Yes and no. This list makes me sad because it neglects every single computer scientist that's interested in doing work on theory. I am one such computer scientist, and much of the work that I do involves merely pen and paper. There are a lot of people on HN that are web monkeys and make good money doing Web 2.0 stuff, and there are a lot of people that know pretty much nothing about computer science but use computers and program. These people equate CS with programming and the other sorts of tasks described in this article and then forget that there are computer scientists that could conceivably have no idea how to program in a modern language and still make contributions to the field.
But maybe HN is the wrong place to go looking for discourse on this sort of material. The point, though, is that this article is misleading. Perhaps it would have better been titled "10000 things every software engineer-hopeful should do" or "10000 anyone who writes code for the web should do".
Umm... I don't think so. If you are thinking of CS as in Computer Science then that is CS and what the list mentions is what someone who wants to work in IT would need to know. Computer science is much more than just web technologies and many many people on HN will testify they got jobs because of knowing what this list mentions I am not denying that there are many others who would say they got jobs by knowing stuff on the list in the link, but hey its just plain wrong to say these things do not get you jobs. Many university professors have this as a minimal requirements for their job, thats one example.
The skills learned from writing something like a compiler or operating system can be applied to any type of software development job and are more valuable than anything on the OP's list.
College isn't a vocational school where you learn X so you can get a job doing exactly X. The idea is to learn a broad range of CS, Mathematics, and general problem solving skills. Doing so will allow you to write any type of software.
You believe that a toy compiler or operating system (which are common in CS curricula) will teach you more about software development than a toy LAMP application?
