In this episode, Hallway Conversations sits down to chat with our very own Steve Bohlen about the parallels often drawn between the profession of software engineering and that of building architecture/engineering.

As a former practicing Architect, Steve explores some of the ways in which these parallels are entirely valid as well as other ways in which some of these ill-informed comparisons may be at the root of any number of ill-advised software engineering practices, the legacy of which our nascent profession still struggles to escape even today.

Whether you’ve always considered “building software” to be very much like “building a building” or you’ve always thought that comparison fundamentally flawed, this episode will help clarify where such metaphors are (mostly) valid and where such comparisons are fraught with implicit danger!

As a Principal Software Engineer on the TED team within the Developer Experience & Evangelism (DX) division at Microsoft Corporation, Stephen brings his varied 20-plus-years of experience as a former practicing Architect, CAD Manager, IT Technologist, Software Engineer, CTO, and consultant to assist select Microsoft Partner organizations in their adoption of cutting-edge and pre-release Microsoft developer products and technologies.

Stephen is also an active contributor to several Open-Source Software projects including NHibernate, Spring.NET, NDbUnit, and others.

Active in the software development community, Stephen speaks publicly, blogs (semi-)regularly, and is the author of several popular screencast series focused on Agile and ALT.NET concepts and technologies including the widely-praised 15-part Summer of NHibernate video series introducing viewers to the popular open-source O/RM tool. Stephen is also a founding/organizing member of the NYC ALT.NET user group as well as a co-organizer of the New York City Domain Driven Design User Group. For the past several years, he has been the Chairperson of the annual New York City Code Camp event. He is also a Microsoft MVP award recipient in Solution Architecture, ASP.NET, and Visual C#, a member of the ASP Insiders and the Visual C# Insiders, and formerly held the office of the Vice President for INETA, North America.

You can follow Stephen via Twitter http://twitter.com/sbohlen or visit his blog at http://blog.unhandled-exceptions.com