Geeze. I've had a similar experience that I managed to skate my way through. My skills are pretty simple, C/C++, Fortran, COBOL, several assembler dialects, some embedded work and quite a bit of device driver writing. I have a super strong UNIX and VMS background. Okay, you should get a feel for it, add 14+ years of solid employment and an incomplete Ph.D. I have this slave trader, lets call him "Jim" (As in simple .. Goon show style), that decides I'd be perfect for a role that he has. Okay, what's it about? Jim: They'd like someone with a strong programming background (check), knows a command line (check), bit of dbase (not strong..but will bring knowledge upto par very fast) and a small amount of VB. Me: VB's my weak one there. No real commercial experience. First and last time I touched it was college and that was VB3 or VB4 for a unit called "Visial Programming" *Snort!*. It's changed a lot. Jim: That's fine.. you'll pick it up. It's a minor thing. They're super picky and your CV pretty well dove-tails what they need *wank wank wank* Me: Okay, put me forward. (They have to ask permission, welcome to Australia). Interview. I get lickered up. Even showered this month! Print out half a dozen copies of my CV, plenty of sleep and roll up for the meet'n'greet. Company is pretty much in the hiring mood and are despo due to deadlines and $OTHER_CIRCUMSTANCES. There is chat to get an emotional feel for each other. I'm interested in what they do.. environments, systems, history (I have done my homework on their products, market position, so many questions ensue). Then comes the kicker. "We're really really impressed with your 14 years of VB skills, and you've been with it for so long. Jim's company has never sent us a bad recruit this highly recommended although we've only placed with Jim once." Wow there tiger, hang on.. VB skills? 14 years? no.. Pardon me for a moment, I believe you've been miss-led and I've been mis-represented, May I have one of your spare CV's, lets trade, here's what it "should" look like. To say "Major Radical Surgery" is a fair assessment. So, without malice we went through it calmly. I Said, "I have a completely different skill-set and do not feel competent with this role. I am though fairly interested in it, but I suspect your not in the luxurious position to let someone "train-up" so I feel I am the incorrect candidate." This hurt because I was getting a bit hungry money/food wise but hey! I've been lied about and now I have to come good on their lies if I get the thing. I also recommended that the company have a strong word with "Jim's" Dream Leader before he attempts to destroy other placements. I didn't even get a chance to get home, through the door and phone Jim before the phone was ringing crazily. He was extremely abusive. I suspect his future at the Slave-traders was not very certain after that. Remember, you have the skills. Be honourable. You need to measure up to their representation. If they are not being forthright and representing you honourably, pull them into line. Also, try a few. Once they know your interviewing for some other slave-trader, they tend to work harder to place you and cop the fee before joe-six-pack up the street manages to snaffle you. It's your life! :) 3

AHeehehahahahahaa! Microlimp's operating system will never be "Enterprise Ready". They should have stayed running on OpenVMS and continued to enjoy flawless 10+years of uptime, instead of this pathetic "five-9's". VMS on any platform FTW!