5 ms·

IME that culture, where it exists, varies from organisation to organisation and is driven from the top. I think a lot of companies don't care about bugs as muc

IME that culture, where it exists, varies from organisation to organisation and is driven from the top. I think a lot of companies don't care about bugs as much as their developers do though, and that isn't necessarily irrational behaviour. Some kinds of customer facing bugs really are ok to just let happen.

falcolas 7y ago
> Some kinds of customer facing bugs really are ok to just let happen. That's the exact mindset of the culture I mentioned. You can justify any kind of bug hitting production with it. It does the exact opposite of pushing things towards a better state; it aims for mediocrity. Even if striving for zero bugs in production is functionally impossible, it encourages developers (and the entire company) to move towards quality, not away from it. Striving for 100% is what drives change.
- crdoconnor 7y ago
  Correct, it aims for mediocrity. If the customer requested 50 McDonald's hamburger, is it a cultural problem that you're not delivering one steak?
  - falcolas 7y ago
    It's funny that you mention a McDonald's hamburger, since there's actually a lot of standards that their hamburger has to live up to. They have just simplified the creation of a hamburger to the point where teenagers can make them properly with minimal supervision. Software development is not at that point. Sometimes we put three pickles on instead of two. Sometimes we forget the pickles. Sometimes we spread ketchup all over the outside of the bun. Sometimes we forget to cook the meat. And we don't aim for a good hamburger, we just aim to get something remotely hamburger shaped out the door to the customer.
    - crdoconnor 7y ago
      The point, however, is that the customer/regulator dictates quality standards, not the person assembling the burger. Whereas apparently many software engineers do not take their cue from customers since they strive for some impossible "no bug policy" (or some other such rubbish).

falcolas 7y ago

> Some kinds of customer facing bugs really are ok to just let happen. That's the exact mindset of the culture I mentioned. You can justify any kind of bug hitting production with it. It does the exact opposite of pushing things towards a better state; it aims for mediocrity. Even if striving for zero bugs in production is functionally impossible, it encourages developers (and the entire company) to move towards quality, not away from it. Striving for 100% is what drives change.

crdoconnor 7y ago
Correct, it aims for mediocrity. If the customer requested 50 McDonald's hamburger, is it a cultural problem that you're not delivering one steak?
- falcolas 7y ago
  It's funny that you mention a McDonald's hamburger, since there's actually a lot of standards that their hamburger has to live up to. They have just simplified the creation of a hamburger to the point where teenagers can make them properly with minimal supervision. Software development is not at that point. Sometimes we put three pickles on instead of two. Sometimes we forget the pickles. Sometimes we spread ketchup all over the outside of the bun. Sometimes we forget to cook the meat. And we don't aim for a good hamburger, we just aim to get something remotely hamburger shaped out the door to the customer.
  - crdoconnor 7y ago
    The point, however, is that the customer/regulator dictates quality standards, not the person assembling the burger. Whereas apparently many software engineers do not take their cue from customers since they strive for some impossible "no bug policy" (or some other such rubbish).