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My problem with posts like this is that it's a vehicle for bashing the currently accepted practices. Here are a few of my favourites in no particular order: *

by vertis 10y ago

My problem with posts like this is that it's a vehicle for bashing the currently accepted practices. Here are a few of my favourites in no particular order: * Stand ups are bad - Let's be frank, I'm belting out code so quickly that staying on the same page as everyone else is just not worth the time anyway (at the speed I'm going it'll be done tomorrow anyway). * Pair programming is bad - when was the last time I caused a bug, right? Or for that matter hit a problem I couldn't solve, and wasted time having to research the solution. Never, right? Right...ohhhh look at the cute picture of my niece on Facebook. * Open plan offices are bad - I'm super important to the company, the company would break if I went away. I'm so much of a star that I should have the best office. Not to mention, I need somewhere to put all my trophies. * Meetings - don't get me started on meetings. BAN THEM ALL. There must be a better way to communicate? Email? Ummm, yeah Email, wait, no, I'll come back to email. I know, lets just have someone decide on the direction we're going to go and write it on a stone tablet, that'll save some meetings (I'll get started on the tablet right after I finish here). I mean lets think about it, why do we need to coordinate anything? I'm the rockstar and if you just leave me to belt out the code it'll all come together...what do you mean other parts of the business need to do things to get ready? * Emails - I get too many of them. For stupid things too. Ops alerts, customers asking questions, internal announcements, travel itineraries. Being included on email chain discussions about direction? Who needs that. What do you mean you made a decision without consulting me? Now we have to start over with the direction I want to go in. And I'm out of time. Off I go to my lean, agile, open plan job.

vertis 10y ago
Not sure I understand the down votes? Sure I made up the reasons above, but people are genuinely hating on the things I've mentioned with no real alternatives offered.
- pessimizer 10y ago
  Instead of engaging the actual points made, you made up a fake idiot, and made different, stupider arguments to support the same points. Lunch breaks are good - Dude, I love to eat, and if I can't stop working when I have my cheeseburger then nothing is getting getting done here even though I'm smelly and 500 pounds. Paychecks are necessary - I'm such a loser that I work for money instead of just loving cranking out sick code that disrupts the world. I grew up poor so I whine about people who don't need the money. Not eating arsenic - Oooh, I'm such a picky wimp that I can't take a little arsenic in my food... And I'm done. Off I go to my volunteer sweatshop that's slowly poisoning me to death.
  - zenlikethat 10y ago
    OP's idiot wasn't fake, it's a real representation of spoiled devs. So many software developers act like divas with no actual tether to legitimate business value. They'd rather chase the latest JavaScript framework, or whatever. Instead of starting their own company where they implement these supposedly superior practices they complain on HN. Don't you think it does a disservice to the actual underprivileged sweatshop workers of the world to compare cushy software coding jobs to sweatshops? Is your software development gig so bad that it's "slowly poisoning you to death" instead of putting food on your table and cash in your 401k? If so, why are you bothering?
kevan 10y ago
>Stand ups are bad - Let's be frank, I'm belting out code so quickly that staying on the same page as everyone else is just not worth the time anyway (at the speed I'm going it'll be done tomorrow anyway). Could you elaborate on this? I find standups most useful when we're working on small widgets of feature work precisely because we move so fast. Standups keep the business side in sync with the code we're putting out (e.g. features x, y ready to release, expecting z next week). It gives them a tighter feedback loop in case they need to manage expectations or coordinate with other groups. If we're working on meatier chunks that take longer then we back off to a pull model. When someone wants to know they ask, but daily standups aren't very helpful when updates sound like "Working on <huge_feature> for the forseeable future"
- vertis 10y ago
  Yep agreed. I was finding arbitrary reasons to rag on stand ups to illustrate a point. You could absolutely write it the way you just said it and be even better.
zenlikethat 10y ago
I agree with you, I would guess some down vote sentiment comes from misunderstanding the sarcasm. Generally I think programmers aren't giving lip service fairly to the things that are actually good about the above. If the tables turn and things go south for developer demand many will be begging to call in to a daily standup because they won't have any job at all.

by vertis 10y ago

vertis 10y ago

Not sure I understand the down votes? Sure I made up the reasons above, but people are genuinely hating on the things I've mentioned with no real alternatives offered.

pessimizer 10y ago
Instead of engaging the actual points made, you made up a fake idiot, and made different, stupider arguments to support the same points. Lunch breaks are good - Dude, I love to eat, and if I can't stop working when I have my cheeseburger then nothing is getting getting done here even though I'm smelly and 500 pounds. Paychecks are necessary - I'm such a loser that I work for money instead of just loving cranking out sick code that disrupts the world. I grew up poor so I whine about people who don't need the money. Not eating arsenic - Oooh, I'm such a picky wimp that I can't take a little arsenic in my food... And I'm done. Off I go to my volunteer sweatshop that's slowly poisoning me to death.
- zenlikethat 10y ago
  OP's idiot wasn't fake, it's a real representation of spoiled devs. So many software developers act like divas with no actual tether to legitimate business value. They'd rather chase the latest JavaScript framework, or whatever. Instead of starting their own company where they implement these supposedly superior practices they complain on HN. Don't you think it does a disservice to the actual underprivileged sweatshop workers of the world to compare cushy software coding jobs to sweatshops? Is your software development gig so bad that it's "slowly poisoning you to death" instead of putting food on your table and cash in your 401k? If so, why are you bothering?

kevan 10y ago

>Stand ups are bad - Let's be frank, I'm belting out code so quickly that staying on the same page as everyone else is just not worth the time anyway (at the speed I'm going it'll be done tomorrow anyway). Could you elaborate on this? I find standups most useful when we're working on small widgets of feature work precisely because we move so fast. Standups keep the business side in sync with the code we're putting out (e.g. features x, y ready to release, expecting z next week). It gives them a tighter feedback loop in case they need to manage expectations or coordinate with other groups. If we're working on meatier chunks that take longer then we back off to a pull model. When someone wants to know they ask, but daily standups aren't very helpful when updates sound like "Working on <huge_feature> for the forseeable future"

vertis 10y ago
Yep agreed. I was finding arbitrary reasons to rag on stand ups to illustrate a point. You could absolutely write it the way you just said it and be even better.

zenlikethat 10y ago

I agree with you, I would guess some down vote sentiment comes from misunderstanding the sarcasm. Generally I think programmers aren't giving lip service fairly to the things that are actually good about the above. If the tables turn and things go south for developer demand many will be begging to call in to a daily standup because they won't have any job at all.