[TheFro]

I'm an american, only speaking english, I've worked in Germany and work in the UK right now. Basically stick to the following areas:

1. Scandinavia/Nordic areas - Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland

2. UK - Obvious english speaking choice ;)

3. "Germanic" - Germany, Belgium, Netherlands, Switzerland

Countries like France, Spain, Italy, etc are very difficult for a non-native speaker.

Getting a visa in the UK is quite difficult (especially because recent administration). Not sure about the other areas but I imagine its quite easy. My german stay was through a large corporation (40K+ employees) and my current work I had the difficulty of getting a tier 1 uk visa on my own.

What programming languages and business areas are you interested in?

[shanked]

Thanks for the initial responses.

Most of my experience is web development related, and my language of choice is Python (although I've used Ruby, C#, Java, PHP, C++, C). Though being a web developer isn't necessarily what I'd look for (I wouldn't mind it), I hope to find a job that offers more challenging computer science problems than merely cutting-pasting libraries to create a simple CRUD interface. However, I know that it'll be difficult to find a job in a new country and a job that really pushes my CS knowledge and forces me to learn, so I don't plan on being overly picky.

From the responses thus far, I realize that for someone hoping to go to a new country, I'll need to learn about VISAs and work-permits.

Beyond information about where I should look to find a job (which is very helpful), do you have any additional insight into how I should find one?

Are there specific European-focused tech job-boards/search engines I should browse? Are there any things I should avoid when contacting European companies, that might be common in job-hunting within the USA?

[ig1]

For the UK you can get a Tier-1 visa which operates on a points based system (if you google you can figure out for yourself if you get enough points to qualify), unfortunately they've introduced a quota system this year which makes it slightly trickier. Still you have a decent chance of getting one.

The advantage of the tier-1 visa is that it doesn't tie you to a particular employer, your free to work for whoever you want as long as your salary meets a minimum level. It also means you can apply to any tech company without having to worry about if they'd be willing to sponsor you, etc.

The financial sector in London is a huge employer of developers and if your looking for hardcore CS stuff might be a good place to look, and most banks are happy to sort out visa stuff on your behalf because they have whole teams dedicated to that stuff.

Most of the UK tech job boards are dominated by recruiters, so your best bet might just be finding some tech company you're interested in and looking at their homepage for job opportunities.

I'm currently in the process of launching a developer job board for the UK (http://www.coderstack.co.uk), but it's still very early days so I don't have very many job listings at the moment.

[TheFro]

Yes, learning about visa/work permits is a lengthy process. If you want me to explain to you the UK one feel free to drop me a line at mbesto AT gmail.

My company (IT consulting company, mainly in ERP tech) may have something...I don't know specifically but they have their hands in everything from online MMO to betting website development to big ERP tech. We also have a partner recruiting company, could put you in contact there as well.

Glad to hear you want to get intl experience. I can't recommend it enough. There are some restrictions I have to deal with as foreigner but otherwise it's a great way to see the world.

sidenote - literally just started learning Python myself and love it so far.