What job do I want? Part 1: me

Skills

It's got to be C or C++, pretty much. Shame to throw away twenty years of that. I'm best on some flavor of Unix but am comfortable enough with Windows and Visual C++ that that'd work well also.

I can also claim some Java, some CORBA, a tiny bit of SQL, some Perl... but those are all minor. If a job says those are handy to have, great; if they're the main course, not great.

Strengths

Mostly, I am smart and I learn fast. I will get to know really complex stuff quickly. In previous jobs, I have plowed into the learning for a while, then eventually surpassed my coworkers in depth of knowledge. Not counting Spice and Stretch, where *everyone* was pretty smart, it would usually be about four months between my start date and when I became my peers' default Question Answerer.

This confidence in my ability to learn means I'm unusual in my willingness to ditch entire areas of previous experience and strike out into something new. The good side of this is that there is probably a lot out there that I could do. The bad side is that it does not play well on a resume. People are much more comfortable hiring experience than raw smarts. Once I get to the interview I'll probably be fine.

Motivation

I want to do something that makes a positive difference to someone somewhere. I want to know that my work made someone's job easier, made someone's hobby more fun, made someone's office run more smoothly, made someone's health better, whatever.

Being motivated this way (rather than by intrinsic coolness of a technology) helps narrow it down.

What job do I want? Part 2: what's out there

A big whole bunch of ideas, not even exhaustive! Feedback on any of them is very welcome. New ideas to add to the list are also very welcome. Job offers are greeted with an angel choir soundtrack and my frantic stammerings of lifelong gratitude.

1. ( Embedded OS/driver stuff )

2. ( UI design and implementation )

3. ( Tools )

4. Spam-killing - No experience there. It sure does pass the "is it worth doing" test for me. What would I need to learn?

5. Apps destined for non-computer-professionals (software for small businesses, etc) - What's out there? Some of this would be way cool to do.

6. Webby stuff a company deploys for its customers to use - Some of this could be cool too. The debug cycle has got to be frustrating as all get-out, and that's something I've got years of tips and tricks for from my X11 work and embedded work.

7. Other - Any other development ideas?

8. QA - Getting farther off the obvious path, how about QA? It likely won't pay what development pays, but I've done it before and I seem to have the mindset.

9. Documentation - At all possible? I have zero training and zero experience, but it appeals, and I believe I could write clearly about complicated things. One unusual trait I have among engineers is that I give a shit about documentation: accuracy, appearance, completeness, etc. I don't even know what I'd have to learn though.

10. Build/release stuff - I've done this as secondary duties; think of the customer as the team down the hall. Again, likely lower pay than development, but if I'm good I can turn a painful process into something almost pleasant.

11. Other Other - What else? Any other ideas?