[caraboga]

I think you need to dismiss the myth that your 'forming' years are behind you.

I work for a few research groups at a large, prominent southern university. There are people who get engineering phds in their 30s and 40s. You have coded a large chunk of your life and have an excellent framework to bolt stuff on to.

There is always a job market for an enthused developer that doesn't believe in his own hype. You don't have to announce you are not among the best, I don't think a lot of people who think they are the best are anywhere close. I write much better code now when I am in my 30s than when I was in my 20s. If you stay in touch with technologies and you build stuff for yourself that you are willing to show people, then your prospects should look pretty good.

Best of luck.

[redmand]

I guess what I meant is I see a lot of guys in the group who are younger (20-25) with more senior guys trying to "form" them into what they feel is a "good" developer. I've been around long enough to have developed my own ideas, and while I'm always open to having my views influenced and changed over time, I'm not going to sit down and have someone tell me "this is what you need to do to be good like me".

Your note about building stuff on your own is something I constantly do. I try to keep at least a couple projects going at home for the purpose of practice and incorporation of advancing technology. I don't have my finger on the pulse of everything, but I'm by no means being left behind.