<p>I really like programming, physics, and math (in that order) so I thought a major like CS or CpE/EECS would be perfect for me, but the more I've read the less certain I've become. If you were in my place, would concerns over outsourcing and a competitive job market stop you from pursuing this major? If so, what other fields would you pursue? Assume that you also like chemistry more than biology and you find English tolerable to enjoyable.</p>
<p>Now back to your question:
Outsourcing is bad, but it’s inevitable. If you truly like the path and like the work, you should consider psure it. To make you a good candidate for future job placement, do things outside the classroom. This is the only way you can get employed as a CS major.
There are millions of us who can do programming, but not that many are elites and experienced :)</p>
<p>Oh, outsourcing. The interesting thing is, CS is the highest paid major in my school, and at least 70% of the companies in the tech career fair recruit for software engineering positions, despite CS being half the size of, say, meches, ece or ORIE. </p>
<p>If outsourcing is a problem, I haven’t noticed it. Oh and like 60% of the companies in the career automatically turned away people that needed visa sponsoring. They all had plaques so they wouldn’t repeat that demand again and again.</p>
<p>And come on, which major has a better outlook than CS? Now if all you’re planning to do is regression testing or something mindless like that (actually designing test cases and test suites is a highly desired skill though), then do expect to get replaced.</p>
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<p>To be optimistic, I just got a phone interview from a large software vendor near Seattle (CEO of which was a life hero for me when I was younger). I would really like the job if I can get it but some of the interview technical questions were hard. I guess there are still CS opportunities around but they are for the damn smart Stanford grads.</p>
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<p>Maybe some of them become managers. At the old place where I worked, many managers managed only 4 or 5 people.</p>
<p>Oh let me see, JPL, Lincoln Labs, Raytheon and Lockheed Martin for obvious reasons. Then there is the likes of GE, Blackrock, GS who always always ask me about my visa status. And the numerous mid-small employers like Workday, Epic and Numerica that just don’t want the hassle. I don’t think I’ve ever had an interview here that didn’t involve the question of visa/work status.</p>
<p>And give me a break, programmers? Of course people leave the programming position. Senior software engineers don’t write that much code simply because they spend most of their time designing software, arguing about architecture, managing, recruiting and of course, talking with clients/end users. Let’s be honest here, programming isn’t something experienced software engineers do a lot of. Their ability to make the architecture and lead projects is much more important. It’s like saying CS has incredible attrition by citing how almost no full time CS professors actually do much programming themselves. Well duh, the actual implementation is made by the grad students.</p>
<p>What happened to Economist10 or Economics10 (whatever his name was)? Maybe he suffered the same fate as poontang… lots of deleted users on this forum I guess?</p>
<p>outsourcing is a reality in CS.
But the job prospects for software engineering are probably stronger than any other engineering by far.</p>
<p>Just keep in mind that not every CS major is creating the logon screen to windows seven or the next iphone firmware.</p>
<p>fatpig554, are you a CS major?</p>
<p>Nah, I am an EE major but have a family full of software engineers.
I also did a couple software internships.</p>
<p>All of my CS friends all have jobs.</p>
<p>I’ve talked to HR and my friends, and from a purely anecdotal view, anyone who is competent at CS has a job right now.</p>
<p>Well, CS majors have to get through the never-ending lab assignments which can seem like hell. If you can get through that, then you can probably take what corporate America throws your way.</p>
<p>Thanks for all the replies. I think I’m ready to go for it. I figure that it’s hard to find stability in any field, so I might as well do something that I love.</p>
<p>^What kind of labs?</p>
<p>Projects. Lots of long projects (but they’re usually interesting and give you cool stuff to talk about during interviews).</p>
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[quote[What kind of labs?
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<p>Back in my day, the labs were assignments where you could only do the work at the college’s computer lab center. Either you had to wait your turn to use the needed computers OR you get yourself a case of Mountain Dew or Dr. Pepper and do your lab work after midnight.</p>
<p>Even today, Global, some of my upperclassmen complain about their “long assignments”.
I totally felt the pain that you went through. I feel lucky as a student in 2010.</p>
<p>I think that every engineering discipline has this where you do labs, psets, etc. where you really question if this is the field that you want to go through. There are schools where the workload is a lot easier but I’d guess that employers know them.</p>
<p>I took a few programming courses back in the late 70s and there was the IBM 360 (Batch/cards/printer) and the time-sharing terminals. I don’t recall personal computers back then. They did exist for hobbyists but college students didn’t typically have them.</p>
<p>In one of my son’s courses, he was one of two students out of the whole class to get a programming assignment finished. The next lab was based on the first lab and he was the only student to finish the second lab as those that didn’t finish the first couldn’t do the second. It should be interesting to see how the professor grades. The professor doesn’t really give you any information on how you write the program - just a specification. You have to figure out all of the other stuff on your own. Son spent a ton of time on these two programs. He’s also spent a lot of time on another course which has a lot of labs. His third CS class is a theory class so fewer labs.</p>
<p>[Why</a> computer science students cheat](<a href=“http://www.networkworld.com/news/2010/041910-computer-science-cheat.html]Why”>http://www.networkworld.com/news/2010/041910-computer-science-cheat.html)</p>
<p>Stanford University disclosed in February that 23% of its honor code violations involved computer science students, although these students represent only 6.5% of the student body. Of 123 honor code violations investigated last year by Stanford’s Judicial Panel, 28 involved computer science students. </p>
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<p>A computer science student admitted to Stanford is probably already pretty good at programming so why would any cheat (say copy another student’s code left in the trash or grab code off the web)? My assumption would be the time pressure on the labs. You can download the videos and probably find syllabi for their intro courses to get an idea of how much work a programming-oriented class entails.</p>
<p>This type of pressure work is seen in many real-world work environments but the difference in the working world is that there is downtime. You may work long hours for long stretches of time but there is usually scheduled tasks where there isn’t a lot of pressure and this is where people take vacations, unwind, relax, look at the big picture, etc.</p>
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<p>I work with at least 100 people in my building (software engineers) that are in their 50s and 60s. My manager is going to retire within two years. His manager is in his 60s too. I’ve been working with many of these people for the last 25 years.</p>
<p>^Sounds like Homer. Hmm, 4 posts, all with his tone of voice. This post also includes a familiar misspelling of his (“your” for “you’re”). Maybe he has an identical twin.</p>
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<p>My manager’s manager works in Silicon Valley. I know many that transferred to Silicon Valley and have regular email contact with them. While I don’t claim to know the jobs picture there, it is untrue that noone hires older workers. We do hire workers from around the country to work in New Hampshire.</p>
<p>Homer, you know that’s just pointless right?
Maybe he doesn’t want too much cynical views here. I think we all received the messages. Future CCers can search those posts if they need an answer.</p>