Microsoft President: We Need a Hippocratic Oath for Software Engineers

Re:Microsoft President: We Need a Hippocratic Oath for Softw... by Chris2048 on Tuesday August 11, 2020 @07:15AM (#24119146)

You need a licence to practice medicine, if there is something called a "license" for engineering but isn't required for practise, then it's not the same. If we have the same barriers, but not enforced, then we don't have the same barriers.

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Re:Microsoft President: We Need a Hippocratic Oath for Softw... by bumby on Tuesday August 11, 2020 @09:37AM (#24120118)

That’s not quite right. You actually do need a state license in the US to practice engineering for the public except for a few basic instances:

1) you work for the federal government

2) you work under a licensed engineer

3) you work under an industrial exemption

There’s differences depending on state. There has been a more concerted effort to remove #3 recently due to both political reasons and the technical issues in this thread. Most people performing engineering work under an industrial exemption don’t actually realize it. Again, this is different state to state. For example, in some states you can’t start a business with “engineering” in the name unless you have a certain percentage of owners/principals with an engineering license.[1]

What actually happens is conflating terms in common parlance. “Engineer” and “engineer” are not necessarily the same. For example, a computer engineer may work under an industrial exemption (due to working in a manufacturing service) while a software engineer does not. Legally, an “Engineer” claims an explicit responsibility to public safety.[2] Apropos to the headline article, there is a distinction with this difference.

[1] https://fxbinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/state-by-state...

[2] https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/11/progr...

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