Joe the Developer doesn’t need a certificate
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Re: Joe the Developer doesn’t need a certificate
#2If only these opinions were carried in the WSJ, FT, etc.
Re: Joe the Developer doesn’t need a certificate
#3Joe the Developer is entrusted with writing code that can cost people money and cause damage. In some cases, it can endanger lives and businesses.
Joe the Developer doesn't need a certificate, but "we the people" (as in the people who have his software inflicted upon them) would rather he did.
The certification argument seems to forget whose benefits from certification. It's not the developer - it's the people who are able to ensure that there is a baseline level of competence among software developers entrusted with certain kinds of development work.
I'm all for certification.
Re: Joe the Developer doesn’t need a certificate
#4Joe the Developer is entrusted with writing code that can cost people money and cause damage. In some cases, it can endanger lives and businesses. Joe the Developer doesn't need a certificate, but "we the people" (as in the people who have his software inflicted upon them) would rather he did. The certification argument seems to forget whose benefits from certification. It's not the developer - it's the people who ar…
Ideally, I would agree with you. But at the same time, when I think of the people I know who have certifications, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't trust any of them to write code I would depend on for anything. The systems for certification that are in place today, are IMHO, lacking real credibility. There will always be people who try to beat the system, because they DO see a certification as something that benefits them - it gets them a job. As long as that's the case - I place a lot more emphasis on my personal experience with a person, than what certifications they can show me.
Re: Joe the Developer doesn’t need a certificate
#5Joe the Developer is entrusted with writing code that can cost people money and cause damage. In some cases, it can endanger lives and businesses. Joe the Developer doesn't need a certificate, but "we the people" (as in the people who have his software inflicted upon them) would rather he did. The certification argument seems to forget whose benefits from certification. It's not the developer - it's the people who ar…
What about certifying the software that Joe the developer creates, rather than Joe the developer? This is the approach the FAA takes with DO178B for the flight software on the jet planes that we ride.
These are very large projects, using hundreds of developers. The quality of the team members varies. Half are below average for the population at large.
Adding certification on top of this doesn't change the fact that half the developers will be below average. The projects are too large.
Re: Joe the Developer doesn’t need a certificate
#6Joe the Developer is entrusted with writing code that can cost people money and cause damage. In some cases, it can endanger lives and businesses. Joe the Developer doesn't need a certificate, but "we the people" (as in the people who have his software inflicted upon them) would rather he did. The certification argument seems to forget whose benefits from certification. It's not the developer - it's the people who ar…
>> "Joe the Developer is entrusted with writing code that can cost people money and cause damage. In some cases, it can endanger lives and businesses."
That's what tests are for.
Re: Joe the Developer doesn’t need a certificate
#7Joe the Developer is entrusted with writing code that can cost people money and cause damage. In some cases, it can endanger lives and businesses. Joe the Developer doesn't need a certificate, but "we the people" (as in the people who have his software inflicted upon them) would rather he did. The certification argument seems to forget whose benefits from certification. It's not the developer - it's the people who ar…
Ideally, I would agree with you. But at the same time, when I think of the people I know who have certifications, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't trust any of them to write code I would depend on for anything. The systems for certification that are in place today, are IMHO, lacking real credibility. There will always be people who try to beat the system, because they DO see a certification as something that benefits them…
I agree that the existing certification programs may be lacking, but I don't think that negates the need for them. It just means we need to come up with better certifications.
Re: Joe the Developer doesn’t need a certificate
#8Joe the Developer is entrusted with writing code that can cost people money and cause damage. In some cases, it can endanger lives and businesses. Joe the Developer doesn't need a certificate, but "we the people" (as in the people who have his software inflicted upon them) would rather he did. The certification argument seems to forget whose benefits from certification. It's not the developer - it's the people who ar…
The certification argument seems to forget whose benefits from certification. It's not the developer - it's the people who are able to ensure that there is a baseline level of competence among software developers entrusted with certain kinds of development work.
You're making one huge assumption here: that the certification actually certifies anything at all. As a matter of fact, it does not. Certifications are useless. Having or not having a certification is no indication of presence or lack of programming skill.
I'll go further, though. The certifications do you, as the public who makes use of developer services, a disservice. They imply that someone has verified and certified "a baseline level of competence" - but that implication is a fabrication, a lie.
All the certifications do, effectively, is give people who shouldn't be in programming jobs working for people who shouldn't be hiring programmers.
Re: Joe the Developer doesn’t need a certificate
#9Joe the Developer is entrusted with writing code that can cost people money and cause damage. In some cases, it can endanger lives and businesses. Joe the Developer doesn't need a certificate, but "we the people" (as in the people who have his software inflicted upon them) would rather he did. The certification argument seems to forget whose benefits from certification. It's not the developer - it's the people who ar…
What about certifying the software that Joe the developer creates, rather than Joe the developer? This is the approach the FAA takes with DO178B for the flight software on the jet planes that we ride. These are very large projects, using hundreds of developers. The quality of the team members varies. Half are below average for the population at large. Adding certification on top of this doesn't change the fact that h…
> What about certifying the software that Joe the developer creates, rather than Joe the developer?
There's a simple reason why - it costs x to certify 1 developer, and y to certify a piece of software.
For most software, "y" is still too expensive to offset the potential damage caused by software failure (compared to a jetliner, where the potential cost is huge).
A programmer may create hundreds or even thousands of pieces of software during a career. Average x over that number of projects, and it's negligible. Multiply that number by y, and you have an enormous figure.
Also, the cost of certifying a piece of software to provide any kind of assurances of quality is time consuming and expensive. Compare this to a certification that shows that anyone who wants to claim to be a "software engineer" actually knows the first thing about software engineering, and is at least capable of producing software in a systematic way.
It's just like we license drivers once and assume that that basic level of competency will ensure "quality driving" on a variety of road types. We don't certify each driver for each road individually.
Re: Joe the Developer doesn’t need a certificate
#10Joe the Developer is entrusted with writing code that can cost people money and cause damage. In some cases, it can endanger lives and businesses. Joe the Developer doesn't need a certificate, but "we the people" (as in the people who have his software inflicted upon them) would rather he did. The certification argument seems to forget whose benefits from certification. It's not the developer - it's the people who ar…
I would argue that certification has very little do with the quality of software that a developer would produce or a baseline level of competence.
We generally hope that a degree would give you a baseline level of competence, but I'm not sure that is entirely true either.