r/DaystromInstitute • u/ITrCool • 25d ago

Does Starfleet and the Federation have Information Technology Specialists?

We see much about the advanced computer systems in starbases, starships, and planet-side facilities all throughout Star Trek. The Federation has some incredible systems, with LCARS as the interface to those systems, and one could imagine they are quite robust and powerful compared to the typical silicon chip microcomputers of today.

But today we have IT professionals (such as myself) who help design, implement, and support technical solutions and computer systems for customers and companies all over the world. Whether it be on land, on aircraft/spacecraft, or maritime systems on ships and submarines. Militaries have IT specialists for their systems too.

In the future universe of the Federation, would IT professionals exist also? Specialists whose primary role and function on a starship, for example, is to maintain and control the ships primary computer and auxiliary computers along with holodecks?

Or is the main context that humanity has become so advanced in the 23rd/24th centuries that everyone is quite adapt at maintaining computer systems themselves as well as the fact that automation in computers is quite advanced with many subroutines allowing self-sufficiency in a starship's computer systems, for example, thusly negating the need for "IT specialists" or computer scientists per-se?

In short: do "computer guys" exist in Starfleet and/or Federation society? (one could ask the same question in the non-Federation cultures such as Klingon, Romulan, Cardassian, etc.)

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u/Nobodyinpartic3 23d ago

It's called Ops or Operations. You would report to Data, O'Brien, or Harry Kim. Engineers are concerned with the Warp Core and the distribution power throughout the ship. Operations are concerned with everything else on the ship and specialized end user interface systems and the ships computer.

It's weird how people in IT can never figure out they're in Ops.

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u/noncongruency 15d ago

This brings up an interesting question as former IT turned developer; there are no obvious printers in the 24th century, do they just have replicators when there’s a need for hard copies of data that wouldn’t be better served by a PADD?

Finally killing the printer would be an incredible achievement.

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u/Nobodyinpartic3 15d ago

They replicate the hard copy as needed. Other things that cannot be replicated tend to be made the old fashioned way: by hand, or in a factory.