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There are many differences between a programmer and a medic.
For one, a programmer deals entirely with known technologies which have been developed by man and are comprised of completely understood fundamentals, the experience and value of the programmer can be rated on how much of these fundamentals the individual understands. A medic is working with the human body which is vastly unknown and not of man's design.
Secondly, a Doctor can only specialise in a certain field (say Neurology) as unlike programming, the brain, heart, lungs etc work very differently even though they may all be classed as "organs", they're functions share very little common functionality. Programmers work with basic fundamentals and specific protocols and share much of the same base knowledge as each other no matter what there choice of environment and tool.
If considering the example of a Doctor when referring to a programmer we can say that a neuro-surgeon would not in fact be a programmer, he would be a "CPU-Architect" and thus in a different field. All programmers can be considered General Practicioners which have the fundamental knowledge of the body/computer architecture and protocols but chooses to treat symptoms/develop solutions using different tools.
In Short - no, we shouldn't be classsified, we're all General Practicioners.
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Craig Gilchrist wrote: with known technologies which have been developed by man and are comprised of completely understood fundamentals
I think there's a flaw in your assumption there.
Marc
VS2005 Tips & Tricks -- contributions welcome!
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Yeah probably. The word "completely" could be replaced. Choose from:
-Partially
-slightly
-not at all
-sometimes
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How about all of the above
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If you think someone who had never done GUI work (and understand human-machine interaction, etc.) could instantly create a good interface because they are a "programmer" then you need to lay off the crack pipe.
Just like someone with a lousy math background couldn't write a great mathematical algorithm, even though they may be able to make a killer UI.
No, programmers do differ.
Jeremy Falcon
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Jeremy Falcon wrote: If you think someone who had never done GUI work (and understand human-machine interaction, etc.) could instantly create a good interface because they are a "programmer" then you need to lay off the crack pipe.
You're talking about ability there, not skillset. Any programmer worth their salt can build a GUI of some description (good or bad) however a heart surgeon will never need to stich up your eyeball!
Jeremy Falcon wrote: No, programmers do differ.
I agree, but not to the same degree as the medical profession, and not enough to warrant formal classification.
Jeremy Falcon wrote: then you need to lay off the crack pipe.
Who told you about my crackpipe?
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Craig Gilchrist wrote: You're talking about ability there, not skillset. Any programmer worth their salt can build a GUI of some description (good or bad) however a heart surgeon will never need to stich up your eyeball!
Ok, I'll give you that but to me they go hand in hand. If you're not able to do sometihng well then don't claim to be able to do it. Just like a heart doc could attempt to stich your eye, but you'd probably end up blind.
Craig Gilchrist wrote: I agree, but not to the same degree as the medical profession, and not enough to warrant formal classification.
I see your point. I for one don't like titles just as much as the next dev. In retrospect, I think my biggest issue with this is devs that claim to know everything like 30 languagues, etc. when they don't know one well.
I was thinking this could be one way to help say what they are really good at and just "ok", etc. at other stuff. Although, someone did moention certs, but still that's subjective on weither they are good. Of course, I supposed a title can be subjective too.
Craig Gilchrist wrote: Who told you about my crackpipe?
Logical deduction. All the programmers are using them now. You should try the CP one, it's shaped like Bob.
Jeremy Falcon
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As a doctor in spe (means that I'm studying medicine) I've got to add something:
1."the brain, heart, lungs etc work very differently even though they may all be classed as "organs", they're functions share very little common functionality."
No, No, NO. Of course they have a different behaviour and use, but the human body is not a collection of organs, but instead they all work together. One example: The heart controls the blood pressure (in a way , but itself is controled by N.vagus, which means: brain - and the kidneys, venes, ....
So, you see, everything belongs together and cannot be seperated.
2. "If considering the example of a Doctor when referring to a programmer we can say that a neuro-surgeon would not in fact be a programmer, he would be a "CPU-Architect" and thus in a different field. All programmers can be considered General Practicioners which have the fundamental knowledge of the body/computer architecture and protocols but chooses to treat symptoms/develop solutions using different tools."
Yeah, I'd agree to that. But remember, every doctor has to have knowledge about everything (in the body, of course) - and you'll be thankful for that once you get a heart attack when you visit a neuro-surgeon
(Indeed, this is the way it's handled in Germany, afaik that's a bit different in US).
