4 ms·

There's no 'silver bullet' - but surely a 'large product' does not need to start off as a 'large product'. A 'small team' making an MVP, and then moving on inc

There's no 'silver bullet' - but surely a 'large product' does not need to start off as a 'large product'. A 'small team' making an MVP, and then moving on incrementally from there, adding more people to do peripheral features as the project progress might seem like a good way to overcome some inherent 'monolithic' risks - as well as keep costs down at the start. It takes an open mind from management to grasp that building complex software is not like building a really big building. You just can't predict outcomes, so, you have to build a good team that can forge a path, and have some 'kill-it-don't-kill-it' guidelines, and expect that many will fail.

cbhl 10y ago
Then you run into "rewrite risk" -- that the company won't survive long enough for the MVP to meet the needs of the existing customers.
- webmaven 10y ago
  Or sometimes your prototype or proof-of-concept simply gets deployed to production by executive fiat because they don't understand that it's put together with bubble gum and baling wire, and over the next 3-5 years you are never given the resources to do anything but (a) keep it running somehow, and (b) add more features that got promised to customers in order to land them and that need to be live ASAP. What's that...? No, I've never experienced that situation myself, why do you ask?
  - snerbles 10y ago
    Watching a past employer slowly drown itself in technical debt is simultaneously sad and satisfying.
    - deleted 10y ago
      [deleted]
  - aaronblohowiak 10y ago
    "protoduction"
  - candiodari 10y ago
    > What's that...? No, I've never experienced that situation myself, why do you ask? Another way to look at it is to say this provided you with a job and an entire company with a revenue basis, probably for years. I mean on the other side of the fence there are plenty of stories of software developers being allowed to "properly design", no technical debt, then after 1 year of zero result they come with a product, which doesn't even start (the tests run and succeed, though). Then the third or so feature request that comes in ... needs a rewrite.

cbhl 10y ago

Then you run into "rewrite risk" -- that the company won't survive long enough for the MVP to meet the needs of the existing customers.

webmaven 10y ago
Or sometimes your prototype or proof-of-concept simply gets deployed to production by executive fiat because they don't understand that it's put together with bubble gum and baling wire, and over the next 3-5 years you are never given the resources to do anything but (a) keep it running somehow, and (b) add more features that got promised to customers in order to land them and that need to be live ASAP. What's that...? No, I've never experienced that situation myself, why do you ask?
- snerbles 10y ago
  Watching a past employer slowly drown itself in technical debt is simultaneously sad and satisfying.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
- aaronblohowiak 10y ago
  "protoduction"
- candiodari 10y ago
  > What's that...? No, I've never experienced that situation myself, why do you ask? Another way to look at it is to say this provided you with a job and an entire company with a revenue basis, probably for years. I mean on the other side of the fence there are plenty of stories of software developers being allowed to "properly design", no technical debt, then after 1 year of zero result they come with a product, which doesn't even start (the tests run and succeed, though). Then the third or so feature request that comes in ... needs a rewrite.