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Comment by lambdaelite | Hacker News Reader

It's interesting to compare this list with the topics covered by the Software Engineering Book of Knowledge or the Software Engineering PE exam. Requirements engineering, formal documentation, estimation, project management, and ethics all seem to be overlooked in Google's guide.

I guess this is sufficient to be an engineer at Google, but this wouldn't be close to sufficient in other industries.

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That's software engineering 101. Everyone learns that in school. Of course Google still needs all of that, just like everyone else. But you can pick up the knowledge part (that is actually tested in exams) very, very quickly.

No, you can't pick it up "very, very quickly." That is a dismissive and indirect way to assert that engineering is somehow easier or requires less intellectual rigor than "higher" disciplines like CS or math.

Right. In school you can learn an ISO version that isn't relevant to he actual projects you take on a non-govt-contractor.

And note that the vs topics are also presented as not need in formal schooling to obtain.

I tried to make it very clear that you can pick up the knowledge-based part - or that part that you can learn at school or using books, which is also the part that is tested in exams - quickly. In that respect it is indeed easier.

What may not be that easy is the experience to make good decisions. But there is no clear path for that, except being an engineer for a sufficiently long time. This piece was targeted at students and you can't just tell them: "Keep working somewhere else for 10 years".

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