4 ms·

"Principal engineer"? Do you actually have an engineering degree? Have you formal education in engineering? What is system engineering? It's not just you; the

"Principal engineer"? Do you actually have an engineering degree? Have you formal education in engineering? What is system engineering? It's not just you; the entire IT industry is suffering from systemic curriculum vitae bloat. That's why the working conditions are so bad in the professional sense.

pjmlp 8y ago
I do, in my home country it is not legal to sign off projects as engineer if not certified by the Engineering Order as such. A certain level of quality is expected, not labeling one selfs as engineers after 1 month bootcamp.
- mcv 8y ago
  I have no idea if there are rules in my country about calling yourself an "engineer", but you can only use the title 'ir' or 'ing', both of which mean ingenieur, which translates to engineer, if you've graduated from a technical university or high-level technical school (technical college? higher trade school? 'ing' is from a level lower than a university degree).
floss_fulltimer 8y ago
> Have you formal education in engineering? Good point. In many countries getting a degree in engineering takes way, way more effort than in computer science. Then it takes 10-15 years of work to be called "senior engineer".
- C1sc0cat 8y ago
  And from family experience (uk) its more a case of who you know not what you know.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
vehementi 8y ago
That's why? So if we merely fixed job titles we wouldn't have this problem of fraudsters?
- Annatar 8y ago
  It would be a good first step measure. There is lots to clean up in the IT industry.
wyclif 8y ago
The subject of what constitutes an engineer or what entitles a professional to the "engineer" title has been discussed ad nauseum here on HN. Spoiler: "engineer" as a title for someone who does computer programming and software development without a license is perfectly fine and acceptable in the USA. In Canada, however, it's probably not.
- Annatar 8y ago
  Lying on one's resume isn't acceptable anywhere, as programmers are not engineers. It's lying and resume inflation for the explicit purpose of making oneself sound more competent than one really is. If one comes to me for a job interview stating on one's curriculum vitae that she or he is a software engineer, the first thing I will demand to see is a portfolio of specifications, manuals, process flows and architecture design documents before going on to look at how they codified those, and one can bet that for 99.99% of the candidates the interview will have finished at that point 99% of the time.
  - Pyxl101 8y ago
    On what basis are you claiming software engineers are not engineers? What constitutes being an "engineer"? For the record, the National Counsel of Examiners for Engineering and Surveying, which is the US body that regulates engineering licensure and "Professional Engineering", recognizes Software Engineering as a branch of the engineering disciplines: https://ncees.org/engineering/pe/software/ https://ncees.org/engineering/pe/software/ "Professional (Licensed) Engineer" is not typically used in software development, but if you care about having this credential, you can become a credentialed Professional Engineer in Software Engineering. Google defines engineering as "the branch of science and technology concerned with the design, building, and use of engines, machines, and structures". An engineer is "a person who designs, builds, or maintains engines, machines, or public works". Software engineers certainly fit that definition from my perspective, because software is a type of virtual or abstract machine. Software engineering certainly qualitatively feels like other branches of engineering to practice, such as electrical engineering or computer (hardware) engineering. I've never designed a structure, but I imagine the principles are the same: understand the requirements of the customer or sponsor; devise a design that accomplishes those goals within the constraints of the medium you're working with, using principles of scientific reasoning to evaluate what is possible and whether a design will meet your needs. Last but not least, software can be just as critical to human life and safety as the artifacts designed in other kinds of engineering. (But being critical to health or safety is not a prerequisite for something to be engineering. It's still engineering if you're building a rocket that only robots will fly on, after all) There may be people whose work on computers does not constitute software engineering. Running some calculations in Excel is probably not engineering. But I think there are plenty of us who build large scale systems that need to operate with high availability under demanding requirements, the properties of which need to be painstakingly planned and analyzed and sometimes mathematically proven -- we who are trained as scientists and engineers, and who apply these principles in our work -- many of us consider our work to be engineering, and consider ourselves engineers. I certainly do.
trsfgbb 8y ago
> "Look at who you're replying to." > "Principal engineer" "Look at who you're replying to." meant "tptacek" or "tyre"? Or both - a general advice?
C1sc0cat 8y ago
Hate to break it to you I worked for a well known civil engineering consultancy and some of our pitch's where economical with the actuality about our engineers experience :-)
vonmoltke 8y ago
> What is system engineering? https://www.incose.org/systems-engineering https://www.incose.org/systems-engineering
- Annatar 8y ago
  I know what it is as I am an actual system engineer; the question was for our self-proclaimed "principal engineer" to see if he has a clue.

