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10.09

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Good coverage of the process related to SE licensing. We need to also have a discussion of the more practical questions: 1) when might such a license be needed or appropriate? 2) how does this relate to the CSDP and CSDA certifications (particularly in terms of demonstrated competencies) 3) does this allow individuals to set up individual businesses as "software engineer" (a protected title in my state) 4) will a company need everybody who does software to be licensed?

Jim Isaak
IEEE Senior Member
Bedford, N.H.

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Water consumption? Not a single drop of water is "consumed" in the production of electricity by the methods implied in this article.

Stewardship of water reservoirs is required, but the use of trigger words that produce false connotation should be avoided by professionals.

James Lawrence
IEEE Member
Bastrop, Texas

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The article was well written. It shines light on the complexities of the intricate patenting process we live in today.

Kermit B. Karns
IEEE Life Senior Member
Imperial, Neb.

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Discussions of patent law tend to be murky and confused. This article stands out for its clarity. It is reasonably self-contained. It clearly states the issues with statutory matter and explains why they are difficult to resolve.

My one concern is with the paragraph:

"We all agree that software and various other processes are strong drivers of innovation and the world economy. ANY limitation on such drivers will affect innovation and economic growth and lead to a reduction in skilled jobs. Clearly, that's a result which is adverse to our members’ interests."

I believe there is legitimate and real debate about whether software patents drive or inhibit innovation. I say this as someone with 29 software patents.

Michael Conner
IEEE Member
Gause, Texas

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I appreciate the points of discussion you raise. To some extent, all software includes mundane steps that can be performed in your head and no one should have a patent on thoughts. On the other hand, the speed, scope, complexity and diversity of problems that software solves far outstrip the possible mental activity on any one person or group of persons. Few would deny patents to computer hardware, such as memories and microprocessors. However, without software, computers would be little more than sophisticated adding machines. Who would buy a personal computer if did not provide word processing and e-mail? I hope the Supreme Court considers the profound implications of its decision.

Thomas FitzGerald
IEEE Member
Rochester, NY

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Patents have become almost a laugh for small inventors and entrepreneurs. They are poker chips for large companies and more in the bailiwick of lawyers than engineers. They are helpful to a small con man that is looking for investment capital, but are as worthless as many mortgages until they are tested in court. There the large companies have to make the choice as to whether to fight it or pay the requested royalty. The odds are not great in fighting it.

Our international trade has compounded the situation. There is a current effort underway to make patents international. In other words, get a method to make a patent good in many countries instead of having to file for a patent in each one independently.

The only objective I can see in wasting time enriching lawyers (who mostly prey on hopeful investors by applying for or even receiving patents on their "invention" or fighting them in court is that it makes money for some people.

Years ago, when life was less complicated, a patent was great asset. Nowadays, it is nearly worthless unless it is easily described and owned by a company that has the money to back it up in court.

To try and give patent protection to software is akin to trying to patent laws. If we could do that, our representatives could get a patent on every law they push through their legislature and collect royalties on every time a criminal is charged or jailed as a result.

How about a patent on every time somebody uses the word "discombobulate"?
Whoever thought that word up just didn't have the sense to patent or copyright it.

David Noble
IEEE Senior Member
Orangevale, California

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Christiansen's column made several of the points I make to our students, and I plan to give them the link to the article to help support my claims. I like the philosophical discussion, too, about "analog" and "digital" types. I very often tell a close relative of mine that she is digital, as in her case there are just two gradations when she speaks of things (movies, for example): either "wonderful" or "awful."

By the way, digital (if by that we mean 1s and 0s) does not have to mean discrete-time. Our work on continuous-time digital systems and signal processing was featured in IEEE Spectrum last year.

Yannis Tsividis
Professor
Dept of Electrical Engineering
Columbia University

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Someone has said, "Everything is analog," because even in circuits that are intended to be digital, the physical implementation is a continuously variable quantity. This consideration is significant because very high-speed digital circuitry requires the designer to treat the conductors as transmission lines. Good points.

Philip Spray
IEEE Member
Amarillo, Texas

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Great article! Being an electrical engineering student in college and very involved with experimentation of RF and other analog intensive parts of electrical engineering (amateur radio), I have come to see similar understandings by my peers. Many think analog is outdated and fading away, when, in truth, it will always be around in one form or another.

Bryce Salmi
IEEE Student Member
Chelmsford, Massachusetts

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I thought the article was great. It definitely puts things into perspective. It sheds some light for aspiring engineering students, as well as for veteran engineers, who sometimes need to revisit the basics.

Patrick Ramirez
IEEE Member
Houston, Texas

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I would love to see more of this. Engineering students should be presented with the concepts of input sources, be they temperature or light, or sound or pressure. It was interesting that one student said "everything is digital." The world we live in is inherently analogue. We can take samples and create digital representations, but in many cases need to produce an analogue final output.

Steve Munie
IEEE Member
Pinehurst, NC

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Very informative and helpful.

Murray Novick
IEEE Life Member
Jericho, NY

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Many thanks to Mr. McClure for a great article. These reform bills should offer a great deal of benefits to all citizens. An important point is lost however. The main reason given for the reforms is to control cost. However, these bills fail to guarantee a cost reduction or quantify it. More insured people will be added to the system, and by the simple law of supply and demand, cost is likely to go up not down. Mandating Health Insurance for individuals or small business or taxing the self insured will likely make things worse. The illegal aliens arguments should be solved by addressing the illegal immigration problem, and not by passing mandates to solve a problem that should not exist in the first place.

