@__d I think you've hit the nail on the head of "the difference between programming and software development", as I've always learnt it.

Software developers write code, sure. They may even spend most of their time writing code. But they don't consider writing code (i.e. "programming computers") to be their fundamental job description/task. The writing of the code is incidental. Anyone can learn to write code. Hell, even machines can write code these days (whether it's *good* code or not is, of course, another matter).

A developer's primary task is to develop solutions to clients' problems, and as such, they need a deep and wide understanding of the context of the code they're writing. What's more, the solutions they come up with don't even necessarily need to involve writing ANY code at all.

I was a Junior *Programmer* in 1998, but I've been a Software *Developer* since 1999,

I would never call myself a Software Engineer. I've never done any engineering, I don't have an engineering degree, and I fail to see any parallels between what I do and laying roads or building bridges (as you have a bias towards the word "developer", so I have one towards the word "engineer"). :-)

I really like your description of engineers being people who want status without responsibility. I think I'm going to use that!