Data engineer vs Machine learning engineer vs Data science

From the last article, we have discussed the difference between Data analytics and Data sciences. But, how's about a Machine learning engineer and Data Engineer. What does ML engineer and Data Engineer exactly do? Let's find it out with us.

There's some confusion surrounding the roles of machine learning engineer vs. data scientist, primarily because they are both relatively new. However, the distinctions become apparent if you parse things and examine the semantics.

At a high level, we're talking about scientists and engineers. While a scientist needs to thoroughly understand the science behind their work, an engineer is tasked with building something.

What Does a Machine Learning Engineering do?

Machine learning engineers sit at the intersection of software engineering and data science. They leverage big data tools and programming frameworks to ensure that the raw data gathered from data pipelines are redefined as data science models that are ready to scale as needed.

Machine learning engineers feed data into models defined by data scientists. They're also responsible for taking theoretical data science models and helping scale them out to production-level models that can handle terabytes of real-time data.

Machine learning engineers also build programs that control computers and robots. The algorithms developed by machine learning engineers enable a machine to identify patterns in its own programming data and teach itself to understand commands and even think for itself.

What Are the Requirements for a Machine Learning Engineer?

To work as a machine learning engineer, most companies prefer candidates who have a master's degree in computer science. However, as this field is relatively new and there is a shortage of top tech talent, many employers will be willing to make exceptions.

According to a report by IBM, machine learning engineers should know the following programming languages
(as listed by rank) :

• Python
• Java
• R
• C++
• C
• JavaScript
• Scala
• Julia

What Are the Responsibilities of a Machine Learning Engineer?

Here's what these roles typically demand:

• Develop machine learning models
• Collaborate with data engineers to develop data and model pipelines
• Apply machine learning and data science techniques and design distributed systems
• Write production-level code
• Bring code to production
• Engage in code reviews
• Improve existing machine learning models
• Be in charge of the entire lifecycle (research, design, experimentation, development. deployment, monitoring, and maintenance)
• Produce project outcomes and isolate issues
• Implement machine learning algorithms and libraries
• Communicate complex processes to business leaders
• Analyze large and complex data sets to derive valuable insights
• Research and implement best practices to enhance existing machine learning infrastructure

With an increase in Big data analysts and machine learning, data engineers' demand is higher than ever. Data Engineer works with data architect and software developer. A data Engineer possesses a deep level of technical and software skills.

What Does a Data Engineering do?

• Create and maintain optimal data pipeline architecture.
• Building an optimum system in data delivery and has greater scalability.
• Build the infrastructure required for optimal extraction, transformation, and data loading.
• Create data tools to help Data Analysts and Data engineers build and optimize the products.

What Are the Requirements for a Data Engineer?

• Data models
• Comparative analysis of data stores
• Logical operations
• Data modeling techniques
• Database clustering tools and techniques

What Are the Responsibilities of a Data Engineer?

• Create and maintain optimal data pipeline architecture.
• Building an optimum system in data delivery and has greater scalability.
• Build the infrastructure required for optimal extraction, transformation, and data loading.
• Create data tools to help Data Analysts and Data engineers build and optimize the products.

Let's summarize 

• Data scientist vs. machine learning engineer: do they need a degree? 
  Most employers would prefer an advanced degree, but they will be open to hiring those who have the right skills and experience to meet demand.
• Data scientist vs. machine learning engineer: what do they do? 
  While there's some overlap, which is why some data scientists with software engineering backgrounds move into machine learning engineer roles, data scientists focus on analyzing data, providing business insights, and prototyping models. In contrast, machine learning engineers concentrate on coding and deploying complex, large-scale machine learning products.
• Data scientist vs. machine learning engineer: who makes more? 
  At present, machine learning engineers make more, but the data scientist role is a much broader one, so there is a wide variety of salaries depending on the job's specifics.

Source:

• Machine Learning Engineer vs. Data Scientist  By Andrew Zola
• Data Scientist vs. Data Analysis vs. ML Engineer: Which job is most suited for you? By Swaastick Kumar Singh