: : Vadim Antonov <avg@exigengroup.com> : : : > On Wed, 22 May 2002, Kristian P. Jackson wrote: : > : >> Perhaps a bachelors in network : >> engineering is in order? : : I'm afraid there's not enough stuff one has to know to sucessfully : "design" networks to fill more than one-semester course. One should not design networks. Designing networks is not a solitary activity. One should be part of a team that works to design networks. That team should be made up of people who know many and divers things. You are not far off the mark, however: There's not enough stuff, not contained in other coursework, to fill more than one-semester course in networking. That is just to say that 'networking' is not a fundamental discipline in the same way as math, or chemistry might be but is an amalgam of intersecting skills and disciplines that are easily found elsewhere. The engineers I admire and respect all combine analytical skills (math), understanding of the physical layer (electrical engineering, physics), financial and resource allocation (economics), building fitout (mechanical engineering, architecture) and computers (those things that sit at the nodes of the networks...) AND they are constantly striving to better understand the relationships between all those things. None of the engineers I respect and admire, came by the depth and breadth of their skill not by walking a linear path but rather by wandering hither and yon... cataloguing as they went. School made sense for many, less so for others... The pivotal advice I received was regarding a decision to stay, or leave, the small college I was attending and to get an engineering degree at a larger college. My physics professor argued thusly: "You can get and engineering degree and be an engineer, or you can get a physics degree and be anything." Peace, Petr -- petr@mit.edu http://web.mit.edu/petr http://lids.mit.edu ____________________________________________________________ You can design simply, or you can design for simplicity. The first requires a fear of complexity only. The second requires an understanding of complexity. Choice is yours ------------------------------------------------------------