4 ms·

Then why do we not study debugging, naming, maintenance, reading code etc... specifically?

by p0nce 4y ago

loydb 4y ago
There needs to be an entire class devoted to working with Product Managers without killing anyone...
beltsazar 4y ago
Because in most universities it's a Computer Science degree, not a Software Engineering degree. I suppose in those universities that offer SE degree, they have more courses focusing on programming and managing software projects.
- fma 4y ago
  I had a class titled "Software Engineering" that prepared me very well for software dev life cycle, maintenance etc... It was a semester long project where the professor was the "business" person and everyone had shared roles (someone was QA for a sprint)...and we get lectures on code quality, testing, best practices. To my surprise it doesn't exist in every college. Even though I went to a state school, not all state schools in that state required it. I disliked the professor but am eternity grateful for the class...I would interview kids nowadays who want $100k but have no idea what Agile is. This was in mid 2000s.
  - maccard 4y ago
    > I would interview kids nowadays who want $100k but have no idea what Agile is. I've worked for companies and managers who don't know what Agile is. Not knowing one specific thing, even if it's an important thing, isn't worth writing off a candidate. If you can't teach someone the basics of agile in an afternoon, you're doing agile wrong.
    - fma 4y ago
      I wouldn't write them off, but certainly as you dig deeper you can see there's more than "one specific thing" and there's a disconnect between theoretical computer science vs practical programming. It would require more than an afternoon to be ready for the workplace and our company ended up having several weeks of bootcamps for all incoming college students...and still hear complaints that something is "too hard".
  - jen20 4y ago
    > I would interview kids nowadays who want $100k but have no idea what Agile is. You’d be amazed at how many middle managers making 250+ think that agile equals scrum or that scrum is valuable in the context of software. I’ll take the person that has never heard of it, to be honest.
    - fma 4y ago
      Right...because someone who went through 4 year of a computer science program and doesn't know anything about any software development life cycle (Agile was just one example) sure shows a lot of passion & initiative to explore outside of what's taught in school or outside their comfort zone. Exactly the type of person to hire.
thematrixturtle 4y ago
Because those are all closely tied to the specific programming language, editor, complier etc that you use, which will change repeatedly over your career.
- bordercases 4y ago
bordercases 4y ago
dev_0 4y ago
Professors are not good software engineers
- rramadass 4y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect
codegeek 4y ago
It depends on the college/university. I went to Stony Brook University (SUNY) in NY and we had an excellent CS program where we not only learned theory but did plenty of real world programming challenges including learning how to use version control (we used cvs circa 2002-2004) etc. We even had one specific class called Software Engineering where we designed a software from scratch and it was great learning. We did decent amount of HTML/CSS/JS as well. At the time, our server side language of choice was Java and Swing for GUI etc. We had assignments where we had to literally just design and not code (I kinda thought it was strange) but made us think more abstract. So yea, it depends where you did your CS degree from. Personally, I think it taught me a lot and got us ready for the real world at least as an entry level. Back then, there were no frameworks.

Then why do we not study debugging, naming, maintenance, reading code etc... specifically?

by p0nce 4y ago

Then why do we not study debugging, naming, maintenance, reading code etc... specifically?

loydb 4y ago

There needs to be an entire class devoted to working with Product Managers without killing anyone...

beltsazar 4y ago

Because in most universities it's a Computer Science degree, not a Software Engineering degree. I suppose in those universities that offer SE degree, they have more courses focusing on programming and managing software projects.

fma 4y ago
I had a class titled "Software Engineering" that prepared me very well for software dev life cycle, maintenance etc... It was a semester long project where the professor was the "business" person and everyone had shared roles (someone was QA for a sprint)...and we get lectures on code quality, testing, best practices. To my surprise it doesn't exist in every college. Even though I went to a state school, not all state schools in that state required it. I disliked the professor but am eternity grateful for the class...I would interview kids nowadays who want $100k but have no idea what Agile is. This was in mid 2000s.
- maccard 4y ago
  > I would interview kids nowadays who want $100k but have no idea what Agile is. I've worked for companies and managers who don't know what Agile is. Not knowing one specific thing, even if it's an important thing, isn't worth writing off a candidate. If you can't teach someone the basics of agile in an afternoon, you're doing agile wrong.
  - fma 4y ago
    I wouldn't write them off, but certainly as you dig deeper you can see there's more than "one specific thing" and there's a disconnect between theoretical computer science vs practical programming. It would require more than an afternoon to be ready for the workplace and our company ended up having several weeks of bootcamps for all incoming college students...and still hear complaints that something is "too hard".
- jen20 4y ago
  > I would interview kids nowadays who want $100k but have no idea what Agile is. You’d be amazed at how many middle managers making 250+ think that agile equals scrum or that scrum is valuable in the context of software. I’ll take the person that has never heard of it, to be honest.
  - fma 4y ago
    Right...because someone who went through 4 year of a computer science program and doesn't know anything about any software development life cycle (Agile was just one example) sure shows a lot of passion & initiative to explore outside of what's taught in school or outside their comfort zone. Exactly the type of person to hire.

thematrixturtle 4y ago

Because those are all closely tied to the specific programming language, editor, complier etc that you use, which will change repeatedly over your career.

bordercases 4y ago

bordercases 4y ago

dev_0 4y ago

Professors are not good software engineers

rramadass 4y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect

codegeek 4y ago

It depends on the college/university. I went to Stony Brook University (SUNY) in NY and we had an excellent CS program where we not only learned theory but did plenty of real world programming challenges including learning how to use version control (we used cvs circa 2002-2004) etc. We even had one specific class called Software Engineering where we designed a software from scratch and it was great learning. We did decent amount of HTML/CSS/JS as well. At the time, our server side language of choice was Java and Swing for GUI etc. We had assignments where we had to literally just design and not code (I kinda thought it was strange) but made us think more abstract. So yea, it depends where you did your CS degree from. Personally, I think it taught me a lot and got us ready for the real world at least as an entry level. Back then, there were no frameworks.