You guys think it's bad when teacher in HS know nothing of CS, or when in college they don't teach the latest and greatest technologies (btw, some college do teach only the latest and greatest, skipping Unix and other fundamental things, but those are bad colleges).
Just wait until you start working.
I am one eight of an inch far from quitting my job and shut the door (over the fingers of some people).
I work on databases, more precisely on Oracle, with a GIS slant, for the government.
Now, designing databases is not a simple task, it requires a lot of forethought, patience, and knowledge, this is why they hired me. They also commissioned to me the creation of a web based front end for this project.
Too bad, the people who actually draw the maps for this project have a lot of power, and since the inception of this project they have been pushing for more control, up to the point where this bunch of f*****g morons designed the database on their own, without consulting me first, and now they are pushing it down my throat. It took them ONE F*****G YEAR to come up with a database that is SO F*****G BAD that it will NEVER F*****G WORK! Who in his f*****g right mind would create a table and include a field to indicate the F*****G SORT ORDER FOR A D**N REPORT??????????????? To select which records of another table are being selected by a user, this D**N F*****G MORON added a field called "Selected"!!!!!!!!! And they created a lot of USELESS reports in Access, and they want me to convert them to Crystal Reports, but the database is so f**ked up that they never work, and they say it's me!!!! And they insist that the best tool for the job is FRONTPAGE! And now they want administrative rights to the server!! AND TO THE ORACLE DATABASE ITSELF!!!!!!!! THEY DON'T EVEN F*****G KNOW HOW TO F*****G TURN ON THE D**N COMPUTER!!!!!!!! WHAT THE F**K! And people talk bad about country folks.. These F*****G MORONS come from the city, and they pretend to know everything, and they look down on people who actually KNOW what they are doing, or at least have read a book on the subject, instead of just trying to patch some s**t together!
And I am being told that "this is being taken care of, don't worry". F**K IT! The cost of this thing has already been nearly $ 1,000,000.00, and is so f*****g far from being EVEN a viable project!!!!! And next year they are going to ask for a budget of another f*****g million dollars!!!! WHAT THE F**K! And all this because they are screaming louder than the rest of the cabinet! Wonderf**k, let's f*****g waste a f*****g million $$, it ain't ours anyway! Let's make a fool of the a*****e who we hired, and let's have fun telling him what to do and when to do it!
At the last meeting I nearly exploded, and this F*****G MORON wiggles his finger at me saying: "calm down, everything is alright. That's not the way to act." and another one: "why are you getting mad, I think what they are doing is a wonderful job, don't you AGREE?" with the tone that says, "YOU HAVE TO AGREE", and why? Because they know somebody and this somebody put them in that position!
Something tells me that I will have a new job by the end of next week! It doesn't pay to work for the government: low pay and all this S**T!

I am so aggravated, that I restarted smoking!!

Well, you know.. the more things change, the more they stay the same.
I just got back from an unscheduled four hours meeting (skipping lunch, btw), and I got to hear that my boss is a moron, and that the guy who wrote the Db is actually trying just to do his work, but noone is helping him. On the other hand my boss says this guy is a moron who is just trying to beef up his resume and never asked for help.
I HATE politics. How in the hell can you pretend things to go ahead, if noone is willing to give in a little?
I never did yell at a meeting, but today I managed to do that.
It is so simple, the business guy writes a table, I review it and give it back. He looks it over, we talk about it and then we agree. Instead there is people who want to do everything, and other that have to agree. The most arrogant thing I heard is that IS/IT people are at the service of the business guys, and we have to give way to them. And now they start pulling rank and doing things behind each other's back.
I am bolting. I am going to document all my work, so that the poor soul who will take my place won't be overwhelmed, but I will be out by mid November!

For SonicSil:
In a business, generally speaking, you want the job done, you don't care how, and you care when. In the government, you want the job done, but you DO care how, and you fairly care of when.
In the government there is a strict hierarchy, and you cannot step out of your bounds. Most people in the government did not get in that position because of their skills, but because of who they know and of how loud they can scream.
If you want an easy job, where nothing changes, where you cannot be fired, where raises are the same for everybody, at the same time, then join the Communist Party, or work for the Government.

[This message has been edited by Daemon (edited November 02, 1999).]