Do coders need math?

[Manus_]

I love when people like you help others get back up while being far away.

[JamesLee-pfdz]

If you're familiar with mathematical thinking, there's a good chance that you'll be a good coder. Do coders need to know advanced mathematical skills? No.

[rhynosouris]

I was an analyst/programmer for a major mining company, working on payroll-hr systems. Didn't need any math beyond simple 8th grade arithmetic (calculating wages & taxes).

[afrivox]

My take on this would be double oriented. a) If you are still in school and you plan to be a developer, PLEASE try to learn as much as school math as you can. It definitely does help. b)If you are out of school and you skip all the math, and want to be a dev, just go and learn stuff as you go. In most interview, you might be asked to do a certain exercise that involves some math. Remember, while some devs might not be college graduates or math wiz, the interviewer will be most likely a computer science or engineering graduate or someone copying interview questions and tasks from the internet...with some math .Just beware!

[PapaVikingCodes]

Let’s face it l, it helps to be a whiz. Pattern skills and acumen overlap.

[emonymph]

Good communication skills are more important!! You can use pre-existing function calls that do math for you behind the scenes, let the nerds do the math for you as long as you know how to use the tools in their toolbox!

[iorekby]

If you want to go for ten-a-penny entry level web dev jobs (nothing wrong with that, btw) then no, you don't really need mathematics.
There are plenty of domains in programming though that having a strong mathematics background. Don't even think about Data Science/AI/ML programming without an excellent mathematics background. Same for cryptographic programming, computer visualisation, systems programming, networking programming etc....

[agme]

I understand this, but the different programming degrees in college seem to be very centered on the math/physics subjects (software engineering, computer science, etc)

[SufiKingdom]

I started learning Java and first student challenge I encountered was “root of quadric equations”. :(

[JonMatcho]

While interviewing a candidate the modulus function came to mind. I asked if he knew of it. “No”, he said, which I thought was fine. I then transitioned to teach him to see how that would go. I asked “What is the remainder of 5 divided by 2?” After much awkwardness of him scribbling on the whiteboard before giving up, I concluded that he was not going to work out. Was I wrong? I think not.

[prepperdon]

Math maybe not, but good at problem solving, yes. So if you are good at math, it will definitely help, at least it did for me.

[peqghgk]

it doesn't help that if you want to study a CS degree in this country, it's a requirement in most cases that you must have passed maths to get in even though hardly any of whats in maths is relevant to what you would use day to day in most programming disciplines

[kittiefloyd]

This always intimidated me and kept me away from coding. Because im terrible at math.

[KDTechverse]

It's like.

You need math for designing better algos to solve complex issues indeed.

You don't need to know advanced math if you're targeting very basic frontend dev's work, or developing complete frontend of apps/websites too.

Math improves prob solving skills insanely trust me.

It totally depends on which domain are you targeting as a software developer. Frontend, backend, full stack, AI & ML.

So uncle Stef is right and wrong at the same time but I love him irrespective of that.

[denisdev]

i think that we need math for problem solving and find a solution for it .

[bmutthoju]

How about Algorithms and Data Structures? We need Math for writing efficient algorithms and data structures such as Discrete Math, Graph Theory, Big-Oh, ... Even if we are not coding algorithms, we need to choose the right algorithms and data structures from libraries for the problem we are solving for which we need to understand the algorithms which in turn needs knowledge of Math.

[mytheos]

I think my math is so bad I need a small refresher so I know how to even pose the question to Python.

[_RedWizard]

Accurate. Damn Stefan been aging hard. I guess it's on-brand 🤣

[vkkv]

Well, this is a myth, that coders need math as a daily driver. But the reality is, that:

1) Math gives opportunity to grow in more advanced fields, than just plopping out webpages
2) In my expirience, people with math knowledge learn faster, code better and make better decisions in design
3) I have a friend who started with WP, html/css and continued with php. Guess what, after 2 years of work he started to learn entry-level math, just because he felt he needs it.

I think that you, Stefan, maybe know the story of GSP where he explains, why karate helped him in his takedowns. Same here: math knowledge can help coders without being applied directly.

So al much as I am annoyed with nerds bragging about 100% theoretical stuff, "without which you cannot start programming", I also don't like points like "if you're not an engineer or game dev, you don't have to learn math"

[clarkkentgwapo]

How can you understand datastruct and alog if you are weak in math?