1 - @Jens - I agree, that many people move from left to right on the bell curve, based on a number of things (desire, motivation, work environment/demands, etc.) Also, there are many people who move from this curve to other technologies altogether.

@Ben - As for the name "Notes Developers", I use that name because typically a "Notes Developer" is also a nontraditional programmer who only took up programming when they started doing it in Notes. Most Notes Programmers learned to develop for the Notes client first, and are Notes client-centric in their development efforts. Furthermore my experience is that these people fear Web development, much as they fear LotusScript. As for your adjustments to the numbers, I probably agree with that, and will adjust them accordingly.

As for the "inlfux" of developers from other programming environments I fear that there just aren't that many of them out there, and those numbers are so small as to be statistically insignificant. Furthermore most of them who come from other programming backgrounds (and are good at it) quickly pick up the skillset to be considered Domino or Domino Plus Developers, IMHO. In any case this is a generalization, and not meant to be legally binding or anything

@Rich - Thanks for the positive comments. I think you're right, you could divide that group up even further, and your cuts definitely describe some "substeps" that occur during a developer's progression through the spectrum. I will probably leave the bell curve as-is, but mention your subdivisions in my note back to the person asking. In any case, thanks much for the input

Rock

2 - @4 I certainly think you're right with Notes Developers being non-traditional programmers. Certainly in my case I started out as senior user on the pilot project for Notes in a UK government department, then moved into development from there. I think the low numbers of developers coming in from other software environments can be attributed to the fact that it takes a lot for a traditional developer to "get" Notes - the mindset to a certain extent has already been fixed, so it takes people who actually use software, rather than write it, to build what's needed.

My 2 penn'orth, anyway

3 - The latent quantitative social scientist in me says that for a simple 2-D projection of the skills continuum this is a pretty good cut. One thing I'd do is split the middle group into three equal parts and call the lower one "Notes Plus Developers" , the middle one "Domino Developers" and the higher one "Domino Web Developers", each at 20%. I'd define them as follows:


Notes Plus Developers := Notes Developers who understand how to use @DbLookup and @DbColumn.

Domino Developers := Notes Plus Developers who understand how to use LotusScript

Domino Web Developers := Domino Developers who understand how to use JavaScript.

-rich

4 - Simply one word:

Great!


Yes, I think, this is a very good description of the current situation. Indeed, there are new people comming into the developer community as you describe, so it is in fact somewhat moving from left to right. And there is movement beyond what used to be the core notes/domino development. We (Bernfried Geiger and I) have seen that at the last Entwicklercamp in Germany, we had a very high interest in our Java-Workshop from the Notes developers there, even it was not related to any notes/domino java development.

5 - I just was browsing blogs and saw this post. Fairly accurate, but I do have issue with the following statement:
"Most Domino Geeks are well-known in the community at large, and are usually involved in Design Review teams with Lotus/IBM. Domino Geeks are the "thought leaders" of the Domino development community. "

I think there are a lot of us who would otherwise fit in that category, but whose non-Domino skills have become such a large part of our work that we just don't participate in the Domino community. Frankly, the last few years when the future of Domino seemed vague made a lot of us edge away from it. I think you are selling us short by presuming that if we are not in the community, then we must not be as skilled.

6 - What about those admins who think they are developers? Probably fits into your power user category, but every company I've worked for has an admin that swares he's a developer. Usually, that means he's looked at code before and can make a view.

Don't get me wrong, there are a few that know code, but usually they don't know as much as they think they do.

I think the reverse is true for some developers. They know the basic structure of how replication and clustering works, but ask them to do it and they might not be able to. They think opening the admin client means they they admin skills. Of course there are people that span the spectrum when combining both dev/admin, but thought you might want to add that admin who thinks he's a developer into your mix.

7 - I think your Power Users is 5-10%, although it has descreased significantly since R3 days, when it was closer to 20% or more. Your Notes developers (although I disapprove of the name, as it implies that developing for the Notes client requires less that developing for the Domino server, which which I don't agree, but I'll leave that aside)... your Notes developer number seems quote low, and I think is more like 25%. These people are usually in corporations, not consulting companies, but I run across them all the time. They often have other responsibilities than Notes development, but are still the most advanced Notes development resource in their companies. If you then call Domino Plus developers 10%, which sounds right to me, and Domino Geeks 5%, which also sounds correct, you have about 50% for Domino Developers. Not a huge change, but definitely more in the Notes developers than you suggest.

The only other problem I have is the idea that every level encompasses the skills of the level before them. How does this address the influx of web developers who know Java, HTML, CSS and VB, but precious little about the Notes object model or the special tricks the Domino Plus Developers know?