"Roland Perry" wrote in message
...
In message , at 20:30:07 on Sat, 14 Jan 2017,
tim... remarked:

Ah, a slight light dawns - you think Uber is just an App, and the
tooth fairly provided the backoffice/online platform?

There is no connection with this discussion on the way that "software
engineer" has been Hijacked

and Uber's requirement.

You are still insisting that it doesn't require software engineers to
build Uber's platform?

Jesus, no I am not

You really are not understanding the point that I made

Just to be clear, you *do* accept that the term "software engineering"
applies to the task of implementing Uber's platform?

like all software, yes

I have written Windows Applications in a past world (starting at 2.0)

Bully for you. Uber's backoffice/online platform is not an
"application".

the back office part isn't, and even when I did work on Win stuff I had no
experience of that.

As to the online part, surely it is, as in "there an app for that!"

In the days of Windows 2.0 there was a Windows app which purported to
produce customised Windows apps. The problem was that both the app itself,
and its offspring were excrutiatingly slow, and the offspring had a very
limited UI feature set.

but it was also possible to write "raw" windows code, that used an SDK.

Fast forward to today, and the way you make a new Android App is to use an
SDK on a PC (not an Android app on a phone).

This is no different to my writing ARM targeted code on a (Intel based) PC

I'm talking about software which is engineered to provide an
integrated solution, thus Google's search engine and cloud processing
counts, even though you need a browser and operating system on your
device to access it. Ditto eBay's trading platform.

But the point is that you were using this example as some sort of proof
that there is some similarity in the way that software developers work
proficiently on software for an engineering product.

All the deliverables above (Uber, Google, eBay) are engineering
products.

I don't agree

they use programs that run on general purpose computers (except for edge
cases like Google glass)

None of the companies substantive products requires "traditional"
engineering skills, except whilst writing software.

Is there an invisible "electronic" in front of "engineering" there?

No, that's just one option.

If so that's just one of dozens of types of engineering. If you have some
pressing need to include metal[1]-bashing into anything you are prepared
to call an engineering product then perhaps you aren't aware that Google
designs and builds its own data centres, full of generators, air
conditioning and all sorts of other non-softwary things.

[1] Semiconductors are metal for the purpose of this discussion

I know nothing about Blockchain,

QED, which is why it's necessary to recruit new blood which does.

Of course it's necessary to recruit more staff if you need them

But you will recall that the discussion was about getting skilled people
and the learning curve if you couldn't

Which is the situation today. A huge skills shortage in the areas under
discussion.

The one you are now discussing perhaps, but not where we came in

You don't recruit and train people to use random development environments
that don't bring anything to your type of product.

FSVO "you". I'd be looking at "the industry as a whole", not each company
separately.

I'm looking at the industry as a whole

This Blockchain tool/process appears to be targeted at database requirements
(if this isn't so you need to tell me)

So there is no point even thinking of using it on a product that doesn't
require a database.


it is (/would appear to be) not a useful tool when writing software for
an engineering product.

Blockchain isn't a tool, it's a process (or protocol if you prefer).

Though it seems to be something to do with accessing stored records (let's
call that a database, shall we?)

One way of thinking about it that it's to databases, what bitcoin is to
money in your bank account.

I have no idea what bitcoin is to my bank account

Bitcoin is a chimera

https://www.ft.com/content/b5d66ed8-...b-680c49b4b4c0

(Sorry, you have to register, but you can read it for free if you do)

tim