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In some economies, to be an engineer means a chartered engineer, which demands completion of a formal assessment by the national engineering council. I'm not t

by ggm 2y ago

In some economies, to be an engineer means a chartered engineer, which demands completion of a formal assessment by the national engineering council. I'm not throwing shade on you, my degree from 1982 was 1 year too early to make certification in my field and I have worked for 42 years in software and systems without charter status. I am however cautious of using the word. I call myself a computer scientist even when what I do is systems and network engineering.

nadermx 2y ago
So much this. I studied and got a degree in civil engineering and only call myself studied as an engineer because I never apprenticed or took the professional engineer exam. Despite doing a ton of software now I still feel it would be an insult to my friends who are P.E.'s to call myself an engineer.
- ghaff 2y ago
  In civil engineering especially, you sort of assume senior people have PEs because they have to sign off on certain official documents. But, in general, outside of a few contexts like that, very few people pay any attention to whether someone is a PE or not.
tombert 2y ago
That's fair, I say the word "engineer" because that was the job title at the companies. Generally when people have asked what I am, I just say something kind of hand-wavey like "Eccentric" or something.
throwaway2037 2y ago
I see this type of comment on HN frequently. I have a dim view of national certifications for software engineering or computer science. Are there any highly advanced economies that have "a formal assessment by the national engineering council" for software engineering or computer science? If so, are they useful? Do they actually indicate quality? For me, the field(s) are changing so fast, that it hardly makes sense. If you are working in an area that is not life threatening, I am not a believer in certifications. It all seems like a bunch of gatekeeping. Today, I was listening to the Lex Fridman podcast with John Carmack. It reminded me that John Carmack does not have a university degree, yet, he is one our generation's globally recognized masters of software optimisation. There are few in the world who can do what he does, and he has no uni degree, nor (I assume!) any "national certifications". Michael Abrash is similar. On a personal note: (US) Wall Street has similarly ineffective gatekeeping with the Series 7 & 63 exams: My father called it "toilet bowl knowledge" when I studied for it. He said: "Once you are finished the exam, you can flush away that knowledge. You will never use it again." He is right about more than 90% of the "knowledge" required to pass those exams.
- seabass-labrax 2y ago
  > Are there any highly advanced economies that have "a formal assessment by the national engineering council" for software engineering or computer science? The EUR ING certificate from Engineers Europe can be awarded to those who have attained a degree in engineering, but also for those with "no exemplifying formal qualifications, but will have engaged in professional Career Learning and peer review via the individual route". https://www.engineerseurope.com/what-eur-ing-certificate https://www.engineerseurope.com/what-eur-ing-certificate Since Engineers Europe is a private organization (albeit one that is widely recognized), I would imagine that individual European countries have their own rules about when someone can call themselves an engineer. I am pretty sure that Germany only requires a degree for instance. Looser still are the rules in Britain: the UK does not require any certification at all for the basic term 'Engineer', although there are more specific titles that are strictly protected (ICTTech being one of them, and yes they really do use that silly abbreviation, obligatory italics included). Theoretically, a country could refuse to recognize certifications from Engineers Europe, but that would not exactly endear them to the European Commission or to other European countries!
  - AlchemistCamp 2y ago
    And so what? Those gatekeepers might not accept a John Carmack or a Palmer Luckey (or Bill Gates or Larry Ellison or Vitalik Buterin, etc, etc), but how many of their certificate-holders have done any comparably significant engineering work?
    - albumen 2y ago
      Does it matter for them? Would any employer/investor, seeking to hire/fund carmack etc hold back because they didn't have a cert? The vanishingly few with those levels of talent stand out quite easily and don't need "proof of competency" to be evaluated. For the _vast majority_ of others, certification allows employers to have externally-validated trust in an engineer who mightn't stand out as obviously.
      - 2y ago
mattbrewsbytes 2y ago
In the software industry and related domains in other industries (i.e. software at a bank, software for retail systems, etc.) the words engineer, developer and programmer can be used interchangeably. I think "engineer" is more trendy these days than "programmer". Other industries also use the words "architect" or even "sanitation engineer" and they mean different things. I don't think its a big deal that the same words are used in job titles in different industries. The second anyone reads the job description or follows up with a question will understand the domain someone works in. I usually go with "I work in software" and non-software people equate all of that to "IT", much like I classify Doctors as "medicine" and there are different disciplines.
- marssaxman 2y ago
  It is a little amusing when people get fussy about credentials and certifications for the term "engineer" given that an "engineer" in the railroad industry is simply a person who operates a locomotive engine. It seems a very small stretch to analogize software engineers as operators of computing engines!
snapcaster 2y ago
I would be skeptical of granting that much power/mental space to gatekeepers you didn't elect. You're fine at your job without the certification right? so maybe it's not needed?

