Chemical Engineering's role in the future of Tech? 2

[carpeliam]

Both the July issue of Wired and the July issue of MIT's Tech Review mags had on their front cover an article about current developments in the construction of a molecular computer. Wired mentioned a few other people, but one of them had already been mentioned in a previous MIT Tech Review front cover article. I just finished my freshman year in college; I'm majoring in Computer Science. Should I schedule some more Chemistry classes over the next 3 years?<br><br>Thanks... <p>Liam Morley<br><a href=mailto:lmorley@wpi.edu>lmorley@wpi.edu</a><br><a href=

http://www.wpi.edu/~lmorley/>

] :: imotic :: website :: [</a><br>"light the deep, and bring silence to the world.<br>
light the world, and bring depth to the silence."

 

[MasterRacker]

If you're going into computer and circuit design it's probably not a bad idea otherwise I don't see how it would directly affect you. <p> Jeff<br><a href=mailto: masterracker@hotmail.com> masterracker@hotmail.com</a><br><a href= > </a><br> Of all the things I've lost in life, I miss my mind the most ...

 

[carpeliam]

Well, I'm going into programming... but I figure it's good to know about the lower-level stuff. It may not <i>directly</i> affect me, but I'm guessing it's good to be knowledgable about hardware when you're programming for software. The steps in between high level and low level are usually good to know, in my opinion. <p>Liam Morley<br><a href=mailto:lmorley@wpi.edu>lmorley@wpi.edu</a><br><a href=

http://www.wpi.edu/~lmorley/>

] :: imotic :: website :: [</a><br>"light the deep, and bring silence to the world.<br>
light the world, and bring depth to the silence.

 

[JimHorton]

imotic,<br>I used to think it made a better programmer to have some low-level hardware knowledge, but I've got to think that only holds true if you're doing alot of low, system-level coding, or writing a compiler, etc.&nbsp;&nbsp;Before I got into programming I was a hardware nut, hording every bit of circuit-level info I could find on chips, motherboards, etc, but honestly, I've never felt it really helped me in programming at all.&nbsp;&nbsp;I just finished a large Oracle project, and I never once even saw the box it ran on, I didn't even know the model...Risc/Unix is all I knew about the platform my 4 months of day in, day out coding was running on.&nbsp;&nbsp;The DBA dealt with the backups, system level stuff, but I bet even he couldn't have said how wide the memory bus was, for instance.&nbsp;&nbsp;It was an extremely fast machine, that's all I knew.&nbsp;&nbsp;I'm saying this not to discourage anyone from learning about hardware, but just keep this in mind if you're allocating your studying time.<br>--Jim

 

[MasterRacker]

I'd agree with Jim and even go a bit further.&nbsp;&nbsp;High-level programming is reaching the point where you are coding your logic to perform a task and making API calls to interface to the computer directly and from the standpoint of your own program you don't necessarily care what the hardware platform is.&nbsp;&nbsp;<br><br>Even if you're programming at the assembly level, you're still using a standard &quot;language&quot; that is completely idependent of the actual hardware.&nbsp;&nbsp;The actual chip could be silicon, copper, molecular, or made of butterflies and moondust and it wouldn't make a bit of difference as to how you code something.<br><br>Spend you time studying languages, data structures, algorithmic theory, etc.&nbsp;&nbsp;That gives you the base.&nbsp;&nbsp;Then to make yourself truly marketable take classes in project management and business processes.&nbsp;&nbsp;You're going into programming because you enjoy it, but you will be hired to write code that facilitates business processes and helps a company make money.&nbsp;&nbsp;Always keep in mind that the end result is <b>ALWAYS</b> benefit to business. <p> Jeff<br><a href=mailto: masterracker@hotmail.com> masterracker@hotmail.com</a><br><a href= > </a><br> Of all the things I've lost in life, I miss my mind the most ...