Are good PHP developers really that hard to find?

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We're trying to hire a full time OO PHP developer at the moment. We're offering what I feel is a reasonable salary (£30k) but the quality of the applicants is very poor.

The candidates either seem to be able to list an impressive array of technologies but with no real commercial experience or they have plenty of experience but are stuck in the mindset of integrating OSCommerce/similar rather than developing proper bespoke applications. Nothing in their portfolio jumps out and says "wow, hire me".

I'm not even that bothered about a degree (I don't have a degree!). What I'm really looking for is a nerd, someone who lives and breathes PHP and who isn't afraid of getting their hands dirty with some seriously complex code (web hosting automation).

Do these people exist? Am I looking in the wrong places? Is the salary not sufficient? Can I be really cheeky and ask what kind of salaries those of you who are skilled at this level are demanding?

Thoughts from employers/staff would be of great interest .

 

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Thanks for your comments, guys.

PaulM, it's nice to know it's not our job advert at fault! We had a developer previously who used to code in such a manner. Everything he did generally worked but it was just 'messy'. I need someone who is nerdy to the point of OCD .

I don't really fancy switching our entire platform to ASP .NET .

 

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There's nothing at all wrong with the job. I'd be happy with it myself if I weren't the MD!

There's no shortage of applicants, they're just all rubbish . Is PHP not taken seriously as a language to learn? Do all the really talented coders flock to ASP .NET or Java because it's seen as being more 'commercial'?

 

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Guys, thanks for the input, your insights have been most useful, especially the suggestion of looking for a C++ developer and 'teaching' them PHP. This would widen the market quite a bit.

aln, with experience of hosting-related systems, you would very high on my shortlist but Scotland to Maidenhead is a bit of a commute! If re-locating is a possibility, you're more than welcome to come for an interview.

We weren't intending to use agencies but we're allowing a couple to send us CVs at the moment on a "no win, no fee" basis but with a very large fee if we do take one of their candidates. The candidates look good at first, until you see their portfolio and find out that the projects they've been involved in aren't in the same league as the kind of systems we're creating. Perhaps I'm being too picky but when I see Joomla mentioned I tend to push the CV over into the rejects pile.

 

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Update:

Eventually I've managed to narrow this down to 3 candidates (1 interviewed so far) who actually appear to have some talent, from around 50 Joomla monkies who have applied. I've sent the final 3 a coding challenge. Let me know what you think, bearing in mind I'm not really a developer myself... It's basically a very dumbed down spec for a system which I wrote. If I'm paying £30k+ for a developer, I expect them to do a much better job of it than me .

When providing a shared e-mail service using the Exim MTA, spam is a major concern. We are able to limit artificially the number of messages a user can relay over a given time period at the transport level but we required a passive, exim independent, "early warning system" to alert if an IP address had sent more than 500 messages through an SMTP relay service in the past 30 minutes.

My solution to this problem was written in PHP (due to familiarity) but any language is acceptable.

Requirements:

1) The check must use the exim main log so that it can be deployed on an exim instance without modifying the configuration
2) The check must be as close to "real time" as possible
3) The check must have the ability to whitelist IPs without restarting the script
4) The system must notify an e-mail address of a potential spammer, including where possible a sample e-mail
5) The system must notify only once per IP
6) The script must run as a daemon (or pseudo daemon) and prevent itself from starting more than one instance
7) It must handle the log file being truncated by another process


You can assume:

1) That Exim is configured with the default configuration from the RHEL5/CentOS 5 RPM, default logging
2) That fixed_login authenticator is used
3) That the script is run as root
4) That nobody is able to relay without using the fixed_login authenticator

This should take 1-2 hours. Points will be awarded for:

1) The elegancy of the solution - the less code, the better
2) Performance and resource considerations
3) Lack of bugs

 

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Hmm, that's a problem i'd solve with a combination of syslog and somthing like Splunk, to me that isn't something a developer should be doing.

I had to come up with something which required some sysadmin knowledge but which wasn't too specialised and which would only take a couple of hours at most. Granted it's not perfect but it should be a pretty good test of the kind of abilities I'm looking for.

 

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That's a bloody good point there Dominic, I'll look out for that .

 

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It's mostly coding but some knowledge of both unix and Windows is essential as most of the code will be automating sysadmin related tasks on both platforms. He/she also needs excellent problem solving ability as part of the role involves debugging customer code, essentially proving to valued customers that their website doesn't work because their developer is an imbecile rather than there being a problem with the hosting!

His/her predecessor had all of the skills required, he was just missing the care and attention to detail aspect which I'm determined to find in the new candidate.

I don't think there are any standard tools which would complete meet the brief I've set out (which is a dumbed down version of the real system which I've already written) but if the candidate wants to suggest something as well as writing the code then fair play .

 

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Badly. Thanks for asking though .

Most of the applicants admitted the challenge I set was beyond their capabilities. Those who completed it made a poor attempt. If it does the job but is full of obvious logic errors and consumes 100% of a CPU core, it's not a solution... that was from a PhD who was insistent that he was perfect for the role.

The problem is with the salary. I'm going to re-assess how much I'm willing to pay and re-advertise the role.

 

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The problem is that I'm very picky about who I employ, they have to be perfect. Because we're a small business, the salary comes directly out of myself and my partner's pockets. I don't have the time to train somebody (except in our bespoke systems) so they need to be switched on and clued up.

sist_si, the challenge is very simple but the requirements specified that the solution has to be bug free and use the least possible amount of code. Written in their language of choice, it needs to watch the log file of Exim and keep a tally of how many messages a particular IP address has sent using auth SMTP, reporting (once) when a certain threshold is reached, including a sample message where possible. The latter requires some "out of the box" thinking as you're not allowed to modify the Exim configuration. It needs whitelist functionality and should be accurate with no false positives.

I chose this particular task because it represents the kind of 'housekeeping' script that gets written on a daily basis within our company. I know this can be done in less than 2 hours because I've done it and it's currently in use. Anyone who responded that they don't have access to a Linux box or haven't heard of Exim were immediately junked. I can't hire someone who isn't capable of RTFM.

Edit: As suggested by some of the posters in this thread, I'm going to widen the net next time and not restrict it to PHP developers. My preference for PHP is only really based on my own familiarity with it and also the speed with which it's possible to deploy an application - I think 5 minutes from conception to implementation is my record.

 

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We hired a freelancer who works from home. Despite me being adamant that I wanted someone office-based, so far he's proved better than anyone who applied for the full time post.