.
• Siebel System Administrator – People who plan, set up, and maintain Siebel system software and who administer database systems.
• Siebel Application Developer – People who configure Siebel applications and code custom scripts to enhance Siebel functions.
• Siebel Application Administrator – People who plan, setup, and maintain Siebel applications and application data. This job is often designated to work on Siebel’s industry specific applications.

Let’s go back to Siebel Call Center, as I mentioned, it is the most commonly used Siebel application. The following Siebel Call Center skills are usually expected:

• Install and configure Siebel Call Center server.
• Install and configure Siebel Call Center dedicated client software and build local database.
• Install and configure Siebel Tools
• Administrator Siebel Call Center application.
• Monitor Call Center operations and performance.
• Manage Siebel user account and responsibilities.
• Manage and update LOVs (list of value).
• Develop and update Siebel Views, Applets, Pick Lists, and Business Components.
• Program e-scripts to customize Siebel functions.
• Develop and maintain Siebel Workfolws.
• Use Siebel Enterprise Integration Manager (EIM) to migrate and upload data.
• Migrate Siebel repository from dev to test and from test to prod.

Database is the heart of today’s enterprise.

The whole IT business works around databases.

Oracle is the leading enterprise database server.

That makes an Oracle Database Administrator (DBA) so special. As you can see, Oracle DBAs play critical roles in IT, no doubt that experienced DBAs are in high demand and get paid well.

What Are Oracle DBAs Doing at Work
Oracle DBAs are responsible for the development, design, implementation and maintenance of one or multiple Oracle database servers. These database servers support mission critical business applications in client-server structure or web-based architecture. These applications could be built in Microsoft .Net framework or J2EE platform. Some applications might be extremely complex. Oracle databases also support data mart, data warehouse, and business intelligence systems.

Oracle DBA’s daily administration work includes database server monitoring, performance tuning, and database backup and recovery. From time to time, Oracle DBAs are required for installation, upgrade, configurations of Oracle database software, and creating new database instances.

In most organizations, database design is a big part of DBA’s task. Oracle DBAs are good at designing logical database model by creating entity relationship diagram (ERD) using case design tools such as Oracle Designer and Sybase PowerDesigner. Oracle DBAs must be able to design the physical data models with schema, roles, tablespaces, tables, views, and other database objects.

Technical Environment

As an Oracle DBA, you may work in the development environment, production environment, or both.

In a heavy development environment, you must provide the expertise in guiding the developers in database platform and design, recommending database design alternatives and participate in design reviews. There will also be customer and end user interaction to ensure their needs are being met from the database side as well. You must be able to identify data needs, such as access, protection, quality and maintenance requirements. DBAs in development environment may be required to code stored procedures and packages to implement business rules.

In the production environment, your task is focused on availability, performance, and security. Your job could be making the database available 7/24 by implementing advanced Oracle technologies such as parallel server and standby database. You may need to tune the database constantly to optimize the transaction processes. You must have a solid backup/recovery plan and you always have to deal with the security processes and procedures to make sure your data is safe.

Skills for Top Flight DBAs

Top-level Oracle DBAs demonstrate the following expert knowledge and skills:

1. Relational database management system (RDBMS) concepts, design, and deployment.

2. Designing, developing, and supporting large RDBMS in the Oracle 8i or 9i environments.

3. Mastering Oracle database software for installation, upgrading, and configuration.

4. Installing and managing Oracle Parallel Server (OPS).

5. Concepts and practices on logical and physical database design.

6. Skills for database performance tuning – including server tuning and application tuning.

7. Developing and implementing backup and recovery plans.

8. Writing SQL query scripts and operating system level scripts to monitor database and perform DBA tasks.

9. Writing PL/SQL stored procedures and packages to implement business logic.

10. Using case tools for data modeling, analyzing business rules and creating entity relationship diagram.

11. Using Oracle Enterprise Manager to perform DBA tasks.

12. Using Oracle RMAN to perform backup/recovery tasks.

13. Data Warehouse and data mart physical structures and design.

14. Using ETL (Extraction, Transformation and Loading) tools such as PowerMart / Informatica.

15. Some knowledge and working experience on other databases such as IBM DB2 and Microsoft SQL Server.

16. Fundamental knowledge of operating systems (UNIX, Windows, etc) and networking (TCP/IP, Novel, Internet, etc.)

17. Knowledge on specific industry – banking, financial, insurance, retail, etc.

How to Obtain Oracle DBA Skills and Experience

There are two kinds of skills in IT – intelligence based skills and experience-based skills. Programming skills, for instance, are intelligence-based skills that count on your brain cells. On the other hand, DBA skills are more likely experience based. DBA skills are obtained from the actual work.

