FurrBall

How many Ph.D's have you met who can't write software? If years of study is not a good measuring stick, I don't see how a "software engineer" certification will help.

I see it as red tape. For serious work you have serious interviews. It doesn't involve looking at their certs and degrees.

It comes down money. There will be a fee paid for the exam. Will other organizations be able to offer certification or will IEEE have a monopoly?

"I should be grateful that at least I have a job in this economic climate"

Really? How about you test that theory by seeing what hits you get in a job search or with a recruiter. You don't need to quit your job to start your search.

"Also I do not know"

Start a job search then you'll know.

"i have seen...."

ads, offers, or friends salaries?

There are 2 kinds of work.

1. Execution of a process. 2. Creation of a process.

Execution can be automated. A factory can be automated with robots. Someone who makes backups can be automated with a script.

But creation (of a process) cannot be automated. Until we have a major breakthrough in AI our jobs are safe. Most programming is the creation of a process, not the rote following of a process. "Programmers" making cookie-cutter-CRUD apps may need to worry!

Our only threats are over supply and under demand. We are currently on the winning side of supply/demand. Competition with low-wage countries has not been able to significantly hurt us they way it has with factory work. We are in a good spot.

The best tool for that is a programming language.

Patent law needs to be overhauled. It's getting ridiculous. If you are successful you WILL be sued by a troll for infringing their "breathing air" patent.

I don't have advice, only sympathy.

Not to mention ammunition is extremely liquid. It's used as currency in some countries.

The wealth of an individual has no bearing on the value of an item. Guns themselves are high value items. Easy to sell for several hundred dollars depending on the model.

High end guns can be sold for several thousand dollars.

More value and liquidity than a TV.

Same reason you wouldn't advertise you have a stash of gold in the house.

Pre: Locks, security stickers on the windows, barking dogs, good lighting, fake or real visible cameras.

During: security system that calls police. Fire arm (last resort).

Post: hidden cameras so you have a record of what happened.

Whether the non-technical guy is uncommitted depends on how much money he is sinking in. Ponying up the cash is an important and legitimate contribution.

If someone drops 1 mil to build an app I would say they are committed.

A 50% pay increase? Go for the money.

Don't hold onto your preferred practices so strongly that you forfeit your own market value.

Personally I would go with Lisp. The symmetry between data and executable code affords flexibility beyond compare. You have a first class suite of tools with Emacs + SLIME + Paredit. You have native deployment on multiple platforms to boot. Can't go wrong.

If you prefer static typing I'd choose C++ over Go. Good old C++ may not be the flavor of the week but it is almost as dummy-easy as Java if you use smart pointers and RAII. It has excellent generics support, something sadly missing from Go. Great mutli-platform native deployment.

Math time! Lets assume you do not work during college and must pay with loans. Here is where you could be in 4 years time with each path.

College: -50k (debt) and a degree in CS.

Work: 480k (cash) and 4 years experience.

There's 530k difference between these two options. The math is a bit off since I didn't factor in tax, but I also did not factor in interest for the debt.

If you really have the skills to get a 120k job then there is no financial reason to go to college. Go to college if you feel the experience is worth a 530k sway in 4 years.

I would not set up a standing desk. The idea of exercising while you work is nice, but it would totally destroy my mental zone.

Absolutely. We should not have to waste time proving a patent is bad.

The root of the problem, the patent system itself need to be abolished.

I would learn Common Lisp. It's not strongly tied to a paradigm like Haskell. For the same reason I'd stay away from Clojure. I think forcing a particular view or paradigm makes a language less "exotic".

CL molds itself to the paradigm and problem domain with no bias. It allows ultimate macro power even over other Lisp dialects.

There are efficient compilers. It's not tied to the JVM so you can deploy native, but there is a JVM alternative if you want it.

Isn't it obvious? They want you working as an engineer.

Their goal is to generate revenue. They don't want a vacancy on the team that's supposed to be generating revenue. Your jump to the statistics team makes their engineering team look like a sinking ship.