4 ms·

Popularity shouldn't be the deciding factor for tools of any kind.

kozhevnikov 6y ago
For personal projects. For engineering managers, popularity of a language or a framework is a significant consideration from resourcing perspective. It is the driving force behind many migrations off Perl, i.e. inability to hire Perl developers in sufficient quantity to continue supporting Perl-based backends.
- FpUser 6y ago
  In my other life I used to manage bunch of developers while still developing myself. My criteria for hiring them generally was not their proficiency in particular tool but ability to grasp programming concepts in general and ability to grok any particular tool in short time. Practical experience in particular areas of course was a big plus. Over the time this strategy proved beneficial. My team ended up having the highest salaries and bonuses in the company along with being given most interesting projects (developing new products from scratch as a rule). I still went on my own after some time as I could not really tolerate that employer/employee style of interaction.
  - dgudkov 6y ago
    >My criteria for hiring them generally was not their proficiency in particular tool but ability to grasp programming concepts in general and ability to grok any particular tool in short time. I'm curious how did you test candidates for this? Did you give them any specific tasks to accomplish and then evaluate their ability to learn?
    - FpUser 6y ago
      I asked them what did they do (projects) and how exactly and what particular parts they were responsible for. After that if I still feel interested I would proceed to delve into details like how they handled this problem/that problem/etc. Sometimes would check references. This would give pretty good picture of what the candidate is capable of. I do not remember being disappointed.
pmiller2 6y ago
Popularity helps if you like your tools to be updated and maintained, and you want to hire lots of people who know how to use them.
disposedtrolley 6y ago
Why not? I mean, it shouldn’t be _the_ deciding factor but it certainly should contribute greatly to the decision. Tools get popular for a reason. You get community support and a test-of-time guarantee that whatever you invest in today is more likely to last compared to the niche choice.
- FpUser 6y ago
  >"Tools get popular for a reason" Sometimes/often for completely wrong reason. And even if the reason was good in particular context then suddenly the tool gets dragged to be used well beyond the original intent.
  - yCombLinks 6y ago
    I like how you've nominated your own opinion as being the right reason, and everyone that made the tool popular as having the wrong opinion.
    - FpUser 6y ago
      I said "sometimes". Do not put words in my mouth.
petercooper 6y ago
I always used to agree with this. But I've been listening to an audiobook that discusses this very topic and it seems there are good reasons for going with the most popular option in situations where you're aiming for the least downside rather than the biggest upside. One example given is that if you're booking a flight for an executive "to New York" you should pick JFK, not because it's the best option, but because it's the most popular. The reason is that if you pick Newark, say, and it all goes swimmingly, the best you can hope for is a "thanks!" .. whereas if there's a delay or some other problem, the person is likely to blame you for picking "a weird airport" (this story comes from a British perspective – I'm sure Newark is better known amongst Americans.. to reverse the story, it'd be like an American flying into Gatwick instead of Heathrow). If they got delayed at JFK, they're more likely to blame the airline, etc. I'm thinking of digging into this a bit further as I think some of this explains why certain programming languages, tools, and services grow in popularity while others don't. AWS feels like the JFK of clouds, for instance. There's also the old "no-one gets fired for buying IBM" adage at play. People pick AWS or JFK not because it's the best option but because it's guaranteed by popularity to not be the worst.
- latexr 6y ago
  Mind sharing the book’s name?
  - petercooper 6y ago
    Alchemy: The Surprising Power of Ideas That Don't Make Sense by Rory Sutherland. He's in lots of videos, TED talks, etc. if you want to get the cut of his jib for free, e.g. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iueVZJVEmEs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iueVZJVEmEs
    - carlmr 6y ago
      Thank you, I'll check it out.
- carlmr 6y ago
  >There's also the old "no-one gets fired for buying IBM" adage at play. You seem to be mostly concerned with CYA here and in the JFK example. >People pick AWS or JFK not because it's the best option but because it's guaranteed by popularity to not be the worst. But this doesn't follow from CYA. It might be the best outcome for you, because your boss doesn't blame you. But it doesn't mean it's overall the best option. I never had a great experience with IBM tools. They're the first example that comes to mind of software which gets bought because buyers aren't users in big corporations and buyers not having a personal incentive to choose better software. In a large company with 100.000 employees where everybody loses 1h a week due to bad UX, slow UI and server restarts, you're losing multiple millions of dollars a week to protect your position. If Newark is on average better than JFK, you're losing your executives time to protect your position. I'm not saying protecting yourself isn't worthwhile, but it's a bad reason to pick tools from the company's perspective.
rusticpenn 6y ago
I guess thats how I got stuck with some niche framework with no proper documentation and almost no answers on Stack Overflow when I am stuck.

