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Ask HN: CS degrees, do they matter again?

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Re: Ask HN: CS degrees, do they matter again?

#181

Post by dogleash »

john-h-k wrote: post #172
epolanski wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They need ways to eliminate chunks of the applications. Illogical ways of eliminating candidates are acceptable because they are better than having no way And this is how Apple/Google end up rejecting candidates to work on open source libraries...despite the candidates being the very authors they are wed out as they haven't spent months preparing for the interview.

Is this referring to homebrew? On the one hand i get it, but on the other hand reversing a binary tree isn’t some crazy leetcode grind. Most people can figure it out in a few mins and i think its fair to reject someone who can’t

It's not one instance. Most people who have this happen to them don't tweet about it. Every instance could have a "well, you should have ______ better" stapled to it.

Here's another one that I already know exists off the top of my head -- the only thing I have to look up is the tweet url: https://twitter.com/tiangolo/status/1281946592459853830

Re: Ask HN: CS degrees, do they matter again?

#182

Post by platevoltage »

RamblingCTO wrote: post #126

I'll say yes. I am the only one in the company that has a degree (MSc compsci). I know stuff the others never heard of. Your exposure to obscure things in uni are really worth the time for deeper topics. I focused on machine learning and had classes like operations research, non-linear optimization or complexity theory & approximation algorithms and I kid you not, I could make use of these things quite a lot to find…

Thank you. Yeah, I would do Comp Sci. I wont say that I know everything about software development. Not even close, but I do think I'm in a position where I have the ability to continue to learn on my own. I mostly want the paper, but I'd be lying if I said I couldn't stand to drastically improve my CS fundamentals. Most of what I do is Typescript/Javascript, but I'm also into embedded development, for which I'm way less advanced at. I could really use some lower level training.

Re: Ask HN: CS degrees, do they matter again?

#183

Post by platevoltage »

iamwpj wrote: post #155

I was self taught for 10 years in the field and found a program that offers a Master's degree with work experience accounting for the undergrad. I didn't take calculus or stats in my undergrad and that has caused some headaches in completing the degree, but the amount of stuff I was exposed to in such a short period of time was incredible. Very quickly into the program I was stuck by just how unethical it was for me,…

A masters with no undergrad? I didn't even know that was a thing.

Re: Ask HN: CS degrees, do they matter again?

#184

Post by platevoltage »

Suppafly wrote: post #164

>Several years ago, we were all told "You don't need a degree bro, degrees are obsolete bro, companies only care about what you know". You were lied to then. It will definitely help you land a corporate job once you decide to stop freelancing.

I mean, we heard this from Google executives and Elon Musk. Seems like the corporations were the ones perpetuating the lies.

Re: Ask HN: CS degrees, do they matter again?

#185

Post by platevoltage »

cml123 wrote: post #152

I'll share my own story and try to answer your question in that context. I was working as an underwriting assistant at an insurance company and became interested in landing a job as a software engineer. I took a Visual Basic class in high school and a Java class in college. I dropped out of a biology degree late during my second year of college. I managed to get a job at my company's IT helpdesk, supporting a specifi…

Thank you for sharing.

Re: Ask HN: CS degrees, do they matter again?

#186

Post by platevoltage »

turtleyacht wrote: post #128

Is a degree necessary for applying to random job postings? Yes. > lifestyle Starting a family at one point may factor into this; you'll be happier having something stable thanks to the degree that helped place you. You can always self-study off .edu syllabi, books, and all that. Not always at the most convenient times, but the knowledge is out there. Make sure the degree is from a reputable school. It's possibly the…

Are any dev jobs really stable at this point though?

Re: Ask HN: CS degrees, do they matter again?

#187

Post by platevoltage »

muzani wrote: post #132

Strong yes. AI is the ultimate generalist, but it's not a specialist unless the operator is a specialist. It'll output the average of what it's trained on. It may know the new stuff, but unless someone programs it to return the new data, it'll return some old outdated stack. You also have to know your terms to communicate properly with it. Like my favorite these days is asking it to decompose a conditional. You never…

Thank you.

Re: Ask HN: CS degrees, do they matter again?

#188

Post by platevoltage »

citadel_melon wrote: post #116

If you live in SF, you can get a cheap degree from a California community college. It will be 10-50 dollars per semester. You can even transfer the last year of the degree to a UC if you care for a name-brand school, but I don’t think that would be necessary with work experience.

A full on Bachelors at community college? interesting. I live right next door to SF in Oakland.

Re: Ask HN: CS degrees, do they matter again?

#189

Post by platevoltage »

fooker wrote: post #168

> Does it matter? Yes. > online CS degree. No. Most of the value of a degree is the connections you build and get opportunities through. You're not going to get much better at software development. You'll learn some core CS/math concepts that can help later if you want to get into niche roles though. But that's not something most people benefit from, by definition of 'niche'.

I'm more concerned with my ability to get past the filters/hard requirements.

Re: Ask HN: CS degrees, do they matter again?

#190

Post by nvarsj »

mixmastamyk wrote: post #160
nvarsj wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I did it over 5 years and it would consume all my free time during crunch periods. Definitely make sure your family is supportive - it’s like having a second part time job with occasional overtime. Having said that - I believe many companies view OMSCS as a strong signal. It’s a difficult degree with high drop out rate.

How is the privacy on that? Have an aversion to being watched on camera, etc.

During exams you mean? They swapped to honorlock which seemed way better and less invasive than proctortrack. It’s a necessary evil unfortunately.
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