3 ms·

I think he's overstating how serious his "transgression" really was. If anything, knowing that one of your rising stars is so into coding that they'd rather be

I think he's overstating how serious his "transgression" really was. If anything, knowing that one of your rising stars is so into coding that they'd rather be still coding for fun rather than anything else would make them _more_ valuable. Not saying that working on side projects on company time / company equipment isn't dumb, but it's certainly not a major offense!

gcheong 18y ago
True. "The implementation (in C) was based on the GADDAG data structure and algorithm explained in a paper by Steven Gordon" Sounds like he was doing something more akin to research, which could certainly have benefitted the company in future development projects, than some guy simply wasting time with a trivial side project.
- michael_dorfman 18y ago
  I was going to post a similar comment, until I read Gordon's paper, which is entitled (wait for it) "A Faster Scrabble Move Generation Algorithm". In other words, this wasn't a case of Eric finding a cool data structure and then choosing Scrabble as a way to play with it-- if it was research, it was Scrabble research. This is not to take away from Eric in any way-- props to him for both the coding he's done, and the article. And, it wouldn't surprise me at all to find that his knowledge of DAGs, DAWGs and GADDADs was helpful later on in SourceGear. But this particular case looks more "recreation" than "research" to me.
mpk 18y ago
I'd say that working on commercial side-projects is unethical. On the other hand, experimenting with code is exactly the thing you want your developers to be doing in their down time. When working on commercial software you're subject to deadlines, management decisions, interoperability issues and bugfixes. This limits your creativity. It goes with the territory, so I'm not complaining here, but large parts of this process are Not Fun. Experiments on the side don't have these issues and allow you to do a little freewheeling. Keeps that whole hacking spirit alive. People without side-projects tend to move into project management, oracle db maintenance or turn into burned-out has-beens after a few years of software development.
- learninglisp 18y ago
  Excactly right. It's your job as a developer to always have some just-for-fun apps going where you test out new tools and techniques. How else can you suggest anything useful when the next project starts? To do otherwise is to always stay status quo on architecture or to pick new technologies at random.

gcheong 18y ago

True. "The implementation (in C) was based on the GADDAG data structure and algorithm explained in a paper by Steven Gordon" Sounds like he was doing something more akin to research, which could certainly have benefitted the company in future development projects, than some guy simply wasting time with a trivial side project.

michael_dorfman 18y ago
I was going to post a similar comment, until I read Gordon's paper, which is entitled (wait for it) "A Faster Scrabble Move Generation Algorithm". In other words, this wasn't a case of Eric finding a cool data structure and then choosing Scrabble as a way to play with it-- if it was research, it was Scrabble research. This is not to take away from Eric in any way-- props to him for both the coding he's done, and the article. And, it wouldn't surprise me at all to find that his knowledge of DAGs, DAWGs and GADDADs was helpful later on in SourceGear. But this particular case looks more "recreation" than "research" to me.

mpk 18y ago

I'd say that working on commercial side-projects is unethical. On the other hand, experimenting with code is exactly the thing you want your developers to be doing in their down time. When working on commercial software you're subject to deadlines, management decisions, interoperability issues and bugfixes. This limits your creativity. It goes with the territory, so I'm not complaining here, but large parts of this process are Not Fun. Experiments on the side don't have these issues and allow you to do a little freewheeling. Keeps that whole hacking spirit alive. People without side-projects tend to move into project management, oracle db maintenance or turn into burned-out has-beens after a few years of software development.

learninglisp 18y ago
Excactly right. It's your job as a developer to always have some just-for-fun apps going where you test out new tools and techniques. How else can you suggest anything useful when the next project starts? To do otherwise is to always stay status quo on architecture or to pick new technologies at random.