Re:Programmer as Market
by DanielBMarkham on Sunday February 20, 2011 @09:21PM
(#2243973)
Often people point out that "don't worry, we'll get the market first then we'll clean up". How often that'll happen? The chances that will happen is probably 1:20 or 1:50
No. If you're in a startup 20-1 odds are you never see that code again. Factor that.
If you're in a spot where the company is making money, you've got an income stream? Different story entirely.
The point is to do the math. Don't just follow one way or another because you have some idea of what a "correct" programmer would do.
I have listened to your rant all my life. Hell, I've even been the one giving it. 99% of the time I was right, because 99% of the time I was talking to a group that had to maintain whatever they wrote for the next five years. But when you are in a not-making-money-startup right and you have 200 folks telling you how to be a great programmer, and not a damn one of them could make a program on the open market that could make a dime. We have put "quality programmer" ahead of "make something useful" because we, as programmers, are a market for other folks to sell us stuff. Our customers are a secondary consideration to them -- and to us. Something is wrong with that picture.
Love the rant. I especially like it when people tell me and others what a good or bad programmer is. Hell, I agree with the thrust of your rant. The problem is that people could give jack shit for a good programmer. They want you to solve their problems. Then money comes. Then you have a code base that you can make all nice and shiny and pat yourself on the ass for how great you are. You can even rant and rave and fire people who don't tow the line like you expect. But until that happens, you got a pipe dream and 40 tons of useless architectural and code design cruft you're carrying around between your ears that you have been sold.
How many times we heard the stories that a hot technology companies growth were uncontrollable and at some point, everything just fall down.
This is one of my favorite canards. Look -- if you're in a technology company that wrote crap code and now you have a million users? That's not a failure! That's a success! We should all be so lucky! For every tech startup that wrote crap code and have a million users there are a thousand or more tech companies that wrote awesome code that nobody cares about. It's not enough for those guys to sit around telling themselves how awesome they are, how much they could scale if they only have users, because getting users is the whole freaking point. Code the Space Shuttle once you can sell a couple of bottle rockets.
You're not talking to somebody who is saying throw out all your good coding practices. You're talking to somebody who is telling you to freely adapt with an open mind to the particular situation you find yourself in.
No. If you're in a startup 20-1 odds are you never see that code again. Factor that.
If you're in a spot where the company is making money, you've got an income stream? Different story entirely.
The point is to do the math. Don't just follow one way or another because you have some idea of what a "correct" programmer would do.
I have listened to your rant all my life. Hell, I've even been the one giving it. 99% of the time I was right, because 99% of the time I was talking to a group that had to maintain whatever they wrote for the next five years. But when you are in a not-making-money-startup right and you have 200 folks telling you how to be a great programmer, and not a damn one of them could make a program on the open market that could make a dime. We have put "quality programmer" ahead of "make something useful" because we, as programmers, are a market for other folks to sell us stuff. Our customers are a secondary consideration to them -- and to us. Something is wrong with that picture.
Love the rant. I especially like it when people tell me and others what a good or bad programmer is. Hell, I agree with the thrust of your rant. The problem is that people could give jack shit for a good programmer. They want you to solve their problems. Then money comes. Then you have a code base that you can make all nice and shiny and pat yourself on the ass for how great you are. You can even rant and rave and fire people who don't tow the line like you expect. But until that happens, you got a pipe dream and 40 tons of useless architectural and code design cruft you're carrying around between your ears that you have been sold.
How many times we heard the stories that a hot technology companies growth were uncontrollable and at some point, everything just fall down.
This is one of my favorite canards. Look -- if you're in a technology company that wrote crap code and now you have a million users? That's not a failure! That's a success! We should all be so lucky! For every tech startup that wrote crap code and have a million users there are a thousand or more tech companies that wrote awesome code that nobody cares about. It's not enough for those guys to sit around telling themselves how awesome they are, how much they could scale if they only have users, because getting users is the whole freaking point. Code the Space Shuttle once you can sell a couple of bottle rockets.
You're not talking to somebody who is saying throw out all your good coding practices. You're talking to somebody who is telling you to freely adapt with an open mind to the particular situation you find yourself in.
</counter rant> :)