Programmers v. Coders

[The Geek]

hmm. Depends on what type of coding... er, programming you are doing. I have been a professional programer for over 5 years and seldom need any complex math skills to accomplish what needs to be done.
Programming is now all about problem solving through using pre existing low level libraries to avoid reinventing the wheel. Low level programming is not nearly as common place as it used to be (thank god cause I dont have pateince for it)

[sonic3d]

i am very good in math. :P

l8er
sonic

[amykhar]

Just for the record, I never said I needed complex math skills to code. The last job where I really needed math, per say, was a defense contractor that I worked for. There was a bit of heavy duty math in some things we did.

The math courses help because they teach you to solve problems - to break down things into steps and work things through. It's a much more vital concept than understanding the syntax of a language.

Amy

[filburt1]

*shrug* I've taken both high school and college calculus (and obviously classes leading up to it) and I don't feel that I gained any problem-solving skills as a result, just knowledge of following already-proven, canned procedures for solving the problem. This is different from actually developing a unique and elegant solution.

But each to his (or her) own.

[Velocd]

The heart of the argument concerns jobs. One?s capacities, mental and physical, is thee factor in determining their chances at a job in the competitive market of today.

Does an elite programmer who learned their material from books have the level of ingenuity as one who majored with a bachelor in Computer Science, and went through many complex courses of math and physics?

A company needs somebody to write complex applications to interact with their Oracle database. The non-Bachelorette has the skill to do this, but so may the computer scientist.

Having physics, mathematics, and theory of computing will likely get the computer scientist the job over the other guy. This isn't to say it?s a false conception of worth, the computer scientist will no doubt have an easier time understanding difficulties and providing solutions. Why? It takes a huge mental capacity to learn many of the complexities in advanced math and physics classes. You?ve built yourself to depend so much on your mind to solving formulas, your brain is like a computer compiler. I?ve heard lectures from some computer scientist graduates, and the speed they can comprehend and make solutions for algorithms and any programming problems is amazing.

no but do you see my point that if your maths ability is increased then your actual language abilitys will drop so although you may recognize the simple patterns of the program languages (i.e abbreviations etc) then your business and natural language will deteriarate.

I don't think the human brain works this way at all. We have the capacity to carry an unbelievable amount of information, and access it at any time.

It is important to emphasize a balance in studies, though. Concentrating too much on math, and not getting English or other studies will dull your mind. Excelling your potential to learn math, physics, English, philosophy, computer science, etc. will make you a very complex and balanced thinker.

Not often do I see someone in the more advanced studies of math have poor English habits, like in college calculus, discrete mathematics, or linear algebra.

Too often around the web you see web coders with horrible English and grammar. Nobody is going to hire you in a well paying job with poor communication skills (bad grammar = bad communication, yes?)

I've drifted some with this post, but to conclude, getting a thorough and balanced education and always persisting to learn more will guarantee you success in any field.

[The Geek]

It depends on the job at hand.
Hiring Einstein to rework a business application is akin to wiping ketchup off your face with a shotgun.

In a business application scenario, experience versus degree every time. In fact, real world application jobs will almost always go to experience over degree.

For specialty apps and low level programming, those rightfully sit in the domain of the Hawkins