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I think the issue is employers are looking for web/mobile/whatever developers with heavy emphasis on building quality code and the latest trends. CS at univers

by UK-AL 11y ago

I think the issue is employers are looking for web/mobile/whatever developers with heavy emphasis on building quality code and the latest trends. CS at university does not teach that.

arethuza 11y ago
"CS at university does not teach that." Personally, I don't think that CS courses should be even trying teach that kind of stuff. CS courses should be about fundamentals not craft or process. [NB Craft and process are obviously more important that fundamentals for at least 95% of development roles - which is why I hate CS courses being regarded as "learn to develop" courses].
- wfn 11y ago
  ...and that's why I think it's a good thing that some universities have separate CS and software engineering diplomas/tracks..
- jon-wood 11y ago
  There should be far more focus on software apprenticeships, which is why I welcome the flurry of development bootcamps that have been springing up over the last couple of years. The best of them know that they're only really getting people to a minimum level, and work hard to place their graduates with companies that are able to commit to spending a year or two continuing to train them, rather than just throwing people with 12 weeks development experience in at the deep end.
  - spacecowboy_lon 11y ago
    Apprenticeships <> Bootcamps And for a "professional" Job its debatable if using such a low status term is a good idea - in the UK Apprenticeships are seen as blue collar low status jobs at best. Ask most people in the UK about Apprentices and they will think of the lusers on that ghastly TV Show. Oh And I say this having followed the vocational track into IT
    - jon-wood 11y ago
      I see bootcamps as one of the few viable options to get a previously inexperienced person into a position where they're able to take on a software apprenticeship. I may be grossly simplifying things, but it feels to me like a trade such as plumbing or gas fitting can be picked up on the job. Software development requires a pretty extensive grounding in the basics just to know what you're looking at when someone shows you new techniques - to stretch my already tenuous metaphor even further, most people at least know how to remove a spanner from a toolbox and which end to hold it. I'm not sure the same can be said of opening a terminal. As for the discrimination against apprenticeships as being a lesser thing than the default route of school -> college -> university, that's a wider issue that needs addressing, and I don't think its going to be helped by inventing some new name for the same thing, especially in the software industry. I also took the vocational route in, and I don't think its ever put me at a disadvantage (if anything it means I have three years more professional experience than my peers). Most of the software developers I know studied unrelated subjects at university anyway.
      - spacecowboy_lon 11y ago
        The name for the associate professional step between Apprentice and Degree level engineers is Technician and has been for the last 50+ years.
- stan_rogers 11y ago
  unfortunate word choice, I think, since process is sort of the point of the whole affair. Not in the sense you meant it there, of course, but in the more general sense of formalizing "how to", from developing adequate descriptions of what - data structures and so forth - to finding the best ways of getting from point a to point b (or finding out that there isn't one and looking for a good-enough good-enough). It's almost a shame that computer and electronic computer are nearly synonymous now; it leads to the idea that CS is somehow a science about these electronic computing machines rather than about computing itself. While it's true that advances in CS have implications for the machines and the way we use them, that's almost incidental to the task of finding the best ways to describe, express and carry out a process. And if it turns out that a (seemingly) ridiculous amount of time is spent at the beginning demonstrating that adding in a place system is usually better than counting, and multiplying is better than adding the same number a whole bunch of times, well, if all you've gotten from that is that typing "*" saves you a few keystrokes, then you've missed the point.
pjmlp 11y ago
Mine did, then again Portuguese universities aren't pure CS, rather "Informatics Engineering" and teach a bit of everything.

by UK-AL 11y ago

I think the issue is employers are looking for web/mobile/whatever developers with heavy emphasis on building quality code and the latest trends. CS at university does not teach that.

arethuza 11y ago

"CS at university does not teach that." Personally, I don't think that CS courses should be even trying teach that kind of stuff. CS courses should be about fundamentals not craft or process. [NB Craft and process are obviously more important that fundamentals for at least 95% of development roles - which is why I hate CS courses being regarded as "learn to develop" courses].

wfn 11y ago
...and that's why I think it's a good thing that some universities have separate CS and software engineering diplomas/tracks..
jon-wood 11y ago
There should be far more focus on software apprenticeships, which is why I welcome the flurry of development bootcamps that have been springing up over the last couple of years. The best of them know that they're only really getting people to a minimum level, and work hard to place their graduates with companies that are able to commit to spending a year or two continuing to train them, rather than just throwing people with 12 weeks development experience in at the deep end.
- spacecowboy_lon 11y ago
  Apprenticeships <> Bootcamps And for a "professional" Job its debatable if using such a low status term is a good idea - in the UK Apprenticeships are seen as blue collar low status jobs at best. Ask most people in the UK about Apprentices and they will think of the lusers on that ghastly TV Show. Oh And I say this having followed the vocational track into IT
  - jon-wood 11y ago
    I see bootcamps as one of the few viable options to get a previously inexperienced person into a position where they're able to take on a software apprenticeship. I may be grossly simplifying things, but it feels to me like a trade such as plumbing or gas fitting can be picked up on the job. Software development requires a pretty extensive grounding in the basics just to know what you're looking at when someone shows you new techniques - to stretch my already tenuous metaphor even further, most people at least know how to remove a spanner from a toolbox and which end to hold it. I'm not sure the same can be said of opening a terminal. As for the discrimination against apprenticeships as being a lesser thing than the default route of school -> college -> university, that's a wider issue that needs addressing, and I don't think its going to be helped by inventing some new name for the same thing, especially in the software industry. I also took the vocational route in, and I don't think its ever put me at a disadvantage (if anything it means I have three years more professional experience than my peers). Most of the software developers I know studied unrelated subjects at university anyway.
    - spacecowboy_lon 11y ago
      The name for the associate professional step between Apprentice and Degree level engineers is Technician and has been for the last 50+ years.
stan_rogers 11y ago
unfortunate word choice, I think, since process is sort of the point of the whole affair. Not in the sense you meant it there, of course, but in the more general sense of formalizing "how to", from developing adequate descriptions of what - data structures and so forth - to finding the best ways of getting from point a to point b (or finding out that there isn't one and looking for a good-enough good-enough). It's almost a shame that computer and electronic computer are nearly synonymous now; it leads to the idea that CS is somehow a science about these electronic computing machines rather than about computing itself. While it's true that advances in CS have implications for the machines and the way we use them, that's almost incidental to the task of finding the best ways to describe, express and carry out a process. And if it turns out that a (seemingly) ridiculous amount of time is spent at the beginning demonstrating that adding in a place system is usually better than counting, and multiplying is better than adding the same number a whole bunch of times, well, if all you've gotten from that is that typing "*" saves you a few keystrokes, then you've missed the point.

pjmlp 11y ago

Mine did, then again Portuguese universities aren't pure CS, rather "Informatics Engineering" and teach a bit of everything.