If you are in a database related position, you can take advantage of the environment and build these skills that I listed above. If you have a IT job but it is not directly related to database tasks on the server side, you may talk to the DBA to give you certain level of access to the database so you can play with it. Most programmers and developers have enough database privileges that they can use to work and play in order to gain database server experience.

Even if you don’t have access to Oracle database at work, or don’t work on an IT job at all, you can still get hands-on skills and experience with Oracle database and market your self as a experienced Oracle DBA for job switching or re-joining the workforce. All you need is to build an Oracle database environment on your PC, and then, work, play, create, break, do whatever you like on it. That’s how you get the hands-on experience.

You can download the fully functional Oracle database software for trail/testing purpose from Oracle website. Oracle database is available in different editions – Personal, Standard, and Enterprise. You may start with the Personal Edition that is smaller. If you want to explore more advanced Oracle technologies, use the Enterprise Edition. Oracle database software can be installed on WindowsNT/2000/XP and Linux. If your PC is running on Windows 2000 Professional, XP, or Linux, you’ll be able to put Oracle database on it.

You need to become a member of Oracle Technology Network in order to download Oracle software. The membership is free. You just need to go to http://otn.oracle.com/ to sign up. After you create you account with user/password, you can go to http://otn.oracle.com/software/content.html to download Oracle database software.

Oracle database software comes with full set documentations in HTML and PDF format. By following the instructions in the documentation, you should have no problem to install the software, create a database instance, and start to play with it. Oracle Technology Network provides a lot of useful information to help you obtain skills and build experience in Oracle database.

Since Oracle is such a popular database, there are tons of technical books and free resources online that you can use. The following link provides online resources on database related topics.
Online Resources for Database

Education and Certifications

Most Oracle DBAs hold a Bachelor’s Degree at least. A major in Computer Science or IT related field is preferred. However Oracle DBAs come from very diversified academic background. I’ve met top level DBAs who were educated in Chemistry, Mining Engineering, Political Science, Linguistics, etc. In IT industry, experience is more countable. If you work to build your experience, you can become a successful Oracle DBA.

Oracle DBA certification is one of the highly valued credentials in IT industry. If you plan to work your way to become a top flight Oracle DBA, certification is strongly recommended. You can find detailed information about Oracle DBA certification at Oracle’s website by clicking http://www.oracle.com/education/certification/.

The most wanted programming skills come with the languages that are widely used in today’s business solution developments. These language-based skills are Java/J2EE skill, SQL skill, C/C++ skill, Visual Basic (VB) skill, JSP skill, ASP skill, XML skill, C# skill, Perl skill, and PHP skill.

1. Java/J2EE

Programming with Java on J2EE platform is one of the hottest skills in today’s IT arena. More and more business solutions are built on web-based systems powered by Java/J2EE. Successful Java programmers not only know how to code Java language, but also master J2EE architecture and APIs.

2. SQL

No business solution could work without database. SQL is the language to use in almost all databases. SQL programming skill is a must for all IT professionals, especially database programmers and solution developers. In addition to basic SQL programming skill, you should also master vendor-based SQL extensions – SQL in Oracle, IBM DB2, and Microsoft SQLServer.

3. C/C++

C and C++ are the most powerful languages for developing sophisticated information systems. C/C++ programming is the premium skill with high and long lasting value because C++ is completed and hard to learn. Although Java has become more favorable, C/C++ programming skill is still in high demand for both existing system maintenance and new development.

