| Everybody is responsible for their work, what I get from all_your_gold's comment is that it is the personal liability that professional engineers take on for their work that makes the difference between professional engineers and all other people calling themselves <various other adjectives> engineers. If I were a P. Eng and had to stamp the PLC programs I write I would be in a much different boat when bad things inevitably happen. I could be sued and held liable for lost revenue. There are much different risks and liabilities in embedded software where lives are at stake, and in machine or process control where physical damage to property and equipment could be a result than in any other business where the worst thing that can happen is lost revenue. I have never heard of anybody stamping a program, no matter what the risks and liabilities are it does not seem to be a requirement, but I think someone calling themselves a Professional Software Engineer should be stamping their work and taking on liability for it the same way professional civil, mechanical, electrical, etc engineers do, if they are going to call themselves Engineers. Does anyone have examples or anecdotes of a program being "sealed" by a professional engineer? I think the line between "software engineers" and all other titles is that "software engineers" should be using physics and hard sciences the same way civil, mechanical and electrical engineers do, but it so happens that they are using hard sciences in programs. Software Engineers may also have to apply computer science to solve their problems, but everyone applying computer science isn't necessarily doing engineering. defence, health, aerospace = software engineering to me, banking not so much, unless you stamp your program and are ready to be sued for everything you got if the customer has any excuse. |