Well, let me rephrase that... they may work now, but not for long. As an industry, we've been down this road. There are limitless dime-a-dozen bootcamps that will get you all kinds of certifications (remember when those mattered?)
When I got my first tech job, doing support for Windows 2000, the training class was about 50% people who had attended various Windows 2000 MCSE "bootcamps" and were all certified. Unfortunately, they didn't know anything about Windows 2000. There was no understanding that people like me had gained from actually USING and WORKING with this stuff. While they were quietly led away to the Word Support team, the rest of us marveled at the hilarity of a "bootcamp" that taught very little real world knowledge.
I think 4-year schools, while mostly being terrible at producing people who can code for a living, do provide a depth and reach of experience that no bootcamp will ever supply. If someone goes into a "Ruby" bootcamp and already knows how to program in Java/PHP/Whatever, then sure, that will be valuable. Otherwise, this is going to be another training bubble similar to the training bubble of the late 90's early 00's.
Your opinion is based on a small group of people you met briefly 10 years ago who had gone through programs in no way related to what is being discussed here.
I'm sorry if I'm being snarky (I admit I am), but I'm so tired of this negativity. HN has a huge anti-beginner bias. Since before I even started this program people have been telling me it will never work, I'm wasting my money, I'm joining a cult, etc. I'm glad I didn't listen.
I hope that you will take the time to learn a little more about what is going on here. If you'd like the real story see my comment below: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4415088
Finster, You have a very good point with the Windows 2000 MCSE bootcamps, though the comparison to Dev Bootcamp is not a perfect analogy. I speak from experience. I spent 10 yrs in the IT Industry. I actually went through the process of getting the Windows 2003 MCSE certification. I did it over a two yr period of working as an IT administrator.
I also just completed the last Dev Bootcamp class last week.
Having an MCSE is supposed to denote a large amount of IT knowledge, if not being an expert. So people that spend a week, get an MCSE and then claim to be experts aren't going to fly very well in a production environment.
At Dev Boot camp we spent 75 hrs a week learning for 10 weeks. The motto here is that we are 'World Class Beginners'. So we spent about 10-15 times longer and then claim to be 'beginners' not experts.
We all spent last Friday meeting 30 companies that want to hire us, being very upfront about our knowledge. In just the last two days I've gotten 8 interviews for companies looking for Jr Developers. I'm going in this week for technical interviews with these companies. They are going to know exactly what I know and what I don't very fast. I'm not alone here, I know many of my classmates are also getting this many interviews.
I've also been told that about 94% of people from the last class got jobs. I've personally met about half of the last class and know they are all working at very respectable places. Actually some are at amazing places.
So with a lot of knowledge on this subject I'm very confident that this program is nothing like an MCSE bootacmp.
No, what he's saying is well known about those certification boot camps. They are notorious. This is not just his experience. It is well known, you could google and find probably a lot of articles about it.
I entered Dev Bootcamp already knowing Java (I worked in the industry for several years on j2ee and j2me). While I felt like I had an advantage at first, once we hit rails and other technologies, everyone was pretty much at the same level. I was amazed at how much everyone learned in such a short period of time. I was also amazed at all the projects we all created over a very short period of time.
Well, let me rephrase that... they may work now, but not for long. As an industry, we've been down this road. There are limitless dime-a-dozen bootcamps that will get you all kinds of certifications (remember when those mattered?)
When I got my first tech job, doing support for Windows 2000, the training class was about 50% people who had attended various Windows 2000 MCSE "bootcamps" and were all certified. Unfortunately, they didn't know anything about Windows 2000. There was no understanding that people like me had gained from actually USING and WORKING with this stuff. While they were quietly led away to the Word Support team, the rest of us marveled at the hilarity of a "bootcamp" that taught very little real world knowledge.
I think 4-year schools, while mostly being terrible at producing people who can code for a living, do provide a depth and reach of experience that no bootcamp will ever supply. If someone goes into a "Ruby" bootcamp and already knows how to program in Java/PHP/Whatever, then sure, that will be valuable. Otherwise, this is going to be another training bubble similar to the training bubble of the late 90's early 00's.