Resumen
This article focuses on the licensing of software engineers in the state of Texas. In June 1998, the Texas Board of Professional Engineers voted to add software engineering as one of the areas of engineering specialization for those seeking licensure. According to the author, major reasons why licensing in Texas has gone smoothly are the waiver rule and the involvement of members of the Texas software engineering community. The waiver rule allows people with a minimum 12 or 16 years of experience, depending upon the type of bachelor's degree obtained, to obtain a Professional Engineer's (PE) license without taking either the Fundamentals of Engineering (FE) or Principles and Practices of Engineering (P&P) exams. The waiver rule has facilitated the licensing of qualified individuals as software engineers. According to author, the licensing of software engineers is an extremely emotional issue with some people in the computing community. His personal belief is that at least in Texas, working within the system has reaped benefits for the software engineering community. When the Texas Board began consideration of the licensing of software engineers in 1997, it was the impression they saw software engineering as a subdiscipline of electrical engineering. However, the Texas Board appointed a Software Engineering Advisory Committee, that was able to help the board better understand the field of software engineering, which in turn led to guidelines for approval of the applications in place today.