It really depends on what you're working on. One thing that I've figured out is that you don't learn software engineering in college at all. Even if you took

It really depends on what you're working on. One thing that I've figured out is that you don't learn software engineering in college at all. Even if you took a bunch of courses in it. However, a knowledge of algorithms can be invaluable. I've been out of college for six years and I can remember using at least: - String search algorithms - B-Trees, Tries - A handful of graph algorithms Other times stuff that I learned in college put me in quick striking distance for stuff that would be more work to understand without a CS background: - Open key cryptography - Word stemming algorithms, text coding - Writing a query optimizer - Digital signal processing You can always find cool stuff to hack on without drifting into that territory, but if you actually dig CS-nerdiness, and are good at it, you'll sometimes get some of the more fun problems thrown in your direction.