Re:Ask HN: Is prompt engineering just snake oil?
by 908B64B197 on Saturday April 22, 2023 @04:20PM
(#35670545)
> As to whether "Software engineering" is a real thing, well in one hand most of it isn't very process-oriented,
Part of the reason for that is the cost of iteration is much lower. So software engineers can afford having less rigorous process. And the tooling is getting better, with formal specification languages, type systems and static analyzer.
Rapid prototyping, microcontrollers and simulation tools brought some of the same possibilities in mechanical & electrical engineering. Even the traditionally very conservative space industry is embracing faster iteration cycles (at least, SpaceX is).
"Software on a microcontroller isn't engineering, it's just coding, but replace said software by TTL chips and PROMs and suddenly it's EE".
Here in France, the engineer diploma is a regulated thing, and there absolutely are software-centered engineering school who are accredited to deliver it, which is how I got mine.
It's in the "Grandes écoles" cursus, which usually follows a more classical STEM-centric cursus called "classes prépa".
As to whether "Software engineering" is a real thing, well on one hand most of it isn't very process-oriented, on the other hand there are such thing as ISO certification for software security, so it's less the individual which is regulated than it is the project in itself when it matters (like critical data-center, or handling of medical data), so it's not like there aren't any regulatory framework in the software world.