4. Visual Basic

Business application development with Microsoft Visual Basic is fast and easy, that makes Visual Basic popular and VB skill hot. The new version, Visual Basic .NET, is fully object-oriented and shares the same development environment with other tools in the Microsoft Visual Studio .NET suite. As Microsoft .NET platform moves forward, Visual Basic .NET programming skill will be increasingly needed.

5. JSP

Java Server Page (JAP) is used for data presentation in all J2EE based application servers – IBM WebSphere, BEA WebLogic, Oracle AS, Sybase EAServer, Apache Tomcat, and more. JSP programming skill is required for all IT professionals who build J2EE based business solutions.

6. ASP

Active Server Page (ASP) is language to develop web applications in Microsoft Internet Information Server (IIS). ASP is used for data presentation and business logic processing. The new version, ASP .NET, is part of the Microsoft .NET framework powered by Visual Studio .NET.

7. XML

XML is a markup language for documents containing structured information. Because XML is the foundation of web services, XML skill becomes hot when web services implementation comes to the stage.

8. C#

C# is Microsoft’s primary language for .NET framework. New development tool for C#, Visual C# .NET is included in Visual Studio .NET suite. C# has several advantages over C++ and Java. C# programming skill is becoming hot as businesses start to implement .NET based solutions.

9. Perl

Perl (Practical Extraction and Report Language) programming skill is in demand mainly in two areas: (1) UNIX operating system administration, and (2) web server CGI. Although CGI may be replaced by JSP and ASP in enterprise web solutions, Perl CGI programming skill is still wanted for mid-market web servers and portal sites. The need for Perl programming in UNIX will stay high.

10. PHP

PHP (Hypertext Preprocessor) is a sever side scripting language for web development. PHP programming skill is needed to build dynamic websites, web portals, and database-driven web applications. The skill of PHP with MySQL database is very valuable.

The booster knowledge and skills will build you a defense base, from which you are able to move forward by attacking and exploring, or withdraw comfortably in the raining days. The booster knowledge and skills are:

1. Programming skills,
2. Modeling/Database skills, and
3. Network and Security skills.

Programming

Programming is the most stable, reliable and extendable skill every IT professional should has. You might not depend on this skill through your whole IT career; you may not even need to start your IT career with this skill, but if you are seriously considering job security, tap onto it.

When dealing with the world we are living in, the best way is to simplify the perspective at the beginning. With IT, computing is all based on logic, clearly defined logic. Any ambiguous input will halt computer and lead to the ending that nothing is accomplished. Programming is the only way to instruct computer to conduct its job; therefore it requires a logically thinking brain in front of the keyboard and monitor. The process of programming has a force-back-training effect, which constantly trains the programmer without his/her awareness. The training is focusing on logically going through a mix of existing conditions and finding a path to reach the goal or solve the problem. In short, it is the Problem Solving Ability. If observing your surrounding carefully, you will find out that such ability is the critical element, sometimes the only one, to differentiate the IT workers.

Everyone entered the IT world will shortly realize that it’s a fast changing environment. We could hear lot sayings that there are so many things to learn, to catch up and no ends in sight. If you are programming-trained, there should not be any more worries. Programming skill and the problem solving abilities acquired by programming allow you very easily adapt any new technologies. That’s because, underneath, any software works and is controlled by the same things, logics and sets of logically written instructions (programs).

Today’s IT world is so diversified that one terminology can mean many things. For one, programming here means that you actually use a true computer programming language (structured or object-oriented) to write a program. The language could be from Pascal, Basic, C/C++ to Java, even COBOL. There are many other activities are called programming, which most time involves using a third generation (3G) toolkit provided by specific vendors. In those cases, the tools confine the building blocks and what the programmer does is merely configuration with business rules applied. These tooling approaches, as said, “Is a good thing.” But it won’t contribute the programming skills we are here hungry for.

Even as important as it is, the programming skill itself won’t carry you anywhere too far, just like the knowledge learned in high school won’t land you a decent career, but you won’t have a career without those knowledge. It’s what the programming skill brings you matters.

