software engineer a software engineer writing javascript a software engineer is a person who applies the principles of software engineering to the design development maintenance testing and evaluation of computer software prior to the mid1970s software practitioners called themselves computer programmers or software developers regardless of their actual jobs many people prefer to call themselves software developer and programmer because most widely agree what these terms mean while the exact meaning of software engineer is still being debated education the examples and perspective in this article may not represent a worldwide view of the subject you may improve this article discuss the issue on the talk page or create a new article as appropriate november 2010 learn how and when to remove this template message half of all practitioners today have degrees in computer science information systems or information technology a small but growing number of practitioners have software engineering degrees in 1987 imperial college london introduced the first threeyear software engineering bachelors degree in the uk and the world in the following year the university of sheffield established a similar program since then software engineering undergraduate degrees have been established at many universities a standard international curriculum for undergraduate software engineering degrees was recently in the us about 50 universities offer software engineering degrees which teach both computer science and engineering principles and practices the first software engineering masters degree was established at seattle university in 1979 since then graduate software engineering degrees have been made available from many more universities likewise in canada the canadian engineering accreditation board ceab of the canadian council of professional engineers has recognized several software engineering programs in 1998 the us naval postgraduate school nps established the first doctorate program in software engineering in the world other degrees in business some software engineering practitioners have mis or computer information systems degrees in embedded systems some have electrical engineering electronics engineering computer science with emphasis in embedded systems or computer engineering degrees because embedded software often requires a detailed understanding of hardware in medical software practitioners may have medical informatics general medical or biology degrees some practitioners have mathematics science engineering or technology stem degrees some have philosophy logic in particular or other nontechnical degrees profession employment see also software engineering demographics most software engineers work as employees or contractors software engineers work with businesses government agencies civilian or military and nonprofit organizations some software engineers work on their own as consulting software engineers some organizations have specialists to perform all of the tasks in the software development process other organizations separate software engineers based on specific softwareengineering tasks these companies sometimes hire interns possibly university or college students over a short time in large projects software engineers are distinguished from people who specialize in only one role because they take part in the design as well as the programming of the project in small projects software engineers will usually fill several or all roles at the same time specializations include in industry analysts architects developers testers technical support managers in academia educators researchers there is considerable debate over the future employment prospects for software engineers and other it professionals for example an online futures market called the future of it jobs in america attempted to answer whether there would be more it jobs including software engineers in 2012 than there were in 2002 possible opportunities for advancement can be as a software engineer then to a senior software engineer or straight to a senior software engineer depending on skills and reputation services exist that are trying to better gauge the coding ability of an engineer given not all engineers progress their abilities at the same rate and to make it easier for both employers and employees to find a good match in terms of jobs software developers working in academia in the uk have founded and fostered the concept of a research software engineer rse work this job is officebased and most of the work is done during normal office hours but can sometimes lead to working away and working late or during weekends depending on where and when the client is situated the job can also be done at home or anywhere a computer is set up impact of globalization most students in the developed world have avoided degrees related to software engineering because of the fear of offshore outsourcing importing software products or services from other countries and of being displaced by foreign visa workers often one is expected to start out as a computer programmer before being promoted to software engineer thus the career path to software engineering may be rough especially during recessions some career counselors suggest a student also focus on people skills and business skills rather than purely technical skills because such soft skills are allegedly more difficult to offshore reasonable command over reading writing speaking english is asked by most of employers prizes there are several prizes in the field of software engineering the codie awards is a yearly award issued by the software and information industry association for excellence in software development within the software industry jolt awards are awards in the software industry stevens award is a software engineering award given in memory of wayne stevens use of the title engineer software engineering professionalism and regulation and licensure in engineering origin of the term margaret hamilton promoted the term software engineering during her work on the apollo program the term engineering was used to acknowledge that the work should be taken just as seriously as other contributions toward the advancement of technology hamilton details her use of the termwhen i first came up with the term no one had heard of it before at least in our world it was an ongoing joke for a long