Re:The Joel Test: 12 Steps to Better Code (2000; Still relev...
by jasonkester on Friday November 05, 2010 @04:17AM
(#1872410)
For the audience it was written for, I'd say yes.
There are still plenty of shops that score close to zero on the Joel Test. Talk to your non-startup friends working for a big company where software is considered a cost center. They'll tell you about the big battle they had to get the company onto source control, and how deploying a new version of the company website still involves copying files by hand and running some wacky freeware database comparison tool to get the new schema changes across.
Hell, just last year I did a consulting gig for a shop that didn't even make a distinction between dev and production before I got there. Changing the site involved creating "index_new4.php", making your changes, smoke testing, then renaming (or repointing links). No source control, and they didn't even have a backup of the production database.
That's the sort of place that needs to get a copy of the Joel Test forwarded around the dev team, up to management, etc. The things on that list are as important today as they were 10 years ago. If anything, it carries more weight when you show it to management by virtue of being 10 years old.
There are still plenty of shops that score close to zero on the Joel Test. Talk to your non-startup friends working for a big company where software is considered a cost center. They'll tell you about the big battle they had to get the company onto source control, and how deploying a new version of the company website still involves copying files by hand and running some wacky freeware database comparison tool to get the new schema changes across.
Hell, just last year I did a consulting gig for a shop that didn't even make a distinction between dev and production before I got there. Changing the site involved creating "index_new4.php", making your changes, smoke testing, then renaming (or repointing links). No source control, and they didn't even have a backup of the production database.
That's the sort of place that needs to get a copy of the Joel Test forwarded around the dev team, up to management, etc. The things on that list are as important today as they were 10 years ago. If anything, it carries more weight when you show it to management by virtue of being 10 years old.