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The problem with making programming a regulated profession is who gets to define the regulations. You are probably imagining that it would be expert developers

The problem with making programming a regulated profession is who gets to define the regulations. You are probably imagining that it would be expert developers with a track record of success. I would bet on it being the people who write lots of blog posts and books about programming and give lots of conference keynotes - whether or not those people have any evidence base to support their advocated policies or any personal track record of delivering good software.

e2le 1mo ago
> You are probably imagining that it would be expert developers with a track record of success. I'll admit I am unsure how such individuals would be chosen. I imagine it would be prudent to learn what processes are used by other licensed professions when choosing such individuals. > who write lots of blog posts and books about programming and give lots of conference keynotes I do not think people who write blog posts and give conference keynotes should be awarded with roles that regulate the profession because they write blog posts and give keynotes. I would hope that any regulation is evidence driven.
- NateEag 1mo ago
  > I would hope that any regulation is evidence driven. Have you found existing regulation in any field that's evidence-driven? My impression is that regulation is not made in a way that has much to do with evidence, but I would be delighted to be shown evidence I'm wrong.
  - decimalenough 1mo ago
    Aviation comes to mind. Most aviation regulations exist because people died. It's hardly a perfect system, but the problem is mostly that it's too conservative and risk aware, making it difficult to impossible to innovate and ignoring the risk this creates. (The world's most popular light aircraft is the 1950s-vintage Cessna 172, mostly because it's impossibly slow and costly to get a reasonably priced modern competitor certified.)
    - NateEag 1mo ago
      Thank you for the data point. I guess I had overlooked that.
  - unknownfuture 1mo ago
    Have you never heard the adage that regulations are written in blood? Plenty of regulations in many many fields are evidence based. Sure, many are not. But to make such a blanket statement is absurd.
- rayiner 1mo ago
  > I'll admit I am unsure how such individuals would be chosen. I imagine it would be prudent to learn what processes are used by other licensed professions when choosing such individuals. Licensing organizations disproportionately attract people who enjoy "administrating" over "doing."
  - 9cb14c1ec0 1mo ago
    Other those who prioritize profits over providing good customer service.
    - rayiner 1mo ago
      People who enjoy administrating rarely think you’re the “customer” lol.
- amoss 1mo ago
  What you have to remember is that the people who decide who to appoint into these roles are another step removed from the problem domain. They will have no programming experience, or the ability to evaluate programming experience. They will try and rely on metrics or some "data-driven" approach to deciding who to appoint. What kind of data will they look towards? Here, we have a precedent from frantically points to absolutely everywhere around us. So the people with "engagement" and "reputation", i.e. they gushed on their blog and farmed engagement, will be exactly who gets appointed to make the decisions.
akiselev 1mo ago
The important part of the professional certification like PE or MD is the liability that comes with it, which means that the professional has a lot more agency. A construction firm or hospital can't really force their professionals to do anything because the consequence is criminal prosecution (and a lot of legal liability for the employer). Bring a software engineer into a courtroom as an expert witness, and the jury's eyes will glaze over. Bring in the PE who told their firm not to cut that corner, and the hammer comes down hard. Even if the certification for software engineers starts as barebones as knowing what WASP is, it still provides an avenue for the feedback mechanism to work (the rules "written in blood"), so that the entire industry can study and learn from what happened, instead of this mess we have now, the peak of which is postmortem blog posts. Even now we have plenty of examples of regulatory frameworks where the regulations adapt to the field like the FDA where you've got a huge spectrum ranging from diagnostics to medical devices of which where are many classes, and drugs where every clinical trial can be tailored to the exact nature of the disease.
- Silhouette 1mo ago
  I have been a professional software developer for decades and worked in several roles where quality and security were at a premium but I have no idea what you mean by WASP. And yet you described it as "barebones" - an interesting illustration of the problem here. Real engineers have many years seeing the hard way what actually works. In software we don't have that kind of consistency and shared understanding of how to reliably get good results yet.
  - coderenegade 1mo ago
    In my experience, good software engineers are often better "engineers" than those working in more physical disciplines, because they get a lot more practice. But traditional engineers have a far better culture when it comes to testing and validation. Since the cycle time is longer, and the cost of mistakes is higher, analysis and testing are generally baked in from the beginning. In software, it's easier to skip that stuff. But software engineers who do get indoctrinated into that culture learn most of the same lessons that traditional engineers do (i.e. how can a component be tested and maintained? what makes for a good design?) and the speed of development means they get more exposure to those types of challenges in general.
inigyou 1mo ago
Once I was talking about a video game and mentioned a global variable holding a reference to the player character and got the eyes wide open horrified look. Those people would be writing the regulations.
- lilbigdoot 1mo ago
  I am a FP nerd and I approve this message

e2le 1mo ago

> You are probably imagining that it would be expert developers with a track record of success. I'll admit I am unsure how such individuals would be chosen. I imagine it would be prudent to learn what processes are used by other licensed professions when choosing such individuals. > who write lots of blog posts and books about programming and give lots of conference keynotes I do not think people who write blog posts and give conference keynotes should be awarded with roles that regulate the profession because they write blog posts and give keynotes. I would hope that any regulation is evidence driven.