time they liked to kid me about my radical ideas it was a memorable day when one of the most respected hardware gurus explained to everyone in a meeting that he agreed with me that the process of building software should also be considered an engineering discipline just like with hardware not because of his acceptance of the new term per se but because we had earned his and the acceptance of the others in the room as being in an engineering field in its own right suitability of the term one could argue that software engineering implies a certain level of academic training professional discipline adherence to formal processes and especially legal liability that often are not applied in cases of software development a common analogy is that working in construction does not make one a civil engineer and so writing code does not make one a software engineer furthermore because computing doesnt utilize the methods of mathematical physics common to all conventional engineering disciplines it is more appropriate to call those engaged in this occupation as software developers or similar in 1978 computer scientist e w dijkstra wrote in a paper that the coining of the term software engineer was not useful since it was an inappropriate analogy the existence of the mere term has been the base of a number of extremely shallowand falseanalogies which just confuse the issue computers are such exceptional gadgets that there is good reason to assume that most analogies with other disciplines are too shallow to be of any positive value are even so shallow that they are only confusing in each of the last few decades at least one radical new approach has entered the mainstream of software development eg structured programming object orientation implying that the field is still changing too rapidly to be considered an engineering discipline proponents argue that the supposedly radical new approaches are evolutionary rather than revolutionary individual commentators have disagreed sharply on how to define software engineering or its legitimacy as an engineering discipline david parnas has said that software engineering is in fact a form of engineering regulatory classification canada in canada the use of the job title engineer is controlled in each province by selfregulating professional engineering organizations who are also tasked with enforcement of the governing legislation the intent is that any individual holding themselves out as an engineer has been verified to have been educated to a certain accredited level and their professional practice is subject to a code of ethics and peer scrutiny it is also illegal to use the title engineer in canada unless an individual is licensed in ontario the professional engineers act it professionals with degrees in other fields such as computer science or information systems are restricted from using the title software engineer or wording software engineer in a title depending on their province or territory of residence in some instances cases have been taken to court regarding the illegal use of the protected title engineer france in france the term ingnieur engineer is not a protected title and can be used by anyone even by those who do not possess an academic degree however the title ingnieur diplom graduate engineer is an official academic title that is protected by the government and is associated with the diplme dingnieur which is one of the most prestigious academic degrees in france iceland the use of the title tlvunarfringur computer scientist is protected by law in iceland new zealand in new zealand the institution of professional engineers new zealand ipenz which licenses and regulates the countrys chartered engineers cpeng recognizes software engineering as a legitimate branch of professional engineering and accepts application of software engineers to obtain chartered status provided he or she has a tertiary degree of approved subjects software engineering is included whereas computer science is normally not united states the bureau of labor statistics bls classifies computer software engineers as a subcategory of computer specialists along with occupations such as computer scientist programmer and network administrator many states prohibit unlicensed persons from calling themselves an engineer or from indicating branches or specialties not covered licensing acts in april 2013 the national council of examiners for engineering and surveying ncees began offering a professional engineer pe exam for software engineering the exam was developed in association with the ieee computer society wikimedia commons has media related to software engineers computer science portal bachelor of science in information technology bachelor of software engineering consulting software engineer release engineer software engineering institute vtesoftware engineeringfields computer programming requirements engineering software deployment software design software maintenance software testing systems analysis formal methods concepts data modeling enterprise architecture functional specification modeling language orthogonality programming paradigm software software archaeology software architecture software configuration management software development methodology software development process software quality software quality assurance software verification and validation structured analysis orientations agile aspectoriented object orientation ontology service orientation sdlc modelsdevelopmental agile eup executable uml incremental model iterative model prototype model rad up scrum spiral model vmodel waterfall model xp other spice cmmi data model er model function model information model metamodeling object model systems model view model languages idef uml usl sysml softwareengineers victor basili kent beck grady booch fred brooks barry boehm peter chen danese cooper ward cunningham tom demarco edsger w dijkstra delores m etter martin fowler adele goldstine margaret hamilton c a r hoare lois haibt mary jean harrold grace hopper watts humphrey michael a jackson ivar jacobson alan kay nancy leveson stephen j mellor bertrand meyer david parnas trygve reenskaug winston w royce james rumbaugh mary shaw peri tarr elaine weyuker niklaus wirth edward yourdon related fields computer science computer engineering project management risk management systems engineering category commons 