Page 6 - Software Engineer

Some apps engineers work together to develop prepack-
aged computer applications that are sold to the general public.
Examples of such apps include the game Angry Birds or the so-
cial platform Snapchat. Apps engineers can create larger cus-
tomized programs for companies to use for things like inventory
or call-center tracking. Some of these
“Development is the engineers also develop custom data-
breath of a software bases, such as a specifi c program that
engineer—it’s what we the National Football League might want
live for. There’s nothing created to keep track of college team
more exciting than names, coaches, scoring percentages,
creating something and lineups for an entire division for re-
new.” 4
cruiting purposes. Retired Intel software
— Nicholas C. Zakas, software engineer Mark Russell created a custom
engineer program called Dolch Tally that searches
for and tallies a specifi c list of words in
text documents. Writers use it to track common word usage and
reading level in their manuscripts.
For creative types, idea creation and development is often
considered the best part of apps engineering. “Development is the
breath of a software engineer—it’s what we live for. There’s noth-
ing more exciting than creating something new,” says software
4
engineer Nicholas C. Zakas, who was a lead developer for Yahoo.
Computer Programmers: A Subset of

Apps Engineers

Computer programmers are also software engineers. They are
tasked with writing programs. “It used to be ‘programmer’ but
now you hear ‘software developer’ or ‘software architect’ for
higher-level people or team leads, and yes, many programmers
refer to themselves simply as ‘software engineer,’” says engineer
Matt Reisner. “I see job postings all the time that use these terms
interchangeably.” 5
After a program’s functionality and purpose are designed and
laid out, the programmer converts that design into an ordered
series of instructions that the computer executes. These instruc-
tions are often broken down into smaller commands, which are

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