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Software Engineering is a Joke

23 points by alex_c 19y ago

caudicus 19y ago
Erm, people label it as an engineering discipline because it uses some of the same principles of system design, use of modules and reuse that other engineering disciplines share... Engineers solve problems. Understanding physics is a means to solving some problems. That's it. "The application of scientific and mathematical principles to practical ends such as the design, manufacture, and operation of efficient and economical structures, machines, processes, and systems." http://www.thefreedictionary.com/engineering http://www.thefreedictionary.com/engineering
cdr 19y ago
Wow, this is ignorant. There's no substance to this argument. Software and the process of building software can't be measured because it's not physical? "The confusion of software engineering probably comes from the fact that programmers often have the same intelligence as engineers, and most of the time share the same interests."? One of the few things I dislike about news.yc is that something like this, an hour old with 3 points and one comment can make it to #8 on the front page. Programming.reddit actually seems more discerning.
manvsmachine 19y ago
Please, do yourselves a favor and read this instead: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=130757 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=130757
aarontait 19y ago
I agree with his point. The development of software is not an engineering discipline because there is a literal and metaphorical art to it. Software creators need to take quantitative aspects of engineering, and incorporate qualitative aspects such as design and aesthetics into the final product. There are no real metrics for measuring some aspects of software creation. Software creation can be viewed as an art.
- RyanGWU82 19y ago
  There's art, design and aesthetics in many other types of engineering. Ever seen a beautiful bridge? Obligatory beautiful bridge link: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2006/12/15.html http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2006/12/15.html
  - deleted 19y ago
    [deleted]
- tim2 19y ago
  Well then electrical engineering and even some projects in mechanical engineering are not engineering either.... In nearly all forms of engineering, it can be far to tell exactly how close to completion you are. And there are no qualitative aspects of other forms of engineering?
pius 19y ago
Spoken like a true ignoramus. If I were the author, I'd start off by learning what engineering is before I pontificating about it. Truly, one of the lamest things I've read all year.
- kradic 19y ago
  Can you give an example of something specific he says that you disagree with?
  - pius 19y ago
    Heh, upon review of what I said, it probably came off as too harsh. I was so terse because I didn't feel like writing a long polemic at the time I made the comment. :) Now that I have a minute, here are some of the points I disagreed with in the essay. "Unfortunately . . . software development and engineering are, even at the most fundamental parts, completely different. Engineering is the practice to develop something touchable, something that obeys the laws of physics." That premise is flawed and leads to misguided conclusions. Engineering is the application of technical knowledge to solve problems. There are tons of ways to say this, depending on who defines it, but no reasonable definition prima facie excludes software from being an engineering discipline. This implies that the product produced can be evaluated with the laws of physics. You can make all kinds of statistics, strength calculations, etc on the product. . . . . Software on the other hand, doesn't obey the laws of physics, by the simple reason because it can't be touched. Sure, it has physical parts, but those physical parts are not that important. Let's forget for a second that all software can be specified in hardware. There are still important "physical parts," constraints, and metrics applicable to the design of software. For instance, one would be hard pressed to argue that physical constraints of RAM and processor speed are completely irrelevant to software. In addition, much of software engineering actually turns out to be how to optimize output of teams with finite amounts of man-hours available. This is non-trivial and subject to a wealth of metrics, experimentation, and methodologies. But let's go even further and put all of that aside. The argument still doesn't hold up. Even if software could not be touched, it could still can be engineered. Disciplines like process engineering and human factors engineering are examples of rigorous practices applied to seemingly abstract implementations. Useful software engineering principles such as modularity, coupling, cohesion, reuse, interfaces, specifications all come directly from other "traditional" engineering practices and have been shown to improve the quality and speed of software development. Look, I appreciate the art of software development; that's part of what I love about it! And there's certainly a point to be made about focusing too much on process over creativity at the wrong stages. But that point wasn't made. The article seemed to suggest that we just throw up our hands and give up trying to do anything rigorous with the products we design because it's all an illusion anyway. I think we can do better than that. We need to do better than that.
tokipin 19y ago
he's not saying software engineering is a joke. he's saying the phrase "software engineering" is a joke in that programming is much more fluid than mechanics that doesn't stop people from trying to engineerize software development, for worser or worse
- tim2 19y ago
  The problem with his argument is that other forms of engineering are not necessarily "engineerized" any more than with software.
dewitters 19y ago
Hi there, I'm the author of that article :). It always seems to provoke a lot of discussion, and most people that react on it always seem to disagree with my point of view ;). Unfortunately my main thought always seems to get lost. Maybe I should try to make it more clear in the article. In my opinion the core focus of software development, and therefore also the most difficult part, is to create an image of the real world (both in source code and the program). An engineer's main focus is completely different.
- Husafan 19y ago
  Would you agree that chip design, via a EE degree, is in fact an engineering discipline? It uses metrics, tolerances, correctness, etc, just like a civil engineer has when building a bridge. Software is simply a layer of abstraction on top of this. For instance, when the USAF wants software for the F-22, you better believe there are requirements and processes just as stringent as Intel's process for designing/developing a CPU. And the people producing that code, imho, are every bit as much engineers as the EE's.
  - dewitters 19y ago
    Indeed, I even agree that the people that write software for the F-22 are engineers, and better use engineering practices to build their software. The requirements are probably pretty strict/well defined. But there is plenty of software out there (maybe most software) like ERP/CRM, desktop/web applications, games, etc ... , where the technical parts are not that important, or aren't really the main problem. The main problem is to try to create the most clear representations of real life items (customers, business processes, human resources, etc.), and make them clear to other programmers in the source code, and to the customers (who most of the time aren't technical). It's probably true that my theory doesn't make much sense for lower level/close to the hardware software development. But for high level things I still think I'm absolutely right ;).
    - Husafan 19y ago
      Point taken. :) Let me ever so humbly posit, however, that this is the exact attitude that separates software developers from software engineers. If you want to develop software without strict practices, that's just dandy, and you don't have to refer to yourself as a software engineer. It does not follow that software engineering is a joke: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=132640 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=132640. On the other hand, if you do want to be a software engineer, these practices can be applied to all projects, no matter how small or high-level. I think this may be what your professor was trying to say.
deleted 19y ago
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mynameishere 19y ago
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3674140982294628000 http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3674140982294628000 "First of all it's not a science. It might be engineering or it might be art. ...has a lot in common with magic." So, who knows what it is exactly.