3. One last thing: the medicine is now ca. 2000 years old, computer science about 100 (?), maybe, we'll all programmers will be classified in about 50 years?
Greetings and best wishes,
Andreas
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Don't forget about the use of computers in medicine. In such situations, a formal clasificiation regulated similarly to that of the medical field may be appropriate.
Google the "therac 25" if you doubt the importance.
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..
-- modified at 8:22 Wednesday 14th December, 2005
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What about the Ugly ones ???
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That is usually a given
Ever attended a microsoft .net launch event? Ugly as far as the eye can see. Not a single woman under 200lbs. Then you think: "Wait a minute, I'm part of this crowd. AHHHHHHH!"
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thrakazog wrote: Not a single woman under 200lbs
Maybe we're not going to the same launch events...
David
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Actually, make that:
There are only 10 kinds, Good ones and Band ones.
George Carlin wrote:
"Don't sweat the petty things, and don't pet the sweaty things."
Jörgen Sigvardsson wrote:
If the physicists find a universal theory describing the laws of universe, I'm sure the a**hole constant will be an integral part of that theory.
My Blog[^]
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No, no and again no!
Formal classification can only help if the classification doesn't get outdated.
But in the IT world I see no chance to have a formal classification be actual and current for longer than 3 years.
If I am a carpenter my formal classification is clear. I can work with wood! And this won't change in the next years as long we have wood.
PS (OT): Thanks to Mr. Bush to be ignorant on the world clima problem so that we have a chance that carpenters will have to search for a new formal classification too...
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They will become softpenters
SkyWalker
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Would you ask for certification, should you want to get the software "services" of a (very) small private company (made, lets say, of two persons)?
SkyWalker
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I fully agree with you!
SkyWalker
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I am not interested in a certification test at all! I would like to see projects some one has done before.
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Some day, the real world is going to come and smack you upside the head and make you realize that what you want doesn't really matter.
The simple fact is our pay checks are paid by those people who are decidedly NOT IT people and have no real concept or understanding of what it is that we do.
The reason we wear these labels and take these tests to get these little pieces of paper is not for our own purpose, but rather those that hire us. We get these certifications so that our "managers" can justify to themselves why they pay such a high salary to us to do things they just don't understand nor have any desire to understand.
Past projects have no bearing on those kinds of situations because they are not your current / future managers projects and therefore have nothing in common with them.
A medical professional specializes for a number of reasons.. first of all, the field of medicine is so diverse that there is room for specialization. Second, by gaining a specialization, that professional can command a higher wage for his or her services than someone without that specializaton.
I firmly believe that developers should seek specialization for the same reasons. IT is a very broad field, and there are definate sects of the industry that would require a definate learned knowledge. Take for example an oracle develper writting PL/SQL code... Now you would not hire that oracle developer to manage your JCL code in your OS/390 environment.
How about the Assembly guy writting embedded code for some specific piece of hardware.. would you hire someone who is a whiz-bang COM developer to fill his roll, or would you seek out another embedded developer?
Say your web services team has an opening. Would you hire an embedded systems engineer to start writting abstract .Net code or would you hire someone with experiance in the field you are looking for?
Like it or not, labels are already here.. and they are here to stay. They are already being applied to you and there is nothing that you can do about it.
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Hi, Jason:
It is true that certfications can indeed help you find a job. However, as a programmer I think what you did before is more important. I think it is more valuable to know your projects, technologies and how you solve the problems. After konwing these, it is not easy to find a wrong person for a job. I will not hire an embedded developer to work with MS .NET ASP project.
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Another thought is, I couldn't care less how you classify yourself, it's your experience that matters.
The "yes" votes is a bit depressing, IMO, because it implies that people prefer meaningless labels vs. real content.
Marc
VS2005 Tips & Tricks -- contributions welcome!
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I'm with you on that.
But I think it's truer for IT that it is for, say, physics.
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I voted yes and I hate labels -- especially meaningless ones. I do think however, that people can specialize in certain areas related to programming an can be extremely competent in that area moreso than someone who hasn't. Sometimes those areas take more than a day to master.
Jeremy Falcon
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