The new 360 lines of Hainan people | Algorithm engineer Wang Zhao: Algorithms are everywhere

Hainan Daily reporter Zhang Huining

I don't know since when, our daily travel is more and more inseparable from mobile phone navigation, sweeping robots seem to have become a must-have for families, parking lot vehicle recognition and billing devices are everywhere, voice translation robots accompany people to travel around the world... These inventions that can improve people's quality of life are actually inseparable from algorithms: navigation uses the shortest path algorithm, vehicle recognition uses image recognition algorithms, and natural language processing technology used by translation robots.

Algorithms, a profound and obscure-sounding concept, seem to be gradually dominating every aspect of our daily lives. The group of algorithm engineers has also gradually entered the public eye and become a scarce talent in the eyes of technology-based enterprises.

Wang Zhao Photo courtesy of the interviewee

The era of big data has spawned the algorithm industry

"Post-90s" girl Wang Zhao, after graduating from graduate school in the United States at the end of 2019, chose to return to China and join an artificial intelligence technology company focusing on the application of knowledge graphs - Hainan Universal Intelligent Technology Co., Ltd., becoming an algorithm engineer.

Wang Zhao introduced that algorithm engineers are professions that come into being with the times, "We live in the era of big data, and every day we will produce a variety of data, consumption data, browsing data, travel data, etc. With data, it will arouse people's interest in data analysis, so that these data can better serve production and life." Wang Zhao said that algorithms are everywhere in people's lives, algorithm engineers are the use of algorithms to deal with affairs, in addition to these algorithm use scenarios that we can feel, in fact, there are many algorithms that silently affect our lives.

"For example, the recommendation algorithm, have you found that the Taobao products and Douyin videos you and your friends see are different?" They are always able to grab your liking and recommend you what you want to buy and see? Wang Zhao introduced that in fact, this is all calculated by the algorithm. Through your browsing, purchase, likes, comments and other records, the algorithm looks for users with the same behavior as you in a huge database, analyzes the preferences of this group of users, and displays the results as the products that users finally see.

"This logic may seem simple, but it also involves a lot of complex questions, such as whether the chronological order of the user's purchase of goods reflects his current interests, and the weight of the goods purchased a year ago and the goods purchased a day ago have different weights for the algorithm model, that is, the influence of what goods to display on the interface to the user is not the same." Wang Zhao said.

"Brain-burning" algorithmic engineer

Many people mistakenly think that an algorithm engineer is a programmer and must have a computer professional background, but this is not the case. Wang Zhao majored in business analysis while studying for a master's degree in the United States. Wang Zhao, who did not graduate from the computer major, why did he choose the industry of algorithms?

Wang Zhao said that her previous internship experience in banks and some companies made her deeply realize how advantageous it is to have fast big data information processing capabilities, so at the graduate level, she chose an interdisciplinary major - business analysis, and some algorithm-related courses during the school period made her interested in algorithms, and she chose to enter the industry after graduation.

"In fact, a lot of algorithm engineers don't come from computer science backgrounds." Wang Zhao introduced that some of her peers are studying physics, some learning mathematics, and some learning communication engineering. Now computer technology, or data processing ability, has become a basic technology that must be mastered by all majors. Algorithms are suitable for a wide range of fields, such as medicine. "Doctor friends often ask me some data analysis questions about the R language, and doctors also need to have image processing skills to help them diagnose some lesions through image recognition technology."

As an algorithm engineer, Wang Zhao is very optimistic about this career prospect, because from an economic point of view, as long as production is progressing and science and technology is innovating, humans must need to do things to improve efficiency, such as automatic driving, face recognition, and the core of algorithm engineers is to do things to improve efficiency, if there is no good algorithm team, even if there is no good data, it is impossible to use.

Of course, if you want to engage in the line of algorithm engineers, it is not an easy task in itself, first of all, you must have a very good mathematical foundation; secondly, you must have a computer foundation to program; you must also think actively, have a flexible mind; have a strong imagination and reasoning ability. When making algorithmic models, it will be very brain-burning, even boring, so you must constantly stimulate your passion and freshness.

Character: Wang Zhao (post-90s)

Occupation: Algorithm engineer

Career philosophy: sensitive to observation, diligent in thinking, good at synthesis, the courage to innovate.

Original title: Algorithm engineer Wang Zhao: Algorithms are everywhere