23 points by alex_c 19y ago

Erm, people label it as an engineering discipline because it uses some of the same principles of system design, use of modules and reuse that other engineering disciplines share... Engineers solve problems. Understanding physics is a means to solving some problems. That's it. "The application of scientific and mathematical principles to practical ends such as the design, manufacture, and operation of efficient and economical structures, machines, processes, and systems." http://www.thefreedictionary.com/engineering http://www.thefreedictionary.com/engineering

cdr 19y ago

Wow, this is ignorant. There's no substance to this argument. Software and the process of building software can't be measured because it's not physical? "The confusion of software engineering probably comes from the fact that programmers often have the same intelligence as engineers, and most of the time share the same interests."? One of the few things I dislike about news.yc is that something like this, an hour old with 3 points and one comment can make it to #8 on the front page. Programming.reddit actually seems more discerning.

manvsmachine 19y ago

Please, do yourselves a favor and read this instead: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=130757 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=130757

aarontait 19y ago

I agree with his point. The development of software is not an engineering discipline because there is a literal and metaphorical art to it. Software creators need to take quantitative aspects of engineering, and incorporate qualitative aspects such as design and aesthetics into the final product. There are no real metrics for measuring some aspects of software creation. Software creation can be viewed as an art.

RyanGWU82 19y ago
There's art, design and aesthetics in many other types of engineering. Ever seen a beautiful bridge? Obligatory beautiful bridge link: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2006/12/15.html http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2006/12/15.html
- deleted 19y ago
  [deleted]
tim2 19y ago
Well then electrical engineering and even some projects in mechanical engineering are not engineering either.... In nearly all forms of engineering, it can be far to tell exactly how close to completion you are. And there are no qualitative aspects of other forms of engineering?

pius 19y ago

Spoken like a true ignoramus. If I were the author, I'd start off by learning what engineering is before I pontificating about it. Truly, one of the lamest things I've read all year.

