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Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

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Re: Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

#141

Post by rhizome31 »

mailslot wrote: post #109
donw wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Candidly, I would say that college does not even provide the base skill-set. In the Real World(tm) of building software, you will work on systems built over years by other people, many of which have long since left the project or company. The level of integration tests, unit tests, documentation, and automation will depend entirely on the culture of the organization. Databases, low-level I/O, sorting operations, and…

Conversely, too much practical experience can lead to a lack of fundamental understanding, innovation, and helplessness. I can’t stand it when an engineer wastes hours looking for a library, instead of even considering actually writing code themselves. Many just can’t because they’re so accustomed to glueing together other people’s code. Of course, I’ve worked with academic types that can never stop theorizing and ac…

I often see the opposite: people wasting hours writing code when they could have found the appropriate library with a few minutes of searching. Often the library is actually already installed with the project or even part of the standard library.

Re: Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

#142

Post by mnazim »

Revive apprenticeships - where learner goes to master and learns directly from the one who practices the skill on a daily basis. In modern wold, this responsibility should rest on tech giants, who should have dedicated apprenticeship programs; and they should pay apprentices an honorarium for investing their time in studying their area of their, instead of their competitors.

For some reason, I don't know/understand, this responsibility got shifted to taxpayer.

Re: Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

#144

Post by [deleted] »

rhizome31 wrote: post #141
mailslot wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Conversely, too much practical experience can lead to a lack of fundamental understanding, innovation, and helplessness. I can’t stand it when an engineer wastes hours looking for a library, instead of even considering actually writing code themselves. Many just can’t because they’re so accustomed to glueing together other people’s code. Of course, I’ve worked with academic types that can never stop theorizing and ac…

I often see the opposite: people wasting hours writing code when they could have found the appropriate library with a few minutes of searching. Often the library is actually already installed with the project or even part of the standard library.

[deleted]

Re: Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

#145

Post by nineteen999 »

cephlanod wrote: post #19

This seems obvious to me since most of the jobs seem to be in web dev, maybe I'm wearing blinders but there doesn't seem to be much out there that isn't CRUD work. Computer science is almost a different field, to me its like masonry vs geology

Web dev seems to be the majority, but there is plenty of work out there in other sectors, eg. banking, finance, day trading, emergency services (my field). The jobs are out there but you have to look for them. And oftentimes they can be much more secure than a role in a startup as well.

It really depends on your skillset. I've got over 20 years experience, and honestly, I don't feel like I have the skills that most startups need either, nor the desire to forgo a decent salary in the hope that they "make it big" someday.

Re: Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

#146

Post by saargrin »

donw wrote: post #75
mreome wrote: post #27

Isn't this just observing the fact that college isn't the same as work experience, and only provides the base skill-set needed to enter enter the industry? "When you join a startup, there’s a lot of emphasis on the design of the application, reusability and clean code, and the ability to conduct and undergo code reviews, as well as the ability to think of and build systems that can scale based on users and geography"…

Candidly, I would say that college does not even provide the base skill-set. In the Real World(tm) of building software, you will work on systems built over years by other people, many of which have long since left the project or company. The level of integration tests, unit tests, documentation, and automation will depend entirely on the culture of the organization. Databases, low-level I/O, sorting operations, and…

college doesnt even provide basics

like im working with a recent cum laude CS grad ,and he was never told how SSL really works, nor DNS nor TCPIP

which makes it really hard to actually operate in the real world beyond IDE

Re: Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

#147

Post by quietbritishjim »

rhizome31 wrote: post #141
mailslot wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Conversely, too much practical experience can lead to a lack of fundamental understanding, innovation, and helplessness. I can’t stand it when an engineer wastes hours looking for a library, instead of even considering actually writing code themselves. Many just can’t because they’re so accustomed to glueing together other people’s code. Of course, I’ve worked with academic types that can never stop theorizing and ac…

I often see the opposite: people wasting hours writing code when they could have found the appropriate library with a few minutes of searching. Often the library is actually already installed with the project or even part of the standard library.