To reduce cost, physicians must have an incentive to practice "efficient" medicine — I missed that point in these bills. Finally, without a Public Option (on a voluntary basis), true cost saving will be hard to achieve.

Khalil Maalouf
IEEE Senior Member
Chambersburg, PA

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I thought this was a reasonably unbiased recap of the issues and options, which I appreciated.

Kent Haspert
IEEE Member
Alexandria, Virginia

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The article is a good review of what has been already said about our health care crisis. However, as with all the other talk, it misses the two root causes of our crisis and seems to just focus on how we add the uninsured and how do we pay for it. There is a great deal of talk about controlling insurance costs which are on the rise. Premiums go up because insurance costs go up. The first of the root causes is the runaway cost in the medical industry (doctors, hospitals and drug companies), and there is not one word anywhere which mentions this. No wonder the medical industry support the proposed bills; they are not affected, and instead just make more money. The solution would be to do a complete systems analysis of the current outmoded system, and then make it more efficient with an increasing level of service. We need to also eliminate infections resulting from hospital stays, which is the fourth leading cause of death. That is unacceptable. We need some engineers from the electronics industry to help with this program. I doubt that a doctor has ever heard of a cost-reduction program. The second root problem is that we use too much of the medical services. How we do that is very simple — PREVENTION. One example is to eliminate the vitamin D deficiency in this country. The estimate is that alone could save 25 to 50 percent of the health care budget. Shocked? Have you heard of the vitamin D deficiency? What is shocking is that with more than 200 studies and technical papers on this subject, and the benefits this would have most doctors do not even know about the vitamin D deficiency. They apparently don't read or believe their own professional literature. Obesity is another problem that needs serious attention along with a list of several other major health issues.

I know what I propose sounds too simple to be true, but how do you think computers now sell for as low as $300. This should show the power of getting engineers involved.

Wallace Shaunfield
IEEE Lifetime Member
Boerne, Texas

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This is the best summary of the health care cost problem and the options that I have read anywhere. Leave it to an engineer, George McClure, to clarify what the politicians and news media have allowed to become a circus. I recommend that IEEE-USA attempt the get this article carried by a major newspaper.

James Gover
IEEE Fellow
Grand Blanc, MI

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Excellent description of the different options under discussion.

Aaron Brill
IEEE Life Fellow
Nashville, TN

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This article provided a fairly good brief overview of the issues on Health Care Insurance. I did detect some personal biases, but no outright advocacy for any position. The only exception was on Medical Tort Reform, where only one side was presented. Public Citizen has been arguing for many years against Tort Reform on the grounds that almost all the cost of payments are due to claims against a very few doctors, who if they were no longer practicing medicine would reduce the cost of the malpractice insurance for all. Perhaps they are correct and perhaps they are not. This is a subject that needs much more study and much more discussion, as it greatly concerns me that a medical mistake that would stop me working for life, when my children were young, would have condemned my wife, children and broken self to abject poverty as a maximum settlement of $250,000 (as it is in some states) does nothing for the innocent family.

Roger Avery
IEEE Senior Member
San Ramon, CA

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This is the best article that I've seen on health care reform.

Michael Ponder
IEEE Member
Neenah, WI

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This is a great article. I generally spend about five hours a day job hunting, not counting networking meetings. Keeping a log is vital, as I just applied to job #923 in my current search. Without the log, there is no way I would be able to remember who I applied with or what the specific positions were, and worse yet, would be unable to follow up. As for venting stress, I highly recommend a punching bag. I hit mine 1,000 times a day.

Scott Ames
Richardson, Texas

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The practical approach mentioned here is of great value, and provides steps in the right direction while searching for jobs.

Adebayo Oluwanoiki
IEEE Member
Lagos, Lagos

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I found this article very useful and excellent! I really like the way you explained job hunting process by simplifying the process in such simple language. This article will certainly help people who are in need of a job.

Vishakha Kadam
IEEE Graduate Student Member
Houston, Texas

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Excellent article. Thoughtful and concise, it brings out some points that I have not considered, particularly with regard to the current labor market and the trials of an Internet search for work. I'll email it to myself for future reference if I need it!

David McQueen
IEEE Member
Lexington, MA

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I thought this was a very good article. It provided good advice, encouragement and a perspective on reality.

Michael Koran
IEEE Member
Norton, MA

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Elizabeth is right on target in this article. Job hunting has taken a couple of quantum leaps in difficulty in the last decade. I would like to see us adopt Toyota's way more (and the Japanese in general) — that is, reduce hours and retrain rather than just casting off people when the business environment gets tough.

Robert Tompkins
IEEE Member
Allen, Texas

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I'm an administrative assistant who was laid off end of March. Even though I am not an engineer, I benefited a great deal from reading this article. Not only do I have my own frustration to deal with, I have all my employed friends wondering 'gee why haven't you found anything.' I'm going to send this article, hoping this provides clueless people some insight into the unemployed-wanting-to-work life.

Thank you for taking my comment!

Janet Coon
Dallas, Texas

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I found the article quite helpful, re-enforcing other information and consistent with some things I am doing, as well as encouraging me to do better.

Stan Smith
IEEE Senior Member
Huntsville, AL

This is not a bad idea, but some of the top choices are unfortunate. Promoting science fiction is much different from promoting science fantasy. Heroes and Fringe, for example, are very much like The Hobbit. Although it is entertaining, there is almost no science.

Paul Swingle
IEEE Member
Pullman, WA

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