pjmlp 8y ago

I do, in my home country it is not legal to sign off projects as engineer if not certified by the Engineering Order as such. A certain level of quality is expected, not labeling one selfs as engineers after 1 month bootcamp.

mcv 8y ago
I have no idea if there are rules in my country about calling yourself an "engineer", but you can only use the title 'ir' or 'ing', both of which mean ingenieur, which translates to engineer, if you've graduated from a technical university or high-level technical school (technical college? higher trade school? 'ing' is from a level lower than a university degree).

floss_fulltimer 8y ago

> Have you formal education in engineering? Good point. In many countries getting a degree in engineering takes way, way more effort than in computer science. Then it takes 10-15 years of work to be called "senior engineer".

C1sc0cat 8y ago
And from family experience (uk) its more a case of who you know not what you know.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

vehementi 8y ago

That's why? So if we merely fixed job titles we wouldn't have this problem of fraudsters?

Annatar 8y ago
It would be a good first step measure. There is lots to clean up in the IT industry.

wyclif 8y ago

The subject of what constitutes an engineer or what entitles a professional to the "engineer" title has been discussed ad nauseum here on HN. Spoiler: "engineer" as a title for someone who does computer programming and software development without a license is perfectly fine and acceptable in the USA. In Canada, however, it's probably not.

Annatar 8y ago
Lying on one's resume isn't acceptable anywhere, as programmers are not engineers. It's lying and resume inflation for the explicit purpose of making oneself sound more competent than one really is. If one comes to me for a job interview stating on one's curriculum vitae that she or he is a software engineer, the first thing I will demand to see is a portfolio of specifications, manuals, process flows and architecture design documents before going on to look at how they codified those, and one can bet that for 99.99% of the candidates the interview will have finished at that point 99% of the time.
- Pyxl101 8y ago
  On what basis are you claiming software engineers are not engineers? What constitutes being an "engineer"? For the record, the National Counsel of Examiners for Engineering and Surveying, which is the US body that regulates engineering licensure and "Professional Engineering", recognizes Software Engineering as a branch of the engineering disciplines: https://ncees.org/engineering/pe/software/ https://ncees.org/engineering/pe/software/ "Professional (Licensed) Engineer" is not typically used in software development, but if you care about having this credential, you can become a credentialed Professional Engineer in Software Engineering. Google defines engineering as "the branch of science and technology concerned with the design, building, and use of engines, machines, and structures". An engineer is "a person who designs, builds, or maintains engines, machines, or public works". Software engineers certainly fit that definition from my perspective, because software is a type of virtual or abstract machine. Software engineering certainly qualitatively feels like other branches of engineering to practice, such as electrical engineering or computer (hardware) engineering. I've never designed a structure, but I imagine the principles are the same: understand the requirements of the customer or sponsor; devise a design that accomplishes those goals within the constraints of the medium you're working with, using principles of scientific reasoning to evaluate what is possible and whether a design will meet your needs. Last but not least, software can be just as critical to human life and safety as the artifacts designed in other kinds of engineering. (But being critical to health or safety is not a prerequisite for something to be engineering. It's still engineering if you're building a rocket that only robots will fly on, after all) There may be people whose work on computers does not constitute software engineering. Running some calculations in Excel is probably not engineering. But I think there are plenty of us who build large scale systems that need to operate with high availability under demanding requirements, the properties of which need to be painstakingly planned and analyzed and sometimes mathematically proven -- we who are trained as scientists and engineers, and who apply these principles in our work -- many of us consider our work to be engineering, and consider ourselves engineers. I certainly do.

trsfgbb 8y ago

> "Look at who you're replying to." > "Principal engineer" "Look at who you're replying to." meant "tptacek" or "tyre"? Or both - a general advice?

C1sc0cat 8y ago

Hate to break it to you I worked for a well known civil engineering consultancy and some of our pitch's where economical with the actuality about our engineers experience :-)

vonmoltke 8y ago

> What is system engineering? https://www.incose.org/systems-engineering https://www.incose.org/systems-engineering

Annatar 8y ago
I know what it is as I am an actual system engineer; the question was for our self-proclaimed "principal engineer" to see if he has a clue.