For personal projects. For engineering managers, popularity of a language or a framework is a significant consideration from resourcing perspective. It is the driving force behind many migrations off Perl, i.e. inability to hire Perl developers in sufficient quantity to continue supporting Perl-based backends.

FpUser 6y ago
In my other life I used to manage bunch of developers while still developing myself. My criteria for hiring them generally was not their proficiency in particular tool but ability to grasp programming concepts in general and ability to grok any particular tool in short time. Practical experience in particular areas of course was a big plus. Over the time this strategy proved beneficial. My team ended up having the highest salaries and bonuses in the company along with being given most interesting projects (developing new products from scratch as a rule). I still went on my own after some time as I could not really tolerate that employer/employee style of interaction.
- dgudkov 6y ago
  >My criteria for hiring them generally was not their proficiency in particular tool but ability to grasp programming concepts in general and ability to grok any particular tool in short time. I'm curious how did you test candidates for this? Did you give them any specific tasks to accomplish and then evaluate their ability to learn?
  - FpUser 6y ago
    I asked them what did they do (projects) and how exactly and what particular parts they were responsible for. After that if I still feel interested I would proceed to delve into details like how they handled this problem/that problem/etc. Sometimes would check references. This would give pretty good picture of what the candidate is capable of. I do not remember being disappointed.

pmiller2 6y ago

Popularity helps if you like your tools to be updated and maintained, and you want to hire lots of people who know how to use them.

disposedtrolley 6y ago

Why not? I mean, it shouldn’t be _the_ deciding factor but it certainly should contribute greatly to the decision. Tools get popular for a reason. You get community support and a test-of-time guarantee that whatever you invest in today is more likely to last compared to the niche choice.

FpUser 6y ago
>"Tools get popular for a reason" Sometimes/often for completely wrong reason. And even if the reason was good in particular context then suddenly the tool gets dragged to be used well beyond the original intent.
- yCombLinks 6y ago
  I like how you've nominated your own opinion as being the right reason, and everyone that made the tool popular as having the wrong opinion.
  - FpUser 6y ago
    I said "sometimes". Do not put words in my mouth.

petercooper 6y ago

I always used to agree with this. But I've been listening to an audiobook that discusses this very topic and it seems there are good reasons for going with the most popular option in situations where you're aiming for the least downside rather than the biggest upside. One example given is that if you're booking a flight for an executive "to New York" you should pick JFK, not because it's the best option, but because it's the most popular. The reason is that if you pick Newark, say, and it all goes swimmingly, the best you can hope for is a "thanks!" .. whereas if there's a delay or some other problem, the person is likely to blame you for picking "a weird airport" (this story comes from a British perspective – I'm sure Newark is better known amongst Americans.. to reverse the story, it'd be like an American flying into Gatwick instead of Heathrow). If they got delayed at JFK, they're more likely to blame the airline, etc. I'm thinking of digging into this a bit further as I think some of this explains why certain programming languages, tools, and services grow in popularity while others don't. AWS feels like the JFK of clouds, for instance. There's also the old "no-one gets fired for buying IBM" adage at play. People pick AWS or JFK not because it's the best option but because it's guaranteed by popularity to not be the worst.

latexr 6y ago
Mind sharing the book’s name?
- petercooper 6y ago
  Alchemy: The Surprising Power of Ideas That Don't Make Sense by Rory Sutherland. He's in lots of videos, TED talks, etc. if you want to get the cut of his jib for free, e.g. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iueVZJVEmEs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iueVZJVEmEs
  - carlmr 6y ago
    Thank you, I'll check it out.
carlmr 6y ago
>There's also the old "no-one gets fired for buying IBM" adage at play. You seem to be mostly concerned with CYA here and in the JFK example. >People pick AWS or JFK not because it's the best option but because it's guaranteed by popularity to not be the worst. But this doesn't follow from CYA. It might be the best outcome for you, because your boss doesn't blame you. But it doesn't mean it's overall the best option. I never had a great experience with IBM tools. They're the first example that comes to mind of software which gets bought because buyers aren't users in big corporations and buyers not having a personal incentive to choose better software. In a large company with 100.000 employees where everybody loses 1h a week due to bad UX, slow UI and server restarts, you're losing multiple millions of dollars a week to protect your position. If Newark is on average better than JFK, you're losing your executives time to protect your position. I'm not saying protecting yourself isn't worthwhile, but it's a bad reason to pick tools from the company's perspective.

rusticpenn 6y ago

I guess thats how I got stuck with some niche framework with no proper documentation and almost no answers on Stack Overflow when I am stuck.