To be more specific, the computer languages that you should claim to be proficient are C/C++ or Java. You don’t have to be doing it, but you should have done it. There are verities that you could easily extend to, such as Visual Basic for Application (VBA), Perl/Shell for scripting or the coming C#. But please don’t tell people the hot babe XML is another computer language you must know.

Modeling/Database

Remember data is the king in this business. What the data really means to the business, from which the data is generated in or collected, is buried in the relationship between the data elements. To fully understand, properly store, logically process, accurately retrieve and meaningfully present the data, modeling is the key. The modeling we are talking about here is beyond the techniques of it, which might include ER modeling, object-oriented analysis and modeling, the full UML arena and so on. Those techniques or skills are tied to certain roles played in IT world. Here the basic modeling skill is to be able to conceptually understand the essential of the relationship among data and apply the relationship into the logic of processing the data. This is equivalent to an example that, entering a big library, you are able to locate the book you are looking for and find the quote on one page. You are not asked to build the library and scientifically index and label all the books. The basic knowledge is to walk through all the bookshelves, knowing how the book is stored, and to find the book.

When dealing with data, rarely you will not touch database. In old days, when a company like IBM and IBM-like technologies dominated the IT industry, data storing and processing were in far backend of the business. There was dark cloud around it so that only a group of elites was able to reach and handle it. Today, new technologies such as client/server, PC or internet/intranet are pushing the data and database to the very frontier of the business battlefield. The knowledge of database and data retrieving become an essential part of requirements to carry on the basic IT tasks.

As for specific skills, you should be able to understand the data by reading data diagram such ER modeling diagram or Object-oriented data diagram. Based on the diagram, you should know how to map the business requirement to the data relationship and apply SQL to manipulate data. While processing data, you need the knowledge of data integrity and you should handle the data accordingly. By knowing the basic logic aspect of data stored in database, you should be able to integrate the knowledge of data relationship to standard database concept such as Primary Key, Foreign key or other database constraints. Moving further, you may be required to use standard mechanism, such as ER modeling with UML, to delineate the data.

Networking

There is hardly one business application without networking capabilities these days. The basic networking knowledge really gives you the insight of data flow existing in the today’s IT environments. This knowledge is the indispensable base to allow you to extend your knowledge to reach the coming technologies that form the e-commerce sports ground. It gives you the luxury and comfort to absorb, adapt, and conquer any acronym beasts, HTTP, SOAP or WSDL, to name a few. Once you grasp the basic concept of modern networking, you would feel that actually the ceiling is not that high and different faces do not make things that differently inside.

There are certain compressed ways to engage in networking knowledge. Given an example, Microsoft provides an exam named Network Essential. The coverage of the exam truly represents the basic networking knowledge. Similar exchangeable exam is also offered from network product vendor such as Sun Micro system.

Security

New technology such as Internet and the broadly availability of networked data exchange bring great attention to the security aspect of IT. Even still at early stage, the requirement of security knowledge is increasingly becoming a crucial ingredient of basic IT skill.

Security is a very unique area that it could saturate into any corner of IT computing environments, and in the mean time, it could be easily neglected. In general, IT security is consisting of Authorization, Accessibility, Confidentiality and Encryption. The knowledge is listed from policies on paper, basic access control, and utilization of specialized software/hardware to full implementation of PKI (Public Key Infrastructure). In the beginning, at least the continuing security awareness should be imposed into the basic IT skills.

• The nuts-and-bolts programming and easy-to-document support jobs will have all gone to third-party providers in the U.S. or abroad. -The company’s core IT team must not only have a technology background, but also know the business sector inside and out, can architect and carry out IT plans that will add business value, and can cultivate relationships both inside and outside the company.
• The skills required to land future technical roles will be honed outside of IT. Some of these skills will come from artistic talents, math excellence or even a knack for public speaking — producing a combination of skills not commonly seen in the IT realm.
• Expertise in areas such as financial engineering, technology and mathematics will come together to form the next round of imaginative tools and technologies.
• IT workers will be involved in information integration and systems integration, or customer service. They’ll be working with people from different types of channels. IT workers must be able to think about process design and management.
• Six out of 10 people affiliated with IT will assume business-facing roles, according to Gartner.
• The IT workforce will become smaller. Gartner predicts that by 2010, 10% to 15% of IT professionals will leave their IT occupations as a result of the automation of tasks or because of a lack of interest in the sector.