kradic 19y ago
Can you give an example of something specific he says that you disagree with?
- pius 19y ago
  Heh, upon review of what I said, it probably came off as too harsh. I was so terse because I didn't feel like writing a long polemic at the time I made the comment. :) Now that I have a minute, here are some of the points I disagreed with in the essay. "Unfortunately . . . software development and engineering are, even at the most fundamental parts, completely different. Engineering is the practice to develop something touchable, something that obeys the laws of physics." That premise is flawed and leads to misguided conclusions. Engineering is the application of technical knowledge to solve problems. There are tons of ways to say this, depending on who defines it, but no reasonable definition prima facie excludes software from being an engineering discipline. This implies that the product produced can be evaluated with the laws of physics. You can make all kinds of statistics, strength calculations, etc on the product. . . . . Software on the other hand, doesn't obey the laws of physics, by the simple reason because it can't be touched. Sure, it has physical parts, but those physical parts are not that important. Let's forget for a second that all software can be specified in hardware. There are still important "physical parts," constraints, and metrics applicable to the design of software. For instance, one would be hard pressed to argue that physical constraints of RAM and processor speed are completely irrelevant to software. In addition, much of software engineering actually turns out to be how to optimize output of teams with finite amounts of man-hours available. This is non-trivial and subject to a wealth of metrics, experimentation, and methodologies. But let's go even further and put all of that aside. The argument still doesn't hold up. Even if software could not be touched, it could still can be engineered. Disciplines like process engineering and human factors engineering are examples of rigorous practices applied to seemingly abstract implementations. Useful software engineering principles such as modularity, coupling, cohesion, reuse, interfaces, specifications all come directly from other "traditional" engineering practices and have been shown to improve the quality and speed of software development. Look, I appreciate the art of software development; that's part of what I love about it! And there's certainly a point to be made about focusing too much on process over creativity at the wrong stages. But that point wasn't made. The article seemed to suggest that we just throw up our hands and give up trying to do anything rigorous with the products we design because it's all an illusion anyway. I think we can do better than that. We need to do better than that.

tokipin 19y ago

he's not saying software engineering is a joke. he's saying the phrase "software engineering" is a joke in that programming is much more fluid than mechanics that doesn't stop people from trying to engineerize software development, for worser or worse

tim2 19y ago
The problem with his argument is that other forms of engineering are not necessarily "engineerized" any more than with software.

dewitters 19y ago

Hi there, I'm the author of that article :). It always seems to provoke a lot of discussion, and most people that react on it always seem to disagree with my point of view ;). Unfortunately my main thought always seems to get lost. Maybe I should try to make it more clear in the article. In my opinion the core focus of software development, and therefore also the most difficult part, is to create an image of the real world (both in source code and the program). An engineer's main focus is completely different.

Husafan 19y ago
Would you agree that chip design, via a EE degree, is in fact an engineering discipline? It uses metrics, tolerances, correctness, etc, just like a civil engineer has when building a bridge. Software is simply a layer of abstraction on top of this. For instance, when the USAF wants software for the F-22, you better believe there are requirements and processes just as stringent as Intel's process for designing/developing a CPU. And the people producing that code, imho, are every bit as much engineers as the EE's.
- dewitters 19y ago
  Indeed, I even agree that the people that write software for the F-22 are engineers, and better use engineering practices to build their software. The requirements are probably pretty strict/well defined. But there is plenty of software out there (maybe most software) like ERP/CRM, desktop/web applications, games, etc ... , where the technical parts are not that important, or aren't really the main problem. The main problem is to try to create the most clear representations of real life items (customers, business processes, human resources, etc.), and make them clear to other programmers in the source code, and to the customers (who most of the time aren't technical). It's probably true that my theory doesn't make much sense for lower level/close to the hardware software development. But for high level things I still think I'm absolutely right ;).
  - Husafan 19y ago
    Point taken. :) Let me ever so humbly posit, however, that this is the exact attitude that separates software developers from software engineers. If you want to develop software without strict practices, that's just dandy, and you don't have to refer to yourself as a software engineer. It does not follow that software engineering is a joke: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=132640 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=132640. On the other hand, if you do want to be a software engineer, these practices can be applied to all projects, no matter how small or high-level. I think this may be what your professor was trying to say.

deleted 19y ago

[deleted]

mynameishere 19y ago

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3674140982294628000 http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3674140982294628000 "First of all it's not a science. It might be engineering or it might be art. ...has a lot in common with magic." So, who knows what it is exactly.