...In the future I am planning to work in the financial sector as a programmer. I have a couple of options right now (1 or 2):

1. Learn and master .NET since presumably that's widely used in that industry OR
2. Learn the programming concepts, learn algorithms, learn a little bit of c,c++,c#,java,objective-c,sql,oracle,cobol - in other words learn the fundamental principles that tie all programming languages together without going too deep in any particular language.

Someone has told me that most of the time as a programmer you won't be writing any code, but instead maintaing and existing code that people before you have built. Does that mean I don't really need to master any specific language and as long as I have general concepts it'll be good enough?

If you or if you know someone who has worked in the financial industry as a software developer could you please share the experience and what is the daily routine consists of? Also what should I be learning right now while I am still young and in college? Do I have to thoroughly understand the market and the current economy? What about Oracle or SQL Databases - do I need to know them inside out as a programmer? Thanks if you have anything else to add that I have not mentioned then please do so!

Thanks in advance!