Accommodation is cheap, I pay 400€ for 50sqm, a friend of mine pays 550 for 70sqm with 3 rooms. That's in a central part of town. In general, between 320 - 600 you can find a pretty reasonable place for a person to live alone.

Döner costs €2.50, a chinese meal off a stall costs €3.00, a restaurant meal in some small restaurant 5€ or 6€, in some normal restaurant maybe 9€ to 12€. Beer costs €3 in most clubs and bars, cocktails €4.50 to €8.00.

Transport costs €70 a month for the train? Not so sure about this. Parking is easy on the outskirts, but the very center of town you usually need to pay in a parkhouse.

Lots of english speaking people, and it's very popular for euro-immigrants (france, england, spain, etc), so a very western europe scene, and very easy to get by on english only.

Berlin generally has a bad work climate (I've heard people say), so if I were you, I'd apply for 10-20 jobs from Warsaw, then come over, stay a week in a ferienwohnung, do all the interviews and if you find one you like, move here. Moving without a job could put you under undue pressure. Warsaw is just 4 hours by train, is it not?

I believe there are a lot of young companies in Berlin, so I don't think the Airbus style jobs are really available here.

An added bonus is the local beach over the Elba :-)

I'd apply for 10-20 jobs from Warsaw, then come over, stay a week...

that's exactly what I'm going to do

so I don't think the Airbus style jobs are really available here

what is an 'airbus style job'? :)

Great summary of cost of living and tech scene from maxklein. You can live very cheaply here, if you work at it. Some bars serve a half-litre of beer for 1€, some reasonable apartments can be got for 120€ a month if you can live with coal-fired heating.

The other tech company I know well is SoundCloud. They are great. They are mostly Ruby-based, but they're expanding the technology they use rapidly at the moment, so they might be flexible.

Good luck: Berlin is a fantastic place to live.

Although I am not qualified enough for such a position I am curious what requirements they have. I check your link and they ask for at least 2 years of experience. Is that "all" ?

As a CS drop out I can't even provide bachelor's degree. The point I am trying to make is: As far as I know here in Germany employees always ask for degrees. Am I way off?

Could I train myself the necessary skills and then work my way up and then some day I'd be qualified enough to work for a company like Ableton?

To sum it up: I don't give a rats ass for any degrees. I don't even have one myself. We send applicants a programming test. I get these tests, and I assess them without even skimming the CV. Because it would otherwise just skew my observations.

If the test convinced me that you can code, you will have a job-interview, via phone or in person depending on if it's feasible to fly you in to Berlin or not.

This interview is pure technical, either.

If this convinced me that you are a good coder, I will arrange a third interview with the CTO, who has the final say on all employments. I won't spoil the enjoyment of that for you :)

I've been into electronic music production & sounddesign for about 8 years now. But I never saw a way that this could somehow be helpful when it comes to finding a job.

Two terms of CS gave me some insight into programming but I mainly solved little mathematical problems rather than gaining insight into "real world software programming".

Now I am attending business school and try to figure out how to avoid a typical office job so that I can do something more rewarding, where I can be somewhat more myself, instead.

I should seriously get into programming in my spare time...

Sorry to everyone else for hijacking this thread. ;-)

€: just finished the video. Looks like an awesome working atmosphere indeed!

1. I have left university 13 months ago and have worked for an online shopping company in Berlin ever since. I have done freelance development as a student, so is the 2 years experience an absolute must?

2. The hiring page is in English but would you like a German-style application (photo, lots and lots of certificates and grades) or the much shorter Anglicized version (3 pages max).

Regarding the CV: give us whatever you have. I personally won't read it, eventually somebody in HR might - but it's not used to filter applications.

The other day we even looked at a 20-year old highschool student, because he looked promising. Neither CV nor experience. We didn't take him for a bunch of reasons, but that's another story.

We also offer german-courses for employees. And english for the germans ;)

The defined API for interacting with Live is Max For Live. Python is only used internally, and to a limited extend.

And for The Bridge, we introduced an XML-based document format, which should be a second option to generate live-sets.

Agree with Mary - Berlin is a fantastic place to live and very affordable in many areas. Great city with a growing start-up scene!

Down in the south (Stuttgart), it's all C or Java and most projects seem to be boring on the first look :-/

But the web-team is large enough to also offer more back-end related work, which is the reason we advertise Python-developers instead of Web-developers only.

I fear though that this is not really that much different from another spin on social networking in the end.

I guess this is unavoidable in just about any web development job these days but at least the context is a little more intrinsically interesting at Ableton. At least to me.

Have your own space, go out sometimes, take cab once in a while... about 1.200€+/month (obviously open end).

Add at least another 130€/month for health insurance.

Unfortunately I don't know about any python gigs but if you are familiar with RoR, let me know... As a freelancer (RoR) you should get something between 300€ - 800€ / day (deepending on your experience).

Update: For Startup-Jbs you might want to check out: http://www.deutsche-startups.de/startups-jobs/stellenangebot... (not only programming and not only Berlin).

