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Re: Software and engineering

When this topic first came up, I gave it a lot of thought and I have concluded that so called Software Engineering is not true engineering. Here's why. First of all, engineers have to deal with the real world, whether on a macro or micro level. Computer programming is a pure abstraction like mathematics. It is often ancillary to engineering but it is not engineering itself any more than pure mathematics is. It isn't even "engineering lite" the way industrial engineering is. There are real areas which are not always thought of as engineering per se but which are true engineering such as biomolecular engineering and nano technology but software engineering is not in that class because it doesn't deal directly with the real world. Engineers may use programming or even hire so called software engineers to help them but the software development itself is not engineering. It is also NOT mathematics. It takes a great deal of time and effort for people who have a special "bent" to learn engineering or mathematics which is why there are relatively few engineers and even fewer mathematicians but loads of computer programmers some of whom are called "software engineers." Some software engineers may take rudimentary or initial courses in some engineering studies such as physics or calculus but some software engineers don't as was pointed out by one contributor who said that there are two year community colleges which offer software engineering programs. But even for those who get a smattering of it, it's hardly the same thing.

About the closest programmers come to engineering is the mathematical modeling of the real world which software can emulate. They translate mathematical models into computer instructions but they don't develop the models themselves. For example a Programmable Logic Controller is an industrial computer which controls real world processes such as running machinery, even entire buildings but the interface to the real world and sometimes the programming is done by trained electrical and mechanical engineers. Software engineers may assist them with the programming but left to their own devices to impliment a project which requires a PLC, they are out of their depth having neither the training nor experience to handle it. Likewise, may DSP circuits may use what was called "hard wired logic" on one coast and "firmware" on the other which is to say no software set or it may use programmable software. The programming in firmware was built into the electrical circuit itself, often using boolean algebra, not computer programming. Real Engineers can work for Software engineers as well. In the development of a new CPU computer chip, the software engineer will define the logic requirements of the chip, it's up to electrical engineers and materials engineers to devise the circuit and translate it into a physical reality.

Sorry again E-Stat, still no cigar.

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