2 answers
iruoghene
Student
Speedway, Indiana
1
Question
Asked
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can you focus on both software and hardware as a computer engineer?
I want to be a computer engineer, but based on my research I found out that computer engineering has two main category; software and hardware. I'm not sure which one is better for me. #computer-engineering
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2 answers
Daniel Moy
Google Software Engineer
158
Answers
Seattle, Washington
Updated
Daniel’s Answer
In undergrad you'll have a lot of time to find out (and you can always take more classes if you want and can handle the load).
Shubhankar Keluskar
Software designing and development
19
Answers
Pune, Maharashtra, India
Updated
Shubhankar’s Answer
Hi,
This is an interesting question and it is faced by everyone pursuing career in Computers at some point.
As you rightly said you have two broad categories and Yes you can combine them, whether you want to is another question.
Let me put few things out
1, Hardware deals with components you can actually see and play with. With that being said, all the hardware in today's world needs software to run. For example, a simple mouse or keyboard also needs driver software to work. The fact that the drivers come as a part of Operating systems is given.
Small note here, the maintenance of computers and related hardware is a big task in itself. Corporations engage in house teams to do this all the time. It can be monotonous at times.
2. Software mainly deals with programs, so you would mostly be working with a computer developing programs. As mentioned above, what these programs may get used to driving a hardware component. But mostly they are applications solving business problems.
Here mostly everything resides and can be visualized on computer screens.
How you decide ? Well, that all depends on what you like, if you like building stuff that you can touch and does actual stuff, hardware is the field and on the other hand if you are ready to work hours on a computer to develop programs that will do wonders, you may go for software.
If you want to work on both then there are device drivers, micro controller programming etc available that involves both hardware and software.
This is an interesting question and it is faced by everyone pursuing career in Computers at some point.
As you rightly said you have two broad categories and Yes you can combine them, whether you want to is another question.
Let me put few things out
1, Hardware deals with components you can actually see and play with. With that being said, all the hardware in today's world needs software to run. For example, a simple mouse or keyboard also needs driver software to work. The fact that the drivers come as a part of Operating systems is given.
Small note here, the maintenance of computers and related hardware is a big task in itself. Corporations engage in house teams to do this all the time. It can be monotonous at times.
2. Software mainly deals with programs, so you would mostly be working with a computer developing programs. As mentioned above, what these programs may get used to driving a hardware component. But mostly they are applications solving business problems.
Here mostly everything resides and can be visualized on computer screens.
How you decide ? Well, that all depends on what you like, if you like building stuff that you can touch and does actual stuff, hardware is the field and on the other hand if you are ready to work hours on a computer to develop programs that will do wonders, you may go for software.
If you want to work on both then there are device drivers, micro controller programming etc available that involves both hardware and software.