Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!ukma!uflorida!novavax!weiner
From: weiner@novavax.UUCP (Bob Weiner)
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
Subject: Re: Component Specification (Was Re: software engineers)
Message-ID: <1275@novavax.UUCP>
Date: 18 May 89 23:00:26 GMT
References: <1736@internal.Apple.COM> <493@bnr-fos.UUCP> <1764@internal.Apple.COM> <495@bnr-fos.UUCP>
Organization: Motorola, Inc.
Lines: 38
In-reply-to: schow@leibniz.uucp's message of 11 May 89 04:19:54 GMT
Posting-Front-End: GNU Emacs 18.47.5 of Tue Sep 15 1987 on novavax (berkeley-unix)


Stanley Chow (schow@BNR.CA) writes:
> It appears to me to be a matter of expectation. Hardware types won't
> even think about using a part unless the specs are there. Software
> types don't care.  This may have something to do with specialization:
> there are IC vs PCB designers, analog vs digital designers, micro-wave
> vs RF designers, etc.  Many software people seem to think they can do
> it all.

This is an egregious misstatement.  I know many, many electrical
engineers who also write software and though they spec their hardware
one way, they do a horrible job on their software specs (if they ever
even write a single word).

Hence, it is not a problem with the mindset of software engineers, but
more with the rest of the world, management in particular.  They are the
ones who let electricals focus on a very narrow area of expertise for
more money than they pay software engineers that they expect to be able
to solve any problem regardless of size, domain, complexity, etc., as
long as it is deemed 'implementable' in software.

Most real-world software engineering projects use many software
engineers with little or no experience in the problem domain of the
project.  The software engineers know their base of knowledge well, but
no amount of clamoring for 'domain experts' or 'close interaction with
the customer' will change many manager's minds.

Until software engineers are allowed to specialize as are their
engineering brethren, the low quality and rampantly bad estimations
associated with today's software projects will continue.  One could also
argue that software should not be viewed as a panacea for all of the
system complexities that electrical engineers have trouble putting into
reliable hardware.


-- 
Bob Weiner, Motorola, Inc.,   USENET:  ...!gatech!uflorida!novavax!weiner
(407) 738-2087