Another place would be: http://www.jobisjob.de/berlin/ruby/jobs (Rubyjobs in Berlin)

You might also consider to get an (free) account at www.xing.com (kind of Germanys LinkedIn which is used by many recruiters).

If you would consider/interested in working for a non-profit (including non-profit pay ;-(, please check out www.betterplace.org or www.spenden.de (the later will relaunch soon). They are/will be done with RoR and are sometimes looking for programmers (mostly freelancers). If interested I might be able to help here.

googles

This is my github account http://www.github.com/bolthar . My expertise with RoR is limited but I know ASP.NET MVC very well and they're similar.

Lots of startups, probably some doing Python, not sure who off the top of my head. Most recruitment in Berlin seems to be done via social networks rather than via job boards, so your best bet might be to get involved with the startup community and get some leads from there.

Most hiring I've done in Berlin is via job boards.

try this map to find startups http://www.businesslocationcenter.de/de/B/iii/1/seite11.jsp

there seems to be a django Berlin group http://groups.google.com/group/django-berlin

As opposed to Berlin specifically, how should an American software engineer get a job in a different country? I'd like to experience different cultures and I'd like to move to another country (after finding a job) but I'm not sure how I should go about doing it.

Initially, I think western Europe is the most ideal place since I do not know any other languages, some place where many people spoke English would be ideal.

If anyone has any tips for how an American (with no foreign contacts, or fluency in other languages) can land a job in a western European country, I'd be very interested in hearing them.

At least here in Finland, English has become the de facto working language at many companies and university departments. Nowadays there is almost always at least one non-Finn in any team, and nobody assumes that foreigners would ever learn Finnish. In large European countries like Germany and France, it's still often assumed that you'll adapt to their language and way of thinking (the French in particular will take it for granted that you're there to absorb the radiant glow of their superior cultural heritage ;)).

Northern Europe is also pretty good for finding IT jobs. Finland has Nokia, Sweden has Ericsson, Netherlands has Philips, Norway has... lots of oil money, I guess. And Denmark is simply a fun place. Take your pick ;)

On the bad side:

* Freaking hot. You will get used to it after about 8 months.

* Expensive apartments. Not as bad as SF or NYC, but getting up there.

* Despite being a decent size city, it often has a conservative, small town atmosphere.

* Asia loves status and brand names and leans towards Java and .Net and industrial programming and tends to look down on scripting languages

Hong kong is probably good to look at too. Bigger more interesting city but like everywhere, has its drawbacks too of course.

Singapore has a mandatory death penalty for many narcotics offenses.

Singapore police have the authority to compel both residents and non-residents to submit to random drug analysis.

There are no jury trials in Singapore. Judges hear cases and decide sentencing.

http://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/cis/cis_1017.html#c...

Singapore's judicial system is consistently ranked in the top 2 in Asia and usually in the top 10 globally, often ahead of places like the US and Germany. http://app.subcourts.gov.sg/Data/Files/File/Research/issue29...

I'm an American who has lived in Singapore almost 2 years. The Singapore government delivers good, fair, cost efficient government, a high standard of living, and is responsive to citizens. This is incomprehensible to Westerners who have been taught to believe that democracy is the only system that works. Western democracy is great and does a decent job. I believe Singapore's government is better in many or most cases. Here is a list of ways that Singapore's government is better than most or all Western governments:

- easier to start a business

- lower unemployment

- higher economic growth

- less corruption (private and government)

- lower, simpler taxes

- less paperwork (everything is online)

- less crime

The following essay on the subject is worth your time: http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/journal_of_democracy/v006/6.3br....

The PAP sues its opponents for defamation. Has your government ever done anything worse?

You mention one small piece of the pie of justice: political free speech. What about property rights, banking law, business law, immigration law, tax law, criminal law, etc? I think you need to show a much broader pattern of abuse to say the judicial system isn't fair.

I'm actually a libertarian. Its taken some time for me to reconcile that with my support of Singapore. Basically, I believe Singapore is more free than most Western countries although sometimes in different ways.

You can quibble about minor issues, but in my experience the government delivers good service, safe streets, a growing economy, and opportunity to the vast majority of Singaporeans.

But Singapore has made good decisions and hasn't been abusive or corrupt. (No government is without sin or without mistakes, so I mean Singapore isn't abusive or corrupt compared to the US and Europe.) Their economy has boomed, their standard of living has risen dramatically in a short period of time. Aren't you curious about how they did it?

Political systems have evolved and improved throughout history and will continue to do so. Western democracy is not the best government that will ever exist on Earth.

1. Ireland

2. Switzerland

3. Norway

...

11. Singapore

...

13. US

...

17. Japan

...

26. Germany

...

29. UK

...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quality-of-Life_Index

1. Scandinavia/Nordic areas - Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland

2. UK - Obvious english speaking choice ;)

3. "Germanic" - Germany, Belgium, Netherlands, Switzerland

Countries like France, Spain, Italy, etc are very difficult for a non-native speaker.

