Questions tagged [professional-development]

13 questions
28
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3 answers

Can Software Engineers become certified Professional Engineers (PE)?

Does anyone know if a Software Engineer can become a certified Professional Engineer or PE for short? I know that my buddies who are Mechanical, Electrical, or Civil Engineers were able to become PEs by taking an exam. Does such an exam exist in…
25
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8 answers

How do you maintain productivity outside of work? (Programming Schedule)

I enjoy programming, but programming at work is just that, work. I would like to further develop my own personal interests in programming. Throughout the week I imagine myself completing a small project on the weekend or finishing up a programming…
snmcdonald
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12
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9 answers

How do I tell my parents that landing a job is what actually counts?

On one side, I just want to get a degree with a 3.0 GPA. On the other side, my parents want more than just a 3. Now here's the thing. I program with a passion. I spend day and night programming. And I ace all my programming courses. However, I do…
12
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3 answers

What problem domain is LINQ made for?

Each time I see a question posted on Stack Overflow on C#, I see at least one or two answers posted that solve a problem with LINQ. Usually people with very high reputation seem to use LINQ like pros. So my question is, what problem domain is LINQ…
11
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11 answers

Does searching documentation and samples look bad?

I am starting a new job in a company with many developers and media people, the layout of the place is open with computers around a skinny oval, I have worked in small teams and programming embedded C, the jobis for objective C I'm still in a medium…
10
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3 answers

Why does "front-end" only pertain to web development?

As a WPF developer, I was confused when I discovered that I'm not considered front-end because my platform isn't web, even though I clearly deal with user interaction and the front end of an application. One thought I had was that desktop…
7
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3 answers

Mostly produce output at programming job but don't learn anything

When I started working a programmer, I learned lots at first, on the job. Although Ive been given more responsibility, which is good in a way, it is mostly in the form of increased workload. I havent had much time or energy left to learn anything…
T. Webster
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5
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4 answers

Should I expect my peers to read or practice on a regular basis?

I've been debating asking this question for some time. Based several of the comments I read in this question I decided I had to ask. This feels like I'm stating the obvious, but I believe that regular reading (of books, blogs, StackOverflow,…
Joshua Smith
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5
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3 answers

learning on the clock

Some might argue this question is too general, but because keeping up seems especially relevant to programming, is anyone's experience that: do employers expect you to stay current? what is the "industry standard" of expected time a programmer…
T. Webster
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4
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2 answers

What is software maintenance?

I'm a hobbyist programmer, so no professional experience. People here often talk about doing maintenance of software at work. The author of this question talks about doing 90% maintenance and 10% development at his job. My question is: what is…
Aviv Cohn
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2
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1 answer

Some Insight on the Field of Knowledge Representations and Reasoning

I started following an MS in computer sciences after about two years of work for a software company. I worked primarily in data warehousing and business intelligence related software development during my previous occupation. There is a high chance…
1
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4 answers

Is it considered 'reasonable' to implement a major part of a program largely by subclassing a library class?

I'm planning to implement a word processor using Java, and Swing for the GUI. I was thinking how I can implement the text area where the user types the text. My idea was to subclass JTextArea. It already has a lot of functionality for setting text,…
Aviv Cohn
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0
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1 answer

What are good strategies to use for learning the workings of larger systems?

For obvious reasons (be a better developer) I desire to gain a deeper understanding of not just my code, but the systems / frameworks / libraries that I work with. As a senior-ish dev* I feel I should have more than a surface level understanding…