[ArGee]

My brother once called me about a problem in his (EE based) CompSci class. He was supposed to write a program to convert ASCII into codes that would lite up an LCD.

(If anyone doesn't know what any of that means, the rest won't mean anything to you so you can skip to the next post).

So my brother was getting caught up in this incredibly complex program trying to calculate the correct code for every character. Since I had already graduated he figured I would know a better answer and called me.

I told him that memory was cheap and programmer time was expensive. If he were working for me I would want him to build an indexed table in memory of all the correct codes and use the letter to grab the value out of the table and send it to the LCD. Long table. Short program that is easy to write and practically impossible to screw up. He said the prof used his homework to lecture the entire class about engineering trade-offs.

The problem with engineering courses is that they always teach the theory, but never the practical stuff. For that you have to spend about four years on the job. Then it all comes together and work can get done.

Shalom.

[afraidfortherepublic]

....engineering courses is that they always teach the theory, but never the practical stuff. For that you have to spend about four years on the job.

That is why you cannot get your professional engineering license until you have worked in an engineering capacity under the tutelege of another professional engineer for a few years in most states. Most engineers never get it.

[maxwell]

The problem with engineering courses is that they always teach the theory, but never the practical stuff. For that you have to spend about four years on the job. Then it all comes together and work can get done.

Well may be for engineering-- seems to me that y'all spend a heck of alot of time converting between units and whatnot-- but you wanna talk about five plus years of specialized education that nobody in industry would hire you for on a Christmas tree, look at physics.
I mean, look at me. Here I am futzing around with low-energy ion bombardment of surfaces and if I'm lucky I'll get a post-doc in plasma phys for a whoppin' $35k when I get out. If I'm real lucky I'll get some r&d position in industry, probably in plasma again... Point is, most of the stuff in my doctoral dissertation will mean dog-waste to employers. You wanna talk about limited usefulness of degrees... I kick myself in the a$$ every day for not going into engineering in the first place... I'd have a friggin' job by now, be making a heck of alot more than I am right now, haha...