Software Engineering Licensing

Main issue is enforcement. Engineering is a good example. Engineers become licensed have guilds etc. Thing is they tend to work on things that are in the physical world and if they break they will cause death and destruction. So the government will force a company to have an engineer stamp that this design doesn't suck and hold them liable when it does. More importantly, most infrastructure projects engineers work on tend to have government involvement to begin with meaning that someone wit

I would imagine OP is referring to "Professional Engineer".https://www.nspe.org/resources/licensure/what-peEvery single design, bridge, etc is certified by a Professional Engineer. Your ass is on the line. I don't mean just being fired from your job - but jail time.Per the website:"A century ago, anyone could work as an engineer without p

Hmm, so maybe having software regulated like an actual engineering profession isn't such a terrible idea after all...

Your opinion is admirable but you're missing something.I, as a software engineer, sign nothing. I do not have a license, I do not have a labor union, and I do not have the "professional stature" to tell my boss to fuck off when he suggests something dangerous. The reason engineering disciplines have such benefits is because after enough cars crumbled and bridges fell the leaders in the industry conceded they needed to listen to professionals. I hear similar bad faith arg

Software Engineers aren't really engineers IMHO. In the US, Professional Engineers are often licensed and can be punished for malpractice. Maybe licensing and enforcing standards of practice wouldn't be such a bad idea for software engineers.

> [Engineers] are bound by honor and state regulatory boards to produce work that is correct, safe, and up to the best practices. Engineers can lose their licenses through negligence...Software development doesn’t have such rigorous accountability, and this may be the area where we stand to improve most.Are you serious?The last thing that software needs is to become part of the state superstructure of cronyistic 'regulation'.If "writing software without a license"

Software engineering could become a real profession with licensing like mechanical, electrical, chemical, civil, and other engineering professions. If you do something unethical, you could be sued for malpractice and lose your license to practice.The code of ethics for Professional Engineers works even though it isn’t any of the things you say are necessary.

Every time this comes up, people (some of whom are in this thread) end up talking about how this can't/shouldn't happen for software. After all, what, is every high-schooler or green college grad that ever wants to code their own app for a startup going to have to be professional certification?I guess I'd argue that those people shouldn't be legally allowed near this kind of thing without that kind of a certification. Looking into all of the other engineering discipli

I've been saying for years that software engineering needs to be elevated to the same standards held by other engineering fields; like civil, mechanical, biomedical, and so on:If an engineer or a firm is negligent and people die and/or millions of dollars are lost, they are kicked out of the industry/lose their right to operate as a business.For example: To work on cryptography and security, you need a degree and to have passed certification, perhaps at regular multi-year in

I hear what you're saying.I would argue that review boards, licensing, etc are only relevant because of the stakes. How to enforce it becomes irrelevant if you can't sell anybody on the idea that it's important in the first place.Even the strength of your statement "...I don't think it would hurt the industry to have..." doesn't sound like something that any part of government would be willing to get behind.There's just such a huge leap from &quo