NateEag 1mo ago
> I would hope that any regulation is evidence driven. Have you found existing regulation in any field that's evidence-driven? My impression is that regulation is not made in a way that has much to do with evidence, but I would be delighted to be shown evidence I'm wrong.
- decimalenough 1mo ago
  Aviation comes to mind. Most aviation regulations exist because people died. It's hardly a perfect system, but the problem is mostly that it's too conservative and risk aware, making it difficult to impossible to innovate and ignoring the risk this creates. (The world's most popular light aircraft is the 1950s-vintage Cessna 172, mostly because it's impossibly slow and costly to get a reasonably priced modern competitor certified.)
  - NateEag 1mo ago
    Thank you for the data point. I guess I had overlooked that.
- unknownfuture 1mo ago
  Have you never heard the adage that regulations are written in blood? Plenty of regulations in many many fields are evidence based. Sure, many are not. But to make such a blanket statement is absurd.
rayiner 1mo ago
> I'll admit I am unsure how such individuals would be chosen. I imagine it would be prudent to learn what processes are used by other licensed professions when choosing such individuals. Licensing organizations disproportionately attract people who enjoy "administrating" over "doing."
- 9cb14c1ec0 1mo ago
  Other those who prioritize profits over providing good customer service.
  - rayiner 1mo ago
    People who enjoy administrating rarely think you’re the “customer” lol.
amoss 1mo ago
What you have to remember is that the people who decide who to appoint into these roles are another step removed from the problem domain. They will have no programming experience, or the ability to evaluate programming experience. They will try and rely on metrics or some "data-driven" approach to deciding who to appoint. What kind of data will they look towards? Here, we have a precedent from frantically points to absolutely everywhere around us. So the people with "engagement" and "reputation", i.e. they gushed on their blog and farmed engagement, will be exactly who gets appointed to make the decisions.

akiselev 1mo ago

The important part of the professional certification like PE or MD is the liability that comes with it, which means that the professional has a lot more agency. A construction firm or hospital can't really force their professionals to do anything because the consequence is criminal prosecution (and a lot of legal liability for the employer). Bring a software engineer into a courtroom as an expert witness, and the jury's eyes will glaze over. Bring in the PE who told their firm not to cut that corner, and the hammer comes down hard. Even if the certification for software engineers starts as barebones as knowing what WASP is, it still provides an avenue for the feedback mechanism to work (the rules "written in blood"), so that the entire industry can study and learn from what happened, instead of this mess we have now, the peak of which is postmortem blog posts. Even now we have plenty of examples of regulatory frameworks where the regulations adapt to the field like the FDA where you've got a huge spectrum ranging from diagnostics to medical devices of which where are many classes, and drugs where every clinical trial can be tailored to the exact nature of the disease.

Silhouette 1mo ago
I have been a professional software developer for decades and worked in several roles where quality and security were at a premium but I have no idea what you mean by WASP. And yet you described it as "barebones" - an interesting illustration of the problem here. Real engineers have many years seeing the hard way what actually works. In software we don't have that kind of consistency and shared understanding of how to reliably get good results yet.
- coderenegade 1mo ago
  In my experience, good software engineers are often better "engineers" than those working in more physical disciplines, because they get a lot more practice. But traditional engineers have a far better culture when it comes to testing and validation. Since the cycle time is longer, and the cost of mistakes is higher, analysis and testing are generally baked in from the beginning. In software, it's easier to skip that stuff. But software engineers who do get indoctrinated into that culture learn most of the same lessons that traditional engineers do (i.e. how can a component be tested and maintained? what makes for a good design?) and the speed of development means they get more exposure to those types of challenges in general.

inigyou 1mo ago

Once I was talking about a video game and mentioned a global variable holding a reference to the player character and got the eyes wide open horrified look. Those people would be writing the regulations.

lilbigdoot 1mo ago
I am a FP nerd and I approve this message