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Comment by eikenberry | Hacker News Reader

Why compare those of us who write software with engineers? It makes more sense to compare us to say.. composers, poets or something. Writing software is an art form and has nothing in common with engineering other than some uncreative types trying to come up with a more official sounding name.

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MechE here. I argue that what I do, designing medical devices, is exactly the same. More an art than a science, and more similar to software engineering than any of those other things you list.

Cool. I've known chemical, civil and structural engineers but never had the chance to meet/speak to a mechanical engineer. Interesting to know you look at your profession the same. Though I still think it (programming) is more akin to music or maybe philosophy than traditional engineering as I've heard it before. The focus on artificial languages, concepts and the severe lack of physical restrictions to guide you.

Totally, in software the rules are human made. One and zero are constructs of the himself mind. In Physics, which is all mechanical engineering is, the rules are created by the universe.

I am not sure why you are being downvoted. There is plenty of artistic expression in programming. Maybe we need to make more distinctions in the types of work that we do because I would love to see programming become a true engineering profession but we still need the artists and tinkerers in the world pushing the boundaries that we don't even know exist yet. We should not push out DaVinci or the Wright brothers but we should make sure critical systems are safe.

Writing code can be an art form, but I think there's a lot of software out there that really does need to be developed with the same amount of rigor as you'd use to design a bridge or a building, because people are depending on it functioning correctly. Nothing catches on fire if a singer makes a lousy rhyme. (At least, not unless they have a really harsh audience.)

I agree with the sentiment but imo software 'engineer' isn't wrong. It is in the sense that it's obviously unrelated to motors/engines but the word comes from the Latin ingeniator; to contrive or devise.

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