The most difficult case is when writing the code from scratch actually is a lot faster than choosing and learning the API for a library, but in the long term takes more effort to maintain (higher TCO).

The choice depends not only on how complex your own code would be, but also how mature and well maintained the library is (e.g. maybe a library that's just right is some solo developer's pet project, whereas a slightly more awkward fit is actively developed by a big company). That is the sort of thing where making the right choice really requires a lot of experience.

Re: Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

#148

Post by stale2002 »

SkyPuncher wrote: post #111
stale2002 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I went to CMU (econ major/CS minor) , and we absolutely had such a degree. It was called Information Systems, and generally taught people the skills needed to become a web developer. Skills such as front end developement, Ruby on rails, ect, as well as even some mobile dev electives I think. Unfortunately, even though it was one of the best such programs in the world, and turned out graduates who made 80k+, it was st…

Information Systems is NOT an engineering degree. The problem for most schools is an engineering degree is a specific, formally defined degree. It seems that ABET has recently updated their Software Engineering criteria, but for decades a software engineering degree required extensive curriculum in physical science.

> Information Systems is NOT an engineering degree.

It teaches you how to work as a web developer. Web development being something that people often call software engineering.

Use whatever word or definition that you want to group Info Systems under, but at the end of the day, these people with these degrees are still getting jobs at Google, FB, and the other top companies, and/or startups, and are giving the job title "software engineer".

That is the definition of software engineer that I use. It is defined as "Those people who are working at google, or top startups or whatever".

Re: Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

#149

Post by stale2002 »

gbacon wrote: post #115
stale2002 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I went to CMU (econ major/CS minor) , and we absolutely had such a degree. It was called Information Systems, and generally taught people the skills needed to become a web developer. Skills such as front end developement, Ruby on rails, ect, as well as even some mobile dev electives I think. Unfortunately, even though it was one of the best such programs in the world, and turned out graduates who made 80k+, it was st…

Information Systems programs are commonly business degrees. At CMU, it is offered by the Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences[0]. In aerospace and defense, some employers and even the government do not value IS, MIS, or CIS degrees as highly because they are not considered engineering degrees like engineering proper, math, computer science, or physics. In those industries, the way to make up the differe…

> In aerospace and defense, some employers and even the government

Fortunately, I wasn't talking about areospace, or defense, or whatever. The vast majority of people who come out of CMU, are not working in these very specific job areas, so they aren't relevant.

Instead, they are working at SF tech companies like Facebook, and Apple, and the like.

And if you look at the places that the Info Systems people go to, it turns out that the vast majority of them have the job title "Software Engineer", making a median salary of 90k$:

https://www.cmu.edu/career/documents/2018_one_pagers/dc/Bach...

It turns out that a whole bunch of people with these degrees are able to get top software engineering jobs at top tech companies.

> In practical terms, one might argue that better route for those industries at least is to choose a degree with higher perceived value.

No, the facts show that a very effective way of getting a prestigious job, working at a top tech company, with the official job title of Software Engineer, is to get an Information Systems degree. The stats I showed, prove it.

Re: Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

#150

Post by agumonkey »

saargrin wrote: post #146
donw wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Candidly, I would say that college does not even provide the base skill-set. In the Real World(tm) of building software, you will work on systems built over years by other people, many of which have long since left the project or company. The level of integration tests, unit tests, documentation, and automation will depend entirely on the culture of the organization. Databases, low-level I/O, sorting operations, and…

college doesnt even provide basics like im working with a recent cum laude CS grad ,and he was never told how SSL really works, nor DNS nor TCPIP which makes it really hard to actually operate in the real world beyond IDE

my university split these into different paths.

- low level was for electronics/cpu architect

- the things you mention were for network engineer

- the mainstream was application developper, and you get to learn java and eclipse

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