Getting a visa in the UK is quite difficult (especially because recent administration). Not sure about the other areas but I imagine its quite easy. My german stay was through a large corporation (40K+ employees) and my current work I had the difficulty of getting a tier 1 uk visa on my own.

What programming languages and business areas are you interested in?

Most of my experience is web development related, and my language of choice is Python (although I've used Ruby, C#, Java, PHP, C++, C). Though being a web developer isn't necessarily what I'd look for (I wouldn't mind it), I hope to find a job that offers more challenging computer science problems than merely cutting-pasting libraries to create a simple CRUD interface. However, I know that it'll be difficult to find a job in a new country and a job that really pushes my CS knowledge and forces me to learn, so I don't plan on being overly picky.

From the responses thus far, I realize that for someone hoping to go to a new country, I'll need to learn about VISAs and work-permits.

Beyond information about where I should look to find a job (which is very helpful), do you have any additional insight into how I should find one?

Are there specific European-focused tech job-boards/search engines I should browse? Are there any things I should avoid when contacting European companies, that might be common in job-hunting within the USA?

The advantage of the tier-1 visa is that it doesn't tie you to a particular employer, your free to work for whoever you want as long as your salary meets a minimum level. It also means you can apply to any tech company without having to worry about if they'd be willing to sponsor you, etc.

The financial sector in London is a huge employer of developers and if your looking for hardcore CS stuff might be a good place to look, and most banks are happy to sort out visa stuff on your behalf because they have whole teams dedicated to that stuff.

Most of the UK tech job boards are dominated by recruiters, so your best bet might just be finding some tech company you're interested in and looking at their homepage for job opportunities.

I'm currently in the process of launching a developer job board for the UK (http://www.coderstack.co.uk), but it's still very early days so I don't have very many job listings at the moment.

My company (IT consulting company, mainly in ERP tech) may have something...I don't know specifically but they have their hands in everything from online MMO to betting website development to big ERP tech. We also have a partner recruiting company, could put you in contact there as well.

Glad to hear you want to get intl experience. I can't recommend it enough. There are some restrictions I have to deal with as foreigner but otherwise it's a great way to see the world.

sidenote - literally just started learning Python myself and love it so far.

I'm an American who was originally sent to the UK to help open an office there. I later was hired by another company to come work in Oslo, where I am now. Scandinavia in general is very easy to find work (they have a strong need for educated people in IT areas - development, support, etc). Getting a job in the UK is certainly possible, but the paperwork is much more of a hassle (30-60 pages depending on the type of visa compared to 4 pages for Norway).

Pretty much everyone here speaks English, although depending on the company you may be strongly encouraged to learn the local language. The plus side of that, though, is that they will often pay for the classes.

Finding the job itself is going to be more difficult just because the job postings may be in the local language and on local sites, but you can use Google to translate them decently. For Norway, the best place to start is finn.no.

Expect endless confusion over faggots (meatballs), football (soccer) and the myriad of ways to describe the weather.

They also speak English in Ireland, you can get by fine almost on English alone in most of Holland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway and bits of Germany.

You'll probably find England the easiest to deal with and it makes a good base. Ireland is lovely but at the moment the job market isn't so great. The economy's very shaky here in England too, but people are hiring for tech jobs.

Your best bet is to try and get transferred through an international company, find a UK-based company that will sponsor a visa (hard, as there's plenty of tech workers here), or come over to study on a visa that will allow you to find work here after you graduate.

There are many .Net jobs here, and not so many doing Ruby or Python. You can take a look at the job offers in http://it-jobbank.dk or http://stepstone.dk.

The living expensives are really high here.

I cant tell about work visa because I am a EU citezen, so the rules are different.

If you have any question about Denmark or Spain, just drop me a line.

1) whilst it is cheap - and rent is included in that statement - it is also big and low density. I felt that I wouldn't want to live away from the central, fashionable areas as the rest of the city feels a bit deserted. Living there probably adds 500EUR/month to your costs.

2) most of the "entrepreneurial" action seems to be in the arts. I didn't see lots of technology and/or international companies e.g. if things don't work out for you.

I have a friend from Berlin running a technoloogy company who loves it there though - and he seems to be able to hire a reasonable amount of talent. And some people don't mind the commute/quiet life as much as me.

The cost of living in Berlin is very variable. I love Kreuzberg, you have good and cheap options to dinner for ~10 euros (e.g around Görlitzer Bahnhof you have some good vietnamese and indian resturants). The rent should be around 250 - 350 E a room. In east berlin you can find cheaper pelaces to live in.

I dont know about job post, but just contact the Berlin Python User Group. I am sure they can give you some good advices about it. The mailing list dont look very acttive, but I am sure is still the best place to start (http://starship.python.net/mailman/listinfo/python-berlin)

There are many tech jobs, most companies are hiring.

As a developer you might make 35-60k EUR a year, depending on the company and your skills.

Transport is currently 72 EUR a month.

Meals are around 5 EUR for lunch, 10 EUR or above in the evening. Pizza is below 10 EUR. Beer is around 3 EUR.

Thanks for sharing your experience... It differs a lot from mine.