5 ms·

That's what happens when your executives vindictively outsource important software to the cheapest devshop they can find. You end up with a product being built

by nisten 4y ago

That's what happens when your executives vindictively outsource important software to the cheapest devshop they can find. You end up with a product being built by a team that by default has no sense of ownership. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-06-28/boeing-s-737-max-software-outsourced-to-9-an-hour-engineers https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-06-28/boeing-s-... https://www.industryweek.com/supply-chain/article/22027840/boeings-737-max-software-outsourced-to-9anhour-engineers https://www.industryweek.com/supply-chain/article/22027840/b...

justinjlynn 4y ago
> by default has no sense of ownership. Because they don't own anything. They're paid to enrich the requirements into software specifications and nothing else. It gains them absolutely nothing - so why would they ever feel any sense of ownership after the job is delivered and accepted? The business relationship is predicated on them being disposable contract workers. At a minimum, a sense of ongoing engineering ownership requires an ongoing relationship predicated on trust and support - which requires ongoing financial support after the software project is 'completed' - which Boeing, in hiring contract workers, explicitly did not want to provide. Given this, how can we seriously expect the engineers of an outsourced development shop, working under a piecework contract, to ever feel any sense of ongoing ownership?
- ClumsyPilot 4y ago
  > how can we seriously expect We get really good as gaslighting and hope to find gullible fools
- achow 4y ago
  By giving recognition for good work, which can go into their resume and/or elevate their status among industry peers.
  - justinjlynn 4y ago
    Ah, yes. Of course... "exposure". You know, the offering of that as compensation for work done has become a meme amongst creative professionals to the point of mocking absurdity.
    - achow 4y ago
      'Ownership' is also same. For either case, one does not get any extra compensation.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
WalterBright 4y ago
There was nothing wrong with the software developed for the MAX. The flaw was in the specification of what the software was supposed to do. The delivered software adhered to the specification.
- atdrummond 4y ago
  I’ve given up arguing this on HN. We have to repeat this every time this topic comes up and despite those of us with air industry experience setting the record straight repeatedly, the number of posters parroting this line never decreases.
  - WalterBright 4y ago
    That's because shows like Frontline come up with all these lies.
hemreldop 4y ago
nonamechicken 4y ago
Common! This gets brought up all the time when the topic is Boeing. Max's issue had nothing to do with the outsourced software. Netflix has a documentary called 'Downfall' which talks about what all went wrong. AirBus also outsources, they haven't crashed right?
- amarka 4y ago
  Not sure if the last sentence is in jest or not, but here's a list of crashes for just one of their plane models: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_accidents_and_incidents_involving_the_Airbus_A320_family https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_accidents_and_incident...
  - nonamechicken 4y ago
    When I mentioned AirBus, I was thinking of this - that the Max crash is clearly due to corporate greed. I am not aware of any such scenario with AirBus. Not only that, according to the Netflix documentary, Boeing was trying to blame the pilots of the Indonesian and Ethiopian airlines initially. Then in turns out that the Indonesian pilot was an Indian who was trained in US, and the Ethiopian pilots followed Boeing's guidelines on MCAS failure properly. I am looking at these blames on outsourcing from that perspective - that Boeing is trying to blame others to hide their greed.
    - WalterBright 4y ago
      > the Ethiopian pilots followed Boeing's guidelines on MCAS failure properly. The Ethiopian pilots did not follow the procedure in the Emergency Airworthiness Directive distributed to all MAX pilots that says: "Initially, higher control forces may be needed to overcome any stabilizer nose down trim already applied. Electric stabilizer trim can be used to neutralize control column pitch forces before moving the STAB TRIM CUTOUT switches to CUTOUT. Manual stabilizer trim can be used before and after the STAB TRIM CUTOUT switches are moved to CUTOUT." https://theaircurrent.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/B737-MAX-AD-1107.pdf https://theaircurrent.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/B737-MA... You might want to also read the report: 2018 - 035 - PK-LQP Final Report http://knkt.dephub.go.id/knkt/ntsc_aviation/baru/2018%20-%20035%20-%20PK-LQP%20Final%20Report.pdf http://knkt.dephub.go.id/knkt/ntsc_aviation/baru/2018%20-%20... And note that the first incident of MCAS failure was overcome by the pilots and the airplane landed safely.
RachelF 4y ago
It happens everywhere - executives think they'll save money by outsourcing (mainly to India where wages are 1/6 what they are in the USA). One most of the projects I've worked on they got what they paid for. However, the executives who'd made the money-saving decision had moved on by then.