So, what IT jobs will be hot tomorrow? There is no secret; today’s high-end jobs are the hot ones tomorrow, — business enterprise architects, business technologists, systems analysts and project managers. Thus, if you are in IT now, try to get in one of these jobs in the next five years. Don’t be a pure technologist. Make a move to the business side.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that you don’t need technical skills in future IT jobs. But there’s much more of a need for the business skills, the more rounded skills. There will be much more emphasis on the business domain and on project management skills than on the technical skills. To survive and thrive, IT professionals must expand their knowledge base and stretch beyond their comfort zones.

It’s time build the right skills for tomorrow’s IT:

Business Domain

- Enterprise architecture
- Project leadership
- Business process re-engineering
- Project planning, budgeting and scheduling
- Third-party provider managers

Enterprise architects in the areas of technology, security and data are expected to play key roles in integrating both systems and cultures in corporate mergers and acquisitions.

Technology Infrastructure and Services

- Systems analysis
- Systems design
- Network design
- Systems auditing
- Routine coding
- Systems testing
- Support and help desk

In the future we expect steep decline in programming and operations jobs since these roles will go overseas or more likely be automated.

Wondering what else will be moved out, here’s the general rule: The more a task can get codified or changed into explicit instructions or documentation, the more likely it can get transferred. The more likely it can be transferred, the more likely someone will come along and will develop tools to reduce even further the number of people required to do the job. Based on this rule, nothing is safe. You think design and analysis tasks should be kept in house? Those tasks are frequently outsourced, although may not be offshore.

Server and Security

- IT security planning and management
- Continuity and recovery
- Storage administrator (with SAN specialization)

For those who are mot familiar with SAN, it stands for storage-area network. A storage-area network routes data to storage devices according to rules that administrators set up. It overcomes geographic limitations. When globalization heating up, SAN administration will be a huge issue going forward simply because of the amount of data we have to deal with.

Application and Internet Development

- Customer-facing application development
- Customer-facing Web application systems
- Legacy skills
- Artificial intelligence

Business Intelligence

- Analysis and reporting
- Data warehousing
- Data mining

Which area of IT do you expect will experience the most growth in jobs in the next five years? Here’s a list from computer World:

1. Web services
2. Wireless/mobile
3. Business intelligence
4. Service-oriented architecture
5. Identity management
6. Disaster recovery/continuity planning
7. Data management/business analytics
8. E-business
9. RFID
10. Antivirus protection

Last comment, if you want to work in IT, you want to work in Web application systems. But you’d better also really know the business and the customer. Future IT workers are expected to do more than simply build things; they must also communicate with co-workers who spend a lot of time with customers or connect with the customers themselves to quickly make changes to process.

1. Informatica – Tools for Data Warehousing, Data Migration, Data Quality, Data Consolidation, Data Synchronization, and Master Data Management.
2. Syncsort DMExpress – DMExpress is the high-speed ETL tool for data warehousing, BI, and other mission-critical applications. For UNIX, Windows, and Linux, DMExpress integrates disparate data from multiple, heterogeneous sources by performing complex transformations and high speed aggregations to create consolidated views of data for reporting, analysis, or other downstream applications.
3. SAS DataFlux – Powerful for managing connectivity and metadata, data cleansing and enrichment, ETL, migration and synchronization, data federation, and master data management.
4. Embarcadero DT/Studio – A a cost-effective, scalable, and easily extensible ETL solution, helps organizations consolidate data from a variety of data sources in weeks, not months.
5. Oracle Warehouse Builder – Oracle Warehouse Builder manages the full life-cycle of data and metadata for the Oracle database. With a single, easy-to-use interface, Oracle Warehouse Builder allows you to design ETL processes between target warehouses, intermediate storage areas and the end user.
6. SQL Server Integration Services – SSIS goes beyond simple ETL (Extract Transform and Load) tools by enabling nontraditional scenarios and leveraging the power of the Microsoft .NET Platform and SQL Server.
7. Pervasive Data Junction – Data Junction ETL tool is now owned by Pervasive. This software suite includes data management and integration products, ETL tools, data migration, data conversion, and application integration solutions.
8. WhereScape RED – This data warehousing software supports entire data warehouse management life cycle in integrated Development Environment. It integrates source system exploration, schema design, metadata management, warehouse scheduling and enhancement into a single, simple integrated design.
9. IBM WebSphere DataStage (Ascential) - Formerlly from Ascential Software, this tool supports the collection, integration and transformation of large volumes of data, with data structures ranging from simple to highly complex.
   
