Military/Govt IT (Score 1)

I spent 21 years in the Navy as an electronics tech/electronics material officer. Along the way I completed an Electronics BS and a Computer Engineering MS via night school. I retired in 94. So, the IT world was limited to specific purpose mini-computer systems, dumb terminal/server combos, and a few desktops while I was on active duty. The maintenance folks did most of the systems maintenance. My military training was excellent, but it was for what is now lost art, discrete component repair and electromechancical device repair. When I left the military, I went into federal agency engineering support and worked primarily with the FAA and the IRS. Both agencies have serious shortcomings with the knowledge level of their government employee computer specialists. There was not a lot of new blood or folks who had continued their educations. The computer specialist field is filled with senior people that started their careers as main frame tape apes/system operators. Unfortunately, they now make decisions about system engineering and acquisition and are for the most part saved by a few knowledgable standouts and a large cadre of better trained contractors. I will say that the IRS has a dedicated and extremely competant crew of COBOL and Assembler programmers that seem to get the extremely complicated tax systems running correctly every year in spite of what Congress might do to change the tax codes.