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The discussion on stackexchange focused more on whether programmers in the east, generally speaking, are of sufficient quality. Living in China and going to a l

by kaptain 16y ago

The discussion on stackexchange focused more on whether programmers in the east, generally speaking, are of sufficient quality. Living in China and going to a local university learning chinese, I've feel that a lot of the symptoms described in the discussion are more of a result of education systems. A lot of my Chinese friends have expressed the need to get a good job, thus there is pressure for them to be in a major that 'guarantees' that: computer science/engineering is seen as desirable in that light. Having attended one of the computer science classes, I've seen two striking things: 1) Only a small percent of the people in this major are have an actual interest in the topic. The rest hope to get some administrative job in a big company and that this degree will be their ticket in. 2) There is a mechanical sense to the way projects and assignments are done. The philosophy seems to be: if I follow the steps that the teacher gave then I am able to solve this problem. There isn't an emphasis on analysis or synthesis. I attribute this to the emphasis on rote learning. These two things make it easier to see why the symptoms described in the discussion occur. In addition, I noticed that the level of education is quite behind my own college experience. They were learning things in their third-year first semester that I learned in my first-year second semester. As a side note, I don't go to one of the top tier universities; I was told that my university is a second or third tier university, so I suspect that this is the reality for most Chinese computer science students.

dualogy 16y ago
Funny I noticed both (1) AND (2) to be prevalent at all 2-4 "western" (German, British) unis I observed. And my suspicion was that (2) was a direct result of (1). Obviously these issues won't exist in UK Cambridge, MIT, Stanford. Also not in Masters degrees at most unis. But I wouldn't call it a Chinese thing at all. Happens the world over based on my anecdotal evidence.
- bugsy 16y ago
  I think it's related to the idea that people are going to college for "training". I see the word 'training', implying blue collar vocational education, used a lot nowadays for supposedly university education. Someone will train you, meaning show you the reproducible steps for operating the machinery or replacing worn brakes. So a lot of people getting these degrees (regardless of country) are expecting to be shown what to do step by step, and that no design will be involved on their own part, given specifications they mechanically translate the specifications into working code.
sriram_sun 16y ago
I attended Texas Tech as a grad student who had to take a number of undergrad courses. Except for a few really good undergrads, almost everything you said about the Chinese students is true of students in the US. Tech could probably be classified as a 3rd or 2nd tier university here. Unfortunately, to be a manager, you have to find a job first.
- Stormbringer 16y ago
  The problem is likely due to the gulf between good programmers and normal programmers being so substantial. All the normal programmers end up as below average due to the minority at the other end of the curve. Hence a normal indian programmer is going to be below average. And a normal chinese programmer is going to be below the average. But a normal western programmer is also going to be below the average. I've worked with some really bad western programmers. And I read excerpts from western programmer blogs that make me cringe (e.g. the "real men don't catch exceptions or check for nulls" crowd). The absolute 100% head and shoulders worst two programmers I ever worked with: The westerner: a consultant from Thoughtworks who deliberately broke core parts of our project, some call it sabotage, others would call it billable hours. The offshore indian: a completely useless twat who did no work whatsoever but just made excuses. You'd talk to him and get problem A sorted out and then repeat for problems B through H... and then the next problem would be problem A again. It was like it was a roundabout, the same 'reasons' why he couldn't get any work done just kept coming around and around and around again. Overall, I would take the indian I guess, at least he can be safely ignored.
nick_dm 16y ago
I've heard that even at top universities in China there are trends among the subjects that don't really exist at the likes of Cambridge, MIT and Stanford. For example it might be that CS is currently more popular than maths/ physics/engineering, as a result all most top students (including high scorers in the math or physics olympiads) will apply for CS at university regardless of their interest in the subject. Those with the very best performance on the entrance exams will be accepted for CS at Peking and Tsinghau, the next tier of students would have a choice between math/physics/eng. there or CS at a 2nd tier university, and other students between math/physics/eng. at a 2nd tier university or CS at a 3rd tier university. On top of that the popular subjects will shift with time, so not only is it hard to judge a student's motivation but you might think that on paper someone is a good student because they were accepted for CS, but perhaps at that time CS was picking up students rejected from engineering.
Stormbringer 16y ago
After working for a while as a programmer, I went back to uni to do some post-grad work (while still holding down a full time programmers job). I noticed a couple of things: Doing the assignments was really easy. My reactions were something like "omg, they wrote a complete and proper spec!" - but it wasn't that. When I reflected upon it, I realised that the spec was very short, but they had removed all ambiguity from it, which made the assignments ridiculously easy compared to real life work. Secondly although I swore I wouldn't do this, I turned into one of the 'mature students' (read as: grumpy-old-men types) who laugh at students whenever they complain about their workload.