10. Adeptia Data Transformation Server – A comprehensive solution that combines data transport with powerful metadata management and data transformation capability. It is Perfectly suited for Extract Transform and Load (ETL) type of scenarios.

Open source ETL Tools

• Talend Open Studio – Talend is the first provider of open source data integration software. Talend Open Studio provides advanced capabilities that dramatically improve the productivity of data integration job design; and proven scalability to ensure the highest execution performance.
• Pentaho Data Integration – The free open source software delivers powerful Extraction, Transformation and Loading (ETL) capabilities using an innovative, metadata-driven approach.

* Increase return on assets
* Decrease costs
* Increase productivity
* Improve asset-related decision-making
* Improve asset service delivery
* Improve regulatory compliance
* Increase business responsiveness
* Lower total cost of ownership

The following list shows the most popular asset management software tools:

• MRO Maximo – Maximo was built by MRO Software which was acquired by IBM in 2005.  Maximo allows you to manage all of your critical assets using a single platform enabling you to implement a consistent set of asset and service management best practices for all asset types, as well as decrease the number of applications you need to run your business.  Maximo Asset Management consists of six key systems that enable companies to successfully manage assets, including production equipment, facilities and transportation assets, in alignment with their business objectives.
• Altiris – Altiris (now part of Symantec) is the leading provider of IT asset management software. The Asset and Configuration Management database (ACMD) suite tracks hardware and software, along with associated contracts and costs.
• BMC Remedy – BMC Software’s Remedy Service Management streamlines the processes around IT service desk, asset management, change management, and service level agreements.  It also enables you to link business services and IT infrastructure to help you manage the impact of technology changes on business and business changes on technology in real time and into the future.
• ZENWorks – Novell ZENWorks manages hardware and software systems.  this year Novell is bulking up its asset management capabilities by integrating tools from Tally systems.

IT industry is huge and skills are many. Generally speaking, IT skills may be developed in the following areas:

• Programming skills
• Database skills
• System and network skills
• Architecture Design skills
• Integration and COTS skills

Programming Skills

Programming skills are essential to IT career success. Many of us stated IT career from programming jobs. Programming skills are about coding computer programs using a computer language. Some of widely used computer languages are Java, C/C++, Visual Basic (VB), C#, and Pascal (Delphi).  Newer languages like Ruby and Python are getting hotter nowadays.
Database Skills

Database skills are so important. No mater what’s your focus in IT career, you got to have some database skills in order to stand tall in IT industry. Database skills include data modeling, database design, database analysis, data warehousing, and database administration. Your database skills should be built on the leading database technologies – Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server, IBM DB2, and Sybase.

System and Network Skills

System and network skills are about designing, installing, configuring, and managing operating systems in a networking environment. The network configurations could be LAN (local area network), WAN (wide area network), or wireless. The most common operating systems are UNIX, Windows, and Linux.  System and network security is a hot sub-area worth your investoment of time and effort.
Architecture Design Skills

Software system architecture designs are high level skills in IT career. While programming jobs are moving to offshore, system architecture design professionals will stay in America. To make your IT career secure, you should acquire more skills in system architecture design. Currently most software system architectures are designed on two leading platforms, – J2EE and .NET.

Integration and COTS skills

Integration and COTS skills are specialized and very valuable. These skills are about mastering one of COTS (commercial off the shelf) software packages that could be ERP, CRM, PLM, or enterprise asset management system. Systems from different vendors or running on different platforms are often needed to work together, that’s where system integration skills apply.