Difference between science and engineering (software engineering)?

This is not a complete answer, but I'll give you some information. My perspective may be unique. I have not been to university in years, but I studied mechanical engineering, later worked as a software engineer, and finally earned a second degree in computer science. One of my engineering professors illustrated the difference between science and engineering in this way. Some one was asking in class about crack propagation in metals. The professor answered in some detail, but the student was not satisfied and kept on asking. The professor said that the student's question was great, but it was getting away from engineering and approaching the field of science. One difference is that an engineer really doesn't have to know down to the atomic level how something works, for example, what causes cracks to spread. But even in his ignorance, he must design a bridge that is safe, that will last, and that will be economical. The scientist may have the luxury to find out the ideal crack-resistant material, and exactly how it works, without worrying about the cost or the availability of the material. Another story: I have read articles about whether computer science and software engineering are actually fields of "engineering". The consensus among the engineering academic community is that they is not. I think it is because there are some things that a computer scientist studies that are not engineering, as described in my example above, but are more like pure science or mathematics. Another idea, but I might be mistaken about this one: I believe the principles of software engineering depend on the current state of the technology. To illustrate: a mechanical engineer studies energy, how it produced, transmitted, and consumed. The basic principles are the same whether one is dealing with steam or diesel engines, or gas turbines. Whereas, what a software engineer does depends on the operating system, the language, the hardware; things that change over short periods of time. At one point, it was important for a software engineer to worry about optimizing use of memory and hard disk storage; later memory and storage became so inexpensive that they were essentially treated as if they were free, and limitless, at least in some applications. Finally: I think it's great when a class includes people from both the scientific and engineering fields. Does this help you?

If it's like it is at my school they just lump the computer engineer and computer science students all into the same software engineering class. I would check with the departments to find out if thats the case at you uni.

This is not a complete answer, but I'll give you some information. My perspective may be unique. I have not been to university in years, but I studied mechanical engineering, later worked as a software engineer, and finally earned a second degree in computer science. One of my engineering professors illustrated the difference between science and engineering in this way. Some one was asking in class about crack propagation in metals. The professor answered in some detail, but the student was not satisfied and kept on asking. The professor said that the student's question was great, but it was getting away from engineering and approaching the field of science. One difference is that an engineer really doesn't have to know down to the atomic level how something works, for example, what causes cracks to spread. But even in his ignorance, he must design a bridge that is safe, that will last, and that will be economical. The scientist may have the luxury to find out the ideal crack-resistant material, and exactly how it works, without worrying about the cost or the availability of the material. Another story: I have read articles about whether computer science and software engineering are actually fields of "engineering". The consensus among the engineering academic community is that they is not. I think it is because there are some things that a computer scientist studies that are not engineering, as described in my example above, but are more like pure science or mathematics. Another idea, but I might be mistaken about this one: I believe the principles of software engineering depend on the current state of the technology. To illustrate: a mechanical engineer studies energy, how it produced, transmitted, and consumed. The basic principles are the same whether one is dealing with steam or diesel engines, or gas turbines. Whereas, what a software engineer does depends on the operating system, the language, the hardware; things that change over short periods of time. At one point, it was important for a software engineer to worry about optimizing use of memory and hard disk storage; later memory and storage became so inexpensive that they were essentially treated as if they were free, and limitless, at least in some applications. Finally: I think it's great when a class includes people from both the scientific and engineering fields. Does this help you?