by ggm 2y ago

nadermx 2y ago

So much this. I studied and got a degree in civil engineering and only call myself studied as an engineer because I never apprenticed or took the professional engineer exam. Despite doing a ton of software now I still feel it would be an insult to my friends who are P.E.'s to call myself an engineer.

ghaff 2y ago
In civil engineering especially, you sort of assume senior people have PEs because they have to sign off on certain official documents. But, in general, outside of a few contexts like that, very few people pay any attention to whether someone is a PE or not.

tombert 2y ago

That's fair, I say the word "engineer" because that was the job title at the companies. Generally when people have asked what I am, I just say something kind of hand-wavey like "Eccentric" or something.

throwaway2037 2y ago

I see this type of comment on HN frequently. I have a dim view of national certifications for software engineering or computer science. Are there any highly advanced economies that have "a formal assessment by the national engineering council" for software engineering or computer science? If so, are they useful? Do they actually indicate quality? For me, the field(s) are changing so fast, that it hardly makes sense. If you are working in an area that is not life threatening, I am not a believer in certifications. It all seems like a bunch of gatekeeping. Today, I was listening to the Lex Fridman podcast with John Carmack. It reminded me that John Carmack does not have a university degree, yet, he is one our generation's globally recognized masters of software optimisation. There are few in the world who can do what he does, and he has no uni degree, nor (I assume!) any "national certifications". Michael Abrash is similar. On a personal note: (US) Wall Street has similarly ineffective gatekeeping with the Series 7 & 63 exams: My father called it "toilet bowl knowledge" when I studied for it. He said: "Once you are finished the exam, you can flush away that knowledge. You will never use it again." He is right about more than 90% of the "knowledge" required to pass those exams.

seabass-labrax 2y ago
> Are there any highly advanced economies that have "a formal assessment by the national engineering council" for software engineering or computer science? The EUR ING certificate from Engineers Europe can be awarded to those who have attained a degree in engineering, but also for those with "no exemplifying formal qualifications, but will have engaged in professional Career Learning and peer review via the individual route". https://www.engineerseurope.com/what-eur-ing-certificate https://www.engineerseurope.com/what-eur-ing-certificate Since Engineers Europe is a private organization (albeit one that is widely recognized), I would imagine that individual European countries have their own rules about when someone can call themselves an engineer. I am pretty sure that Germany only requires a degree for instance. Looser still are the rules in Britain: the UK does not require any certification at all for the basic term 'Engineer', although there are more specific titles that are strictly protected (ICTTech being one of them, and yes they really do use that silly abbreviation, obligatory italics included). Theoretically, a country could refuse to recognize certifications from Engineers Europe, but that would not exactly endear them to the European Commission or to other European countries!
- AlchemistCamp 2y ago
  And so what? Those gatekeepers might not accept a John Carmack or a Palmer Luckey (or Bill Gates or Larry Ellison or Vitalik Buterin, etc, etc), but how many of their certificate-holders have done any comparably significant engineering work?
  - albumen 2y ago
    Does it matter for them? Would any employer/investor, seeking to hire/fund carmack etc hold back because they didn't have a cert? The vanishingly few with those levels of talent stand out quite easily and don't need "proof of competency" to be evaluated. For the _vast majority_ of others, certification allows employers to have externally-validated trust in an engineer who mightn't stand out as obviously.
    - 2y ago

mattbrewsbytes 2y ago

In the software industry and related domains in other industries (i.e. software at a bank, software for retail systems, etc.) the words engineer, developer and programmer can be used interchangeably. I think "engineer" is more trendy these days than "programmer". Other industries also use the words "architect" or even "sanitation engineer" and they mean different things. I don't think its a big deal that the same words are used in job titles in different industries. The second anyone reads the job description or follows up with a question will understand the domain someone works in. I usually go with "I work in software" and non-software people equate all of that to "IT", much like I classify Doctors as "medicine" and there are different disciplines.

marssaxman 2y ago
It is a little amusing when people get fussy about credentials and certifications for the term "engineer" given that an "engineer" in the railroad industry is simply a person who operates a locomotive engine. It seems a very small stretch to analogize software engineers as operators of computing engines!

snapcaster 2y ago

I would be skeptical of granting that much power/mental space to gatekeepers you didn't elect. You're fine at your job without the certification right? so maybe it's not needed?