Earlier this year, after completing working on a heavy-duty technical book , I said, “Never again. No more books “. But after a short break, I “ve decided to write a small non-technical book discussing an everyday life of an enterprise software developer.

Observing the business side of the corporate software development cycle is pretty interesting activity, and I write about things AS THEY ARE rather then trying to present a pretty picture of IT departments of enterprise giants that are developing bleeding edge software day in and day out.

I “ve gotten OK from the publisher, and here “s a preliminary layout of this book with a working title “The life of an enterprise programmer “:

Foreword

What this book is about

Part 1: Getting into IT

Do you want your child to be a programmer?

Enrollment in CS and IS majors is on decline

Out of college: catch-22 situation

How to pass a technical interview with flying colors

Interviewing Enterprise developers

Give a second chance

And he hung up during the interview

Part 2. Living in IT

Manage your software development career

Who are these IT contractors, anyway?

Why hire an IT contractor

Will high-paid contractors extinct?

How comfy is your cubicle?

On casual Fridays and a revolution made by women

Arranged Marriages

The Honeymoon

The Family Life (a.k.a. Corporate Politics)

The Family Budget

Divorce Is Not an Option

Corporate Java Training

Who Is Teaching

Finding Quality Training

Enjoy your technical conference

The cost of attending a technical conference

Increase your visibility

Manage your manager

Self-publishing a book is easier than you think

Outsourcing

The world is round

What CIO should know about outsourcing

Ten tips on dealing with offshore developers

Dead souls from overseas

Outsourcing to students

Cultural difference in outsourcing

Russian Programmers

And Pedro said, “Move over, Ravi! rdquo;

Visiting an offshore training camp for programmers

Once again on outsourcing

Insourcing – the foreign programmers

Welcome to the USA!

H1B Visa

How to select a software vendor for your next enterprise project

Political stuff

Another Brick in the wall

What “s your salary?

Underpaid? Quit!

Overpaid? Hardly!

Working overtime? Poor management!

Is life in startups any different?

SOA, RIA and the Human factor

SOA Ground Up

SOA Top Down

SOA as a burner

SOA Maturity

Technical Benefits of SOA

ESB Infrastructure

To SOA or not to SOA

Making Business Users Happy

SOA+RIA

Agile development

Part 3. Getting out of IT

And he was fired

Do not tell me cause it hurts

Thoughts of an aging programmer

My friend is a 72-year old programmer

If you think I “ve missed a topic or would like to share your story that illustrates an interesting, stupid, political, or career aspect of lives of enterprise software developers, just shoot me an email at yfain at sys-con.com.

This book summarizes my personal opinions that were formed during twenty five years of wearing different hats in Enterprise IT and running a small startup. The odds are that you will not agree with all my observations or find some of them rather cynical or even insulting. But this is how I see things today, in 2007, living in the geographical area known as Big Apple.