4 ms·

I've always been a little interested in this. How competent are EEs at general programming? This is a serious question -- the only EEs I know that program wrote

I've always been a little interested in this. How competent are EEs at general programming? This is a serious question -- the only EEs I know that program wrote some really crappy assembly code for a robotics project I helped on (don't even get me started on their C).

acgourley 17y ago
They probably say the same thing about your circuit design
- dagw 17y ago
  The difference being that circuit design isn't part of the CS curriculum and most programmers wouldn't claim to know circuit design.
  - stcredzero 17y ago
    Actually, it is covered in some courses like "NAND to Tetris." It should be covered.
  - GFischer 17y ago
    I agree that most wouldn't, but it depends. Over here (Uruguay), if you want to be an IT Engineer, you do have to learn to design circuits (and lots of other stuff like advanced calculus that the state deems required to give you a recognized "Engineer" degree). On the other hand, if you just want to code, you can study some Programming or Information Systems career and never learn advanced calculus or circuit design (I ended up with a degree in Information Systems myself, but I started the Engineering career and took a course on circuit design)
    - dagw 17y ago
      Basically the same here in Sweden, Computer Engineering and Computer Science are two different degrees, and computer engineers have to learn hardware as well as software.
ErrantX 17y ago
Depends; because EE is a wide field. I know EE's who are mainly physicists and ones who are mainly programmers, for example. On my course, generally speaking, those of us interested in digital electronics were competent programmers. Ironically most of us were better than our CS peers (but only because cs at our Uni was not a great course) Don't forget their programming will have been taunt working on pics - so programs will tend to be terse and efficient (die to memory constraints) and employ lots of "hacks" (again due to memory/compiler constraints). Luckily I learned c before these habits :-p
adityakothadiya 17y ago
I'm a EE in a day job. I design processors. I write programs in hardware descriptive languages such as Verilog and Object Oriented languages such as SystemVerilog. I write Perl, Shell scripts too. Every day, I write code. I build websites in the part-time too. I write all PHP, CSS, MySQL, Javascript on my own, and build beautiful websites like http://shopalize.com http://shopalize.com. Every night, I write code too. So trust me, we're competent.
- stcredzero 17y ago
  So trust me, we're lot competent. Ironically, this needs editing.
  - plinkplonk 17y ago
    " > So trust me, we're lot competent. Ironically, this needs editing." Agreed ( I didn't say it) but so does this "I saw some EE student C code once" (from your earlier comment) ;-)
    - stcredzero 17y ago
      Sorry, but that's a valid sentence. Thanks for displaying your, "lot competent."
      - plinkplonk 17y ago
        You say "I saw some EE student C code once" is grammatical? How about "I saw some American woman English speak once"? ;-) I wonder who is "lot competent" here! Look, it is all right to make minor mistakes in grammar, especially if you are not a native speaker (the "lot comment" guy seemed Indian). I was just pointing out your hypocrisy in using that as a marker of competence and ask for editing, when you write more ill structured sentences yourself. He who would be a Grammar Nazi should first write grammatically correct sentences. Relax and let live.
        17y ago

acgourley 17y ago

They probably say the same thing about your circuit design

dagw 17y ago
The difference being that circuit design isn't part of the CS curriculum and most programmers wouldn't claim to know circuit design.
- stcredzero 17y ago
  Actually, it is covered in some courses like "NAND to Tetris." It should be covered.
- GFischer 17y ago
  I agree that most wouldn't, but it depends. Over here (Uruguay), if you want to be an IT Engineer, you do have to learn to design circuits (and lots of other stuff like advanced calculus that the state deems required to give you a recognized "Engineer" degree). On the other hand, if you just want to code, you can study some Programming or Information Systems career and never learn advanced calculus or circuit design (I ended up with a degree in Information Systems myself, but I started the Engineering career and took a course on circuit design)
  - dagw 17y ago
    Basically the same here in Sweden, Computer Engineering and Computer Science are two different degrees, and computer engineers have to learn hardware as well as software.

ErrantX 17y ago

Depends; because EE is a wide field. I know EE's who are mainly physicists and ones who are mainly programmers, for example. On my course, generally speaking, those of us interested in digital electronics were competent programmers. Ironically most of us were better than our CS peers (but only because cs at our Uni was not a great course) Don't forget their programming will have been taunt working on pics - so programs will tend to be terse and efficient (die to memory constraints) and employ lots of "hacks" (again due to memory/compiler constraints). Luckily I learned c before these habits :-p

adityakothadiya 17y ago

I'm a EE in a day job. I design processors. I write programs in hardware descriptive languages such as Verilog and Object Oriented languages such as SystemVerilog. I write Perl, Shell scripts too. Every day, I write code. I build websites in the part-time too. I write all PHP, CSS, MySQL, Javascript on my own, and build beautiful websites like http://shopalize.com http://shopalize.com. Every night, I write code too. So trust me, we're competent.

stcredzero 17y ago
So trust me, we're lot competent. Ironically, this needs editing.
- plinkplonk 17y ago
  " > So trust me, we're lot competent. Ironically, this needs editing." Agreed ( I didn't say it) but so does this "I saw some EE student C code once" (from your earlier comment) ;-)
  - stcredzero 17y ago
    Sorry, but that's a valid sentence. Thanks for displaying your, "lot competent."
    - plinkplonk 17y ago
      You say "I saw some EE student C code once" is grammatical? How about "I saw some American woman English speak once"? ;-) I wonder who is "lot competent" here! Look, it is all right to make minor mistakes in grammar, especially if you are not a native speaker (the "lot comment" guy seemed Indian). I was just pointing out your hypocrisy in using that as a marker of competence and ask for editing, when you write more ill structured sentences yourself. He who would be a Grammar Nazi should first write grammatically correct sentences. Relax and let live.
      - 17y ago