Embedded Systems Engineering Standards Column vol 16.5 August October 2008 A Standard Individual: What has the BCS and IET done for us? By Chris Hills

These are my own personal views and not those of my company Phaedrus Systems see www.phaedsys.com which is where the full version of this column, with links etc, resides under the Documents tab.

 

As a member of the BCS I recently got paperwork through urging me to vote “yes” to the BCS adopting the CITP (Chartered IT Professional) and franchising it to other organisations. Internally they have had the CITP for a while but now they want to make it available to other organisations. Having been in software for about 30 years I have yet to do more than 6 months IT and that was not on Windows or Unix network but an old mini computer.  So I wondered what they are playing at.  Also I wondered what they are doing for the rest of us non IT software people. A couple of years ago the IET merged with the IIE and is now expanding its Tech Eng level. Why? More members equals more subscriptions?  Why are neither of them pushing C.Eng?

 

So I phoned up Ian Ryder a BCS Director and Michelle Richmond a Director of the IET for comment. The following are not quotes from them by but my overall impressions of the two, separate conversations.

 

I got to the BCS first. Their view was that the majority of their members were more in the IT sector than engineering.  The average IT person would run a mile from the term “Engineer” much as all SW Engineers know that all IT people are cowboys…  (we have seen the comedy series on TV).   So it seems the BCS feels that it has an impossible task to get many of it’s members to look at C.Eng.  Also there are a large number of non BCS people who have not or will not join as there is not real incentive and they also do not see themselves as engineers. However CITP is something they would look at and the BCS is hoping that not only will more of its members want the CITP but it will attract new members too.  Though the cynical amongst you may still think this is a marketing or money making enterprise I think they do have a point.  Though the discussion amongst some BCS members at the IET Systems Safety conference thought the BCS was shooting itself in the foot as people in other organisations could get the CITP and not bother joining the BCS.  This remains to be seen.

 

The BCS, I think, sees the embedded world as more the domain of the IET. Certainly the vast majority of their members are in IT not embedded. So I think we can see little coming from the BCS specifically for their few embedded software engineers.

 

To put it in perspective the BCS has about 65K members, the majority in IT and the IET about 150K Members. The majority of the IET members would see themselves as Engineers. 

 

So the BCS is hoping that it will, with the CITP, get more of it’s members to the Chartered [ITP] level and hence improve the profile of the Chartered computing Professionals in the UK.  Also many of those with CITP may want to additionally gain the C.Eng which on a unscientific poll of a few C.Eng.s’ and a couple of CITP’s is seen as a higher grade than the CITP.   

 

The BCS thinking is that in the future you will be required to be a CITP in order to sign off projects or parts of a project.  I have some sympathy for this strategy.    It will mean that in the computing industry we will see more people professionally qualified and Chartered status may actually become significant.  This could have a knock-on effect in other areas of computing.

 

Turning to the IET I had a discussion with Michelle Richmond, who it turned out, had managed Embedded Engineers before she became an IET Director. I commented on the item in their May 2007 news letter which said that they were helping the Eng Tech’s with a fast track to ECS but did not appear to be doing anything for the C.Eng.   The answer is that they wanted actually do something practical for the Eng Tech group of which there were five thousand and in a way were helping the C.Eng.

 

The problem the IEE had is that apart from the membership grades of Member and Fellow no other professional distinction than the C.Eng and it was that or nothing.  When they merged with the Institute of Incorporated Engineers and became the IET they gained the a body of Engineering Technicians and the   Engineering Technician and the Incorporated Engineer professional grades.   I understand that shortly these will be progressive. So you can apply and be told what level you are at and what you need to get to the next level. It will be worth applying in the New Year because unlike before it was pass/fail for C.Eng it will now be, for most of you, C. Eng. or I. Eng. with some at Eng. Tech.  In either the I. Eng. or Eng. Tech. case you will have a route forward to the next level.   Previously it was a case of either getting C.Eng or get nothing and having to do it all again from scratch in a few years time.

 

The idea being that if they can kick-start a lot more of the membership into gaining professional status the more it will become common in the industry.  Apparently at the moment about 50% of the IET membership has Tech. Eng, I.Eng. or C.Eng at the moment and the IET want encourage the other 50% to take it up.

