[Beowulf] Beowulf SysAdmin Job Description

[Peter St. John]

Nicholas,

Who tells you to stop writing code?
The whole point of FORTRAN was to make it possible to for engineers (who
understand their problem domains) to write their own code. And the situation
has just gotten better, not worse. Bookkeepers can set up their own
databases. Not big efficient ones maybe.

Programming is long since democratized. The languages just get higher level,
and more is automated, so eventually grandma will just ask for results and
not specfify any logic at all.

Sure you want trained software engineers for real time, mission critical,
etc etc,  and we produce the most good code per hour, but programming is
plenty accessible for domain experts to express themselves effectively.

My ha'penny,

Peter

On 5/7/09, Nicholas M Glykos <glykos at mbg.duth.gr> wrote:
>
>
>
> <snip>
>
> > Too many Ph.D persons (in fields other than Computer Science) assume
> > that any sort of computer work is something they could do in their
> > spare time, if they just took the time.
>
> </snip>
>
> Taking your point to its diametrically opposite extreme, I have repeatedly
> been told that I should stop writing code because there is no way that the
> code I manage to write could possibly compete with what a professional
> programmer could have written. They are, of course, absolutely right.
> Still, I would not trade the fun (and concurrent training) of solving my
> problems in my way with even the most highly optimised, readable and
> absolutely professional pieces of code.
>
> My twopence,
> Nicholas
>
>
>
> --
>
>
>           Dr Nicholas M. Glykos, Department of Molecular Biology
>      and Genetics, Democritus University of Thrace, University Campus,
>   Dragana, 68100 Alexandroupolis, Greece, Tel/Fax (office) +302551030620,
>     Ext.77620, Tel (lab) +302551030615, http://utopia.duth.gr/~glykos/
>
>
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