IT pilot fish is facing layoffs at the defense contractor where he works, but at least he feels better about one thing: His job didn't require a security clearance.

"Those folks were limited in what they could put on their resumes," says fish. "They weren't even allowed to list normal commercial software packages that they used in a cleared program.

"For instance, they couldn't list that they had used C with the Oracle RDBMS, or list SQL or the Pro*C Oracle precompiler. That would make it much harder to find a job -- their resume wouldn't get past the keyword searchers in HR.

"The security folks explained that enemy spies could combine that information to gain insight into individual programs.

"Fortunately, before the layoff notice period expired, the company was able to get a waiver. Those folks would be allowed to list off-the-shelf software they used. There was much rejoicing in those areas."

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