by kaptain 16y ago

dualogy 16y ago

Funny I noticed both (1) AND (2) to be prevalent at all 2-4 "western" (German, British) unis I observed. And my suspicion was that (2) was a direct result of (1). Obviously these issues won't exist in UK Cambridge, MIT, Stanford. Also not in Masters degrees at most unis. But I wouldn't call it a Chinese thing at all. Happens the world over based on my anecdotal evidence.

bugsy 16y ago
I think it's related to the idea that people are going to college for "training". I see the word 'training', implying blue collar vocational education, used a lot nowadays for supposedly university education. Someone will train you, meaning show you the reproducible steps for operating the machinery or replacing worn brakes. So a lot of people getting these degrees (regardless of country) are expecting to be shown what to do step by step, and that no design will be involved on their own part, given specifications they mechanically translate the specifications into working code.

sriram_sun 16y ago

I attended Texas Tech as a grad student who had to take a number of undergrad courses. Except for a few really good undergrads, almost everything you said about the Chinese students is true of students in the US. Tech could probably be classified as a 3rd or 2nd tier university here. Unfortunately, to be a manager, you have to find a job first.

Stormbringer 16y ago
The problem is likely due to the gulf between good programmers and normal programmers being so substantial. All the normal programmers end up as below average due to the minority at the other end of the curve. Hence a normal indian programmer is going to be below average. And a normal chinese programmer is going to be below the average. But a normal western programmer is also going to be below the average. I've worked with some really bad western programmers. And I read excerpts from western programmer blogs that make me cringe (e.g. the "real men don't catch exceptions or check for nulls" crowd). The absolute 100% head and shoulders worst two programmers I ever worked with: The westerner: a consultant from Thoughtworks who deliberately broke core parts of our project, some call it sabotage, others would call it billable hours. The offshore indian: a completely useless twat who did no work whatsoever but just made excuses. You'd talk to him and get problem A sorted out and then repeat for problems B through H... and then the next problem would be problem A again. It was like it was a roundabout, the same 'reasons' why he couldn't get any work done just kept coming around and around and around again. Overall, I would take the indian I guess, at least he can be safely ignored.

nick_dm 16y ago

I've heard that even at top universities in China there are trends among the subjects that don't really exist at the likes of Cambridge, MIT and Stanford. For example it might be that CS is currently more popular than maths/ physics/engineering, as a result all most top students (including high scorers in the math or physics olympiads) will apply for CS at university regardless of their interest in the subject. Those with the very best performance on the entrance exams will be accepted for CS at Peking and Tsinghau, the next tier of students would have a choice between math/physics/eng. there or CS at a 2nd tier university, and other students between math/physics/eng. at a 2nd tier university or CS at a 3rd tier university. On top of that the popular subjects will shift with time, so not only is it hard to judge a student's motivation but you might think that on paper someone is a good student because they were accepted for CS, but perhaps at that time CS was picking up students rejected from engineering.

Stormbringer 16y ago

After working for a while as a programmer, I went back to uni to do some post-grad work (while still holding down a full time programmers job). I noticed a couple of things: Doing the assignments was really easy. My reactions were something like "omg, they wrote a complete and proper spec!" - but it wasn't that. When I reflected upon it, I realised that the spec was very short, but they had removed all ambiguity from it, which made the assignments ridiculously easy compared to real life work. Secondly although I swore I wouldn't do this, I turned into one of the 'mature students' (read as: grumpy-old-men types) who laugh at students whenever they complain about their workload.