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Software Engineering

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    +1 Thanks for the insight. "to design if you know know how things work" -> " to design if you don't know how things work" ? Commented Aug 1, 2012 at 10:07
  • Hey builder, I suggested some edits to this post, I think you have excellent points, I just tried to clean up some grammar. Commented Aug 1, 2012 at 16:28
  • I definitely agree with the point about programming being more of an art than engineering. I often find creativity as a core aspect in software design. Commented Nov 25, 2014 at 6:03
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    I disagree with the assertion that a large software project and a tower have similar complexity - based on my experience working as both a structural engineer and a software engineer, I'd say software complexity is much higher. There's probably a raft of reasons for this, but the one I'd suggest is that there's a whole lot of wiggle room in engineering; the upper bound of construction design is almost always given by cost, and that's a soft constraint. Software needs to be exact, since computers don't deal with ambiguity well. Slab not working? Add a shitload of steel, she'll be right. Commented Oct 7, 2017 at 11:32
  • Some people do design and build buildings for pleasure. Don't tell my employer, but now that I think of it some of my software is like the Sagrada Familia: Idiosyncratic, too many ornaments, never quite finished; but of interesting design, fun to build and use and still standing. Commented Jul 16, 2018 at 12:13