by nisten 4y ago

justinjlynn 4y ago

> by default has no sense of ownership. Because they don't own anything. They're paid to enrich the requirements into software specifications and nothing else. It gains them absolutely nothing - so why would they ever feel any sense of ownership after the job is delivered and accepted? The business relationship is predicated on them being disposable contract workers. At a minimum, a sense of ongoing engineering ownership requires an ongoing relationship predicated on trust and support - which requires ongoing financial support after the software project is 'completed' - which Boeing, in hiring contract workers, explicitly did not want to provide. Given this, how can we seriously expect the engineers of an outsourced development shop, working under a piecework contract, to ever feel any sense of ongoing ownership?

ClumsyPilot 4y ago
> how can we seriously expect We get really good as gaslighting and hope to find gullible fools
achow 4y ago
By giving recognition for good work, which can go into their resume and/or elevate their status among industry peers.
- justinjlynn 4y ago
  Ah, yes. Of course... "exposure". You know, the offering of that as compensation for work done has become a meme amongst creative professionals to the point of mocking absurdity.
  - achow 4y ago
    'Ownership' is also same. For either case, one does not get any extra compensation.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

WalterBright 4y ago

There was nothing wrong with the software developed for the MAX. The flaw was in the specification of what the software was supposed to do. The delivered software adhered to the specification.

atdrummond 4y ago
I’ve given up arguing this on HN. We have to repeat this every time this topic comes up and despite those of us with air industry experience setting the record straight repeatedly, the number of posters parroting this line never decreases.
- WalterBright 4y ago
  That's because shows like Frontline come up with all these lies.

hemreldop 4y ago

nonamechicken 4y ago

Common! This gets brought up all the time when the topic is Boeing. Max's issue had nothing to do with the outsourced software. Netflix has a documentary called 'Downfall' which talks about what all went wrong. AirBus also outsources, they haven't crashed right?

amarka 4y ago
Not sure if the last sentence is in jest or not, but here's a list of crashes for just one of their plane models: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_accidents_and_incidents_involving_the_Airbus_A320_family https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_accidents_and_incident...
- nonamechicken 4y ago
  When I mentioned AirBus, I was thinking of this - that the Max crash is clearly due to corporate greed. I am not aware of any such scenario with AirBus. Not only that, according to the Netflix documentary, Boeing was trying to blame the pilots of the Indonesian and Ethiopian airlines initially. Then in turns out that the Indonesian pilot was an Indian who was trained in US, and the Ethiopian pilots followed Boeing's guidelines on MCAS failure properly. I am looking at these blames on outsourcing from that perspective - that Boeing is trying to blame others to hide their greed.
  - WalterBright 4y ago
    > the Ethiopian pilots followed Boeing's guidelines on MCAS failure properly. The Ethiopian pilots did not follow the procedure in the Emergency Airworthiness Directive distributed to all MAX pilots that says: "Initially, higher control forces may be needed to overcome any stabilizer nose down trim already applied. Electric stabilizer trim can be used to neutralize control column pitch forces before moving the STAB TRIM CUTOUT switches to CUTOUT. Manual stabilizer trim can be used before and after the STAB TRIM CUTOUT switches are moved to CUTOUT." https://theaircurrent.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/B737-MAX-AD-1107.pdf https://theaircurrent.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/B737-MA... You might want to also read the report: 2018 - 035 - PK-LQP Final Report http://knkt.dephub.go.id/knkt/ntsc_aviation/baru/2018%20-%20035%20-%20PK-LQP%20Final%20Report.pdf http://knkt.dephub.go.id/knkt/ntsc_aviation/baru/2018%20-%20... And note that the first incident of MCAS failure was overcome by the pilots and the airplane landed safely.

RachelF 4y ago

It happens everywhere - executives think they'll save money by outsourcing (mainly to India where wages are 1/6 what they are in the USA). One most of the projects I've worked on they got what they paid for. However, the executives who'd made the money-saving decision had moved on by then.