 

In my non-legally qualified opinion now the new Corporate Manslaughter Act is in it will become far more important to be professionally qualified.  Hopefully when it is launched in the New Yeare new IET system means you can apply and you will get one of the three distinctions. More important you can build on the Eng Tech or I.Eng to get the C.Eng without having to start from scratch each time. It will be progressive.   I think this is better than the single shot pass/fail C.Eng all or nothing route.

 

Both organisations have claimed to have done lots of research… I know they did not ask you, or me, but they have both done a lot of work on it.  Not only in industry but academia and the Armed Forces, the military are now more technical then ever before and encouraging their people the take up of the professional grades where possible. 

 

The discussion wandered onto some form of protection fro the term Engineer as in many other countries, particularly in Europe.  Sadly the IET, and in fact all the UK  Engineering Institutes, have come to the conclusion that in the UK the term “engineer” has been so badly abused over many generations there is no way of salvaging it in the same way the word Architect is protected.  So the next best step are the protected C.Eng, I. Eng.  and Eng. Tech titles.

 

They hope that by getting the majority of the IET members with one of the three Professional designations they will be come more of a requirement by employers etc.  Both the IET and BCS pointed out that computing and software is a relatively new industry. It will take a while to sort itself out and get a proper structure as the other professions have.  Part of the problem was that in the 1980’s home computer boom anyone who could copy type a program out of a magazine into a home computer became “a programmer”.

On a very minor point the IET have said that on their forms and web sites where it asks Mr, Mis, Ms, Prof. Dr, Duke, Arch Bishop etc. they will now include the Eur. Ing pre-nominal. This is the pan European Equivalent of C.Eng that they administer and issue in the UK. Sadly their website and other forms have so far not recognised their highest professional grade.  

 

Well we may not get the term Engineer protected but I think things are going the right way in getting the professional status of the industry sorted. It will not happen overnight but do we have time?

 

According to The Guardian  http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/blog/2008/sep/09/kids.poll
a survey by Shell showed that Britain could be “loosing 60,000 scientists a year”. They asked 4000 fourteen year olds if they are interested in science.  What do 14 year olds know about science you ask?  Not a lot probably but that is the age where they choose their GCSE’s (O-levels to me). This is where they decide what career direction they want to go in.  Once on a path it is difficult to change if indeed you have any incentive to do so. Actually it appears the interest in science peaks around age 12.    

 

I dread to think what the response would be for [computing] engineering.  Other than wanting to be games programmers/players.   This is where the IET Imagineering http://www.imagineeringweb.co.uk/
and other initiatives http://www.theiet.org/education/promotingengineering/index.cfm
 can help.  see http://www.phaedsys.com/infor mation/ese/ese0408.html  where there are some contacts and http://www.phaedsys.com/infor mation/ese/ese0805.html  the IET initiative are worth supporting. See if your company can help locally.

 

A couple of interesting links came my way both on space software.  I read both and though they were very similar then I realised they are about a decade apart!  The first is:
http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/06/writestuff.html?page=0%2C0  and the second a fascinating interview (both the transcript and the mp3 sound track are available.
http://news.oreilly.com/2008/07/the-software-behind-the-mars-p.html    fascinating stuff. So when I say “good software comes from basic engineering discipline… its not rocket science.” I am wrong.  It is rocket science or rather rocket engineering.  

On a final note as this is the last column before Christmas presents is something you might like get for yourself or mention to your partner.   Cray has announced the CX1 super computer http://www.internetnews.com/hardware/article.php/3772471/Cray+Launches+a+Consumer+Supercomputer.htm
 I am serious, Cray’s used to cost the earth but this new CX1 http://www.cray.com/products/CX1.aspx   “consumer” version with around a teraflop of computing power starts at 5K GBP!! I think “typical”  configurations might be around 10K GBP  Going back a mere 20 years only a few governments could afford this sort of computing power.  Unlike the Cray 1 super computer it is quite small, does not incorporate a fish tank or seats.  It is about half the size of a standard fridge.

 

The question is, having bought one, what are you going to do with all that computing power?   Most novel suggestion sent in to me before the end of the year will win a copy of the book “Embedded Internet” on TCP/IP complete with a CD containing a full implementation that runs on an ARM part.  Seasons Greetings and a Happy New Year.

 

As usual any comments, praise or death threats to Chris at the adress below

 

 

Author Details and contact

 

Eur Ing Chris Hills BSc CEng MIET MBCS MIEEE  FRGS   FRSA is a Technical Specialist and can be reached at This Contact

 

Copyright Chris A Hills  2003 -2008
The right of Chris A Hills to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988