Ayende @ Rahienhttp://ayende.comAyende @ RahienCopyright (C) Ayende Rahien 2004 - 2021 (c) 202660Joshua Lewis commented on As to the methods there may be a million, but principles are fewConsider me chagrined. I agree completely that having a degree is often no indication of competence. When I consider things like networking, von Neumann machine architecture and even data structures etc, I think that (electrical) engineering degrees at least expose you to those kind of things, whereas non-engineers can not be guaranteed to know about such things. It is true that being exposed to these things is also no guarantee that the person was listening in class that day (I qualified with many of that kind of person). I believe it is also true that even the above-average developer does not necessarily need to know about these low-level issues to do well in his everyday job. That's why we have garbage collected languages, 'automatic capacity' data structures like generic Lists, serialisation etc. http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment18http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment18Tue, 12 Jan 2010 10:27:32 GMTSimon commented on As to the methods there may be a million, but principles are fewSounds like your talking about the law of leaky abstractions. Sometimes its useful to know what is going on with the system that you are dealing with [www.joelonsoftware.com/.../LeakyAbstractions.html](http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/LeakyAbstractions.html)http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment17http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment17Tue, 12 Jan 2010 08:24:19 GMTMe commented on As to the methods there may be a million, but principles are few@Arnis L. True. But not having a badge gets your resume thrown in the trash when they make the first cut during these difficult times. There are simply too many badged people, and many with a "post graduate badge." The "badge" is exactly what Joshua Lewis states, a marker that signifies some degree of competence. That's why we license people such as real estate brokers, accountants, lawyers, doctors, pest control people, and the list goes on forever. Getting licensed - errrr badged - is simply a manner to state to those you present yourself to, that you have mastered a certain level of skill as testified to by the "badger." http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment16http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment16Mon, 11 Jan 2010 20:40:12 GMTDmitry commented on As to the methods there may be a million, but principles are fewIn my experience a good engineering school will teach you the fundamentals. It will not make you a good developer but will provide the potential to be one. http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment15http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment15Mon, 11 Jan 2010 17:49:48 GMTSet commented on As to the methods there may be a million, but principles are fewThis discussion on degrees reminds me the old adage "No one ever got fired for buying IBM". Anyway I was wondering where your knowledge came, now I've my answer :) http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment14http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment14Mon, 11 Jan 2010 17:36:04 GMTFrank commented on As to the methods there may be a million, but principles are fewEven though I program against frameworks at a higher level, I am always interested in the low level details of how things work, like protocols for example. Up until now it has served me well, because once in a while you run into a problem, where you actually need to know how things actually work, instead of only knowing how to use the high level framework. It also helps me understanding new frameworks faster, since I already understand the basics of what they are trying to wrap. http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment13http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment13Mon, 11 Jan 2010 15:30:47 GMTfirefly commented on As to the methods there may be a million, but principles are few@ Arnis, it proves the abilities of one to put up with a lot of craps :))) http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment12http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment12Mon, 11 Jan 2010 13:49:37 GMTArnis L. commented on As to the methods there may be a million, but principles are few@Joshua I disagree with you. Degree badge proves *nothing*. It's all about ones will and ability to learn. @Ayende Thanks for inspiration. http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment11http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment11Mon, 11 Jan 2010 13:28:01 GMTWilliam commented on As to the methods there may be a million, but principles are fewQuestion I have is, if Java/C#/F# can replace the C/C++ route in 2010 to help grasp principles? http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment10http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment10Mon, 11 Jan 2010 12:42:08 GMTAdrian commented on As to the methods there may be a million, but principles are fewJoshua, no degree can indicate that someone has or not problem solving skills and the will to learn new things... http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment9http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment9Mon, 11 Jan 2010 12:29:36 GMTJoshua Lewis commented on As to the methods there may be a million, but principles are fewFair enough. Then let me rather say that I find qualified engineers come with the grasp of fundamentals already, i.e. they have to do a lot less self-learning to gain that information. I guess essentially I mean that knowing someone has an engineering degree is a reasonable yardstick, and is a good indicator of someone having that fundamental knowledge, as opposed to assessing it during an interview etc. http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment8http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment8Mon, 11 Jan 2010 11:51:25 GMTAyende Rahien commented on As to the methods there may be a million, but principles are fewA single course doesn't make a developer. It gave me a good grasp of the basics, but I learned a lot on my own http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment7http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment7Mon, 11 Jan 2010 11:41:57 GMTJoshua Lewis commented on As to the methods there may be a million, but principles are fewActually, since you took that C/C++ course, would you still consider yourself self-taught? :) http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment6http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment6Mon, 11 Jan 2010 11:37:58 GMTJoshua Lewis commented on As to the methods there may be a million, but principles are fewSure, but you're exceptional. You have the initiative to find out the things you don't know. (I concede that any non-engineer with that trait would likely exhibit the same). Anyway, my post is a generalisation, but I still think it's a valid point. http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment5http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment5Mon, 11 Jan 2010 11:29:44 GMTAyende Rahien commented on As to the methods there may be a million, but principles are fewFirefly, Checkout my Erlang & CouchDB posts http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment4http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment4Mon, 11 Jan 2010 11:21:38 GMTAyende Rahien commented on As to the methods there may be a million, but principles are fewJoshua, _I_ am self taught :-) http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment3http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment3Mon, 11 Jan 2010 11:21:03 GMTfirefly commented on As to the methods there may be a million, but principles are fewI agree, the fundamental are so important especially once you reach a certain level. Since you are such a smart guy I think you should take up on a functional language... Maybe extremely robust system are build on top of them. Because they require a totally different set of thinking they can open you up to many different possibilities... http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment2http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment2Mon, 11 Jan 2010 11:16:31 GMTJoshua Lewis commented on As to the methods there may be a million, but principles are fewI agree about understanding the low-level fundamentals, as well as the context of work. That is why I prefer hiring people with engineering degrees (as opposed to self-taught developers for example). (I'm also a bit of an elitist). I find that engineers, especially electrical engineers, have a very good grasp of the fundamentals (besides problem solving), and have a more rounded and diverse education. http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment1http://ayende.com/4359/as-to-the-methods-there-may-be-a-million-but-principles-are-few#comment1Mon, 11 Jan 2010 11:11:58 GMT