4 ms·

If all you do is board-level integration of relatively low-speed stuff, then yes, SWE is more demanding. But that's not even the tip of the iceberg in the EE w

If all you do is board-level integration of relatively low-speed stuff, then yes, SWE is more demanding. But that's not even the tip of the iceberg in the EE world. To name a few: high speed digital (Gbps+), ASIC (digital vs. mixed signal, RTL vs. physical design, ...), RF, precision analog, both very low and very high power, photonics, EMI... Each of these subjects require deep, arcane domain knowledge on top of physics, AND lots of grinding + experience + tacit knowledge + know-how, much more than SWE. Source: Electronics/Embedded hobbyist with an SWE day job.

spoiler 4y ago
The stuff about needing to know a lot more physics or arcane domain specific stuff isn't so true. If you talk to someone who's got pink sunglasses about SWE, they'll say a bunch of stuff in our industry is "arcane domain specific knowledge" to them. You're probably romanticising it too because it's a hoby of yours, which just leads to skwes in your perception. Source: studied EE, after realising I wouldn't like my career paths, I switched to CS. Mostly worked as SWE tho, but I did work in ab unusual and creative EE role first, before realising that most EE jobs wouldn't be so engaging
- notch656a 4y ago
  >The stuff about needing to know a lot more physics or arcane domain specific stuff isn't so true ha ha wait until you find out about microwave engineering.
  - spoiler 4y ago
    Pardon, but I don't understand the point you tried to make... Does a software engineer have perfect grasp and understanding about every subfield in SWE? Ranging from DX to writing compilers or designing languages, SWE is an extremely broad field. EE is no different.
    - anotherhue 4y ago
      The failure modes are substantially different, which changes the approach. Free climbing a 5ft rock wall is not different than a 50ft one, etc.
    - GeorgeTirebiter 4y ago
      The EE domain is substantially smaller than the CS domain. It take less time and effort to be an EE "domain expert" than it does to become a "CS domain expert".
      - notch656a 4y ago
        Sure, if you arbitrarily slice the pie to make it that way. The great thing is you can just semantically decide what you want to call EE and CS until your assertion is true, so you've made an assertion that is completely impossible to disprove. Bravo.
  - GeorgeTirebiter 4y ago
    You know, I'm a microwave engineer who is currently doing CS. I find most of these comments against my original points as me not explaining myself so well. And, I can say one thing for sure, EE's are good at downvoting! ;-) I'm trying to say that EE, like MechE is not especially complicated. You have your theories you need to know but that's it. Yes, you can be inspired, you can figure out some trick. But: how often does an ME invent a fundamentally new mechanism? Pretty much never. How often does an EE invent a fundamentally new circuit? Pretty much never. Now, how often does a CS person have to solve some nasty problem that has never been solved before --- every day! I have done microwave engineering for over 20 years. I know what it takes. It's NOT Rocket Science, I assure you. My degree (6-3) is in EECS from a small technical school on the banks of the Charles River. So I'm not full of it when I make my statements; they come from over 50 years' experience.
    - notch656a 4y ago
      Are you seriously citing a fucking MIT degree in support of your case that microwave engineering is not complicated? You went to the most prestigious engineering school in the US, if not the world. I think you've lost sight of reality. You started off 2 miles above ground level and with the hindsight of 50 years of experience beyond that, sure it might seem like nothing to you. > EEs just learn altium, read some data sheets, and poof, out pop the circuits. Initially I just thought you were a troll, but with this kind of experience and education now I just know you're vicious liar. I'm sure every time you made a microstrip filter, feed ramp, or antenna you just poof from Altium after looking at a datasheet and it just worked. Not to mention a great deal of microwave engineering now happens in other tools like microwave office and ADS, I'm not sure Altium is even that great or useful for relatively common microwave stuff like designing say a microwave horn antenna.
- imtringued 4y ago
  I haven't seen any arcane domain specific knowledge that was in the software part, sure a your business can be infinitely arcane but the software was always very straightforward. EE is in a different ballpark, imagine if you had to explicitly pay attention to write software that didn't melt your CPU.
  - spoiler 4y ago
    That's still just domain knowledge, though... It's arcane to you, not them

spoiler 4y ago

The stuff about needing to know a lot more physics or arcane domain specific stuff isn't so true. If you talk to someone who's got pink sunglasses about SWE, they'll say a bunch of stuff in our industry is "arcane domain specific knowledge" to them. You're probably romanticising it too because it's a hoby of yours, which just leads to skwes in your perception. Source: studied EE, after realising I wouldn't like my career paths, I switched to CS. Mostly worked as SWE tho, but I did work in ab unusual and creative EE role first, before realising that most EE jobs wouldn't be so engaging

notch656a 4y ago
>The stuff about needing to know a lot more physics or arcane domain specific stuff isn't so true ha ha wait until you find out about microwave engineering.
- spoiler 4y ago
  Pardon, but I don't understand the point you tried to make... Does a software engineer have perfect grasp and understanding about every subfield in SWE? Ranging from DX to writing compilers or designing languages, SWE is an extremely broad field. EE is no different.
  - anotherhue 4y ago
    The failure modes are substantially different, which changes the approach. Free climbing a 5ft rock wall is not different than a 50ft one, etc.
  - GeorgeTirebiter 4y ago
    The EE domain is substantially smaller than the CS domain. It take less time and effort to be an EE "domain expert" than it does to become a "CS domain expert".
    - notch656a 4y ago
      Sure, if you arbitrarily slice the pie to make it that way. The great thing is you can just semantically decide what you want to call EE and CS until your assertion is true, so you've made an assertion that is completely impossible to disprove. Bravo.
- GeorgeTirebiter 4y ago
  You know, I'm a microwave engineer who is currently doing CS. I find most of these comments against my original points as me not explaining myself so well. And, I can say one thing for sure, EE's are good at downvoting! ;-) I'm trying to say that EE, like MechE is not especially complicated. You have your theories you need to know but that's it. Yes, you can be inspired, you can figure out some trick. But: how often does an ME invent a fundamentally new mechanism? Pretty much never. How often does an EE invent a fundamentally new circuit? Pretty much never. Now, how often does a CS person have to solve some nasty problem that has never been solved before --- every day! I have done microwave engineering for over 20 years. I know what it takes. It's NOT Rocket Science, I assure you. My degree (6-3) is in EECS from a small technical school on the banks of the Charles River. So I'm not full of it when I make my statements; they come from over 50 years' experience.
  - notch656a 4y ago
    Are you seriously citing a fucking MIT degree in support of your case that microwave engineering is not complicated? You went to the most prestigious engineering school in the US, if not the world. I think you've lost sight of reality. You started off 2 miles above ground level and with the hindsight of 50 years of experience beyond that, sure it might seem like nothing to you. > EEs just learn altium, read some data sheets, and poof, out pop the circuits. Initially I just thought you were a troll, but with this kind of experience and education now I just know you're vicious liar. I'm sure every time you made a microstrip filter, feed ramp, or antenna you just poof from Altium after looking at a datasheet and it just worked. Not to mention a great deal of microwave engineering now happens in other tools like microwave office and ADS, I'm not sure Altium is even that great or useful for relatively common microwave stuff like designing say a microwave horn antenna.
imtringued 4y ago
I haven't seen any arcane domain specific knowledge that was in the software part, sure a your business can be infinitely arcane but the software was always very straightforward. EE is in a different ballpark, imagine if you had to explicitly pay attention to write software that didn't melt your CPU.
- spoiler 4y ago
  That's still just domain knowledge, though... It's arcane to you, not them