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Link to the Falsehoods article, it's a good read: https://github.com/google/libphonenumber/blob/master/FALSEHOODS.md https://github.com/google/libphonenumber/b

by kylec 2y ago

Link to the Falsehoods article, it's a good read: https://github.com/google/libphonenumber/blob/master/FALSEHOODS.md https://github.com/google/libphonenumber/blob/master/FALSEHO...

foota 2y ago
Um... Does anyone else see the repo owner?
- layer8 2y ago
  They meticulously document the falsehoods their programmers believe. ;)
  - ffsm8 2y ago
    These decisions haven't been made by programmers in over 10 years. These lists made sense in 2000-2010 when programmers had the autonomy ( in most corporations ) to decide on what feature to develop and how it should behave. This hasn't been the case since the industry introduced roles such as product owner. I've had to implement my fair share of anti patterns that I was fully aware would degrade the experience for the user. At the end of the day, the programmers have been reduced to essentially blue color workers that just do whatever the MBAs decide on.
    - ketzo 2y ago
      Programmers are some of the most in-demand workers in the world. You wield significant influence. And any even-slightly-functional workplace will at least try to listen to the word of their experts. Perhaps it’s possible you didn’t do enough to explain why you didn’t believe it was the right work to do, or if you did, perhaps there were other factors in play than “user experience.” Also, uh, “I have to do what my boss says” doesn’t make you a blue collar worker.
      - ffsm8 2y ago
        > doesn’t make you a blue collar worker. I know, I was exaggerating. I thought it was clear from my usage of the word "essentially". > perhaps there were other factors in play than “user experience.” Of course there were. There always are - chief among them the profitability, because selling the customer on stuff they didn't need is profitable. Especially if you frame it "right". But that example is completely unrelated to this case, to very little value in getting deeper into it.
      - Mountain_Skies 2y ago
        If programmers are some of the most in-demand workers in the world, why do they have to send out over 1000 job applications and are still treated like trash by hiring processes? Hacker News is one of the few places on Earth where this belief that programmers are in control of everything still exists. Pretty much everywhere else has adapted to the reality where programmers are in great surplus, but the investor class won't be happy until it's a minimum wage job, or even better, an unpaid internship. No wonder HN has a reputation for being a bunch of out of touch Bay Area investors with little concept of the real world.
        saagarjha 2y ago
        Do you think this accurately describes a Google engineer?
        smallmancontrov 2y ago
        Yesterday? No. Today? Maybe. Tomorrow? Yes.
        ravenstine 2y ago
        Programmers have control over things product owners and management don't care about. Frankly, those are things nobody but programmers cares about. When it comes to meaningful decisions that would either improve or harm the user experience, I have only ever seen programmers treated as advisors at best and obedient little foot soldiers at worst. And why wouldn't they be treated this way by MBA types? Programmers are a necessary evil that management would rather not exist at all. Just because there are startups founded by programmers doesn't mean that's the reality of the vast majority of the software industry, or that said startups won't soon replace their leadership with MBA bozos whose only goal is making it to the next quarter.
    - antonvs 2y ago
      > programmers have been reduced to essentially blue color workers Papa Smurf will not be pleased to hear about this.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    - rad_gruchalski 2y ago
      > These lists made sense in 2000-2010 when programmers had the autonomy ( in most corporations ) to decide on what feature to develop and how it should behave. Falsehoods programmers believe?
      - dingnuts 2y ago
        Which part? That programmers ever had that level of autonomy?
    - twic 2y ago
      Is anyone old enough to remember when Google was an aspirational place to work? They had the best engineers and were doing the best stuff, and people spoke their name with awe. Now it's just Microsoft with a salad bar.
- out-of-ideas 2y ago
  im sure it will be deleted/modified/adjusted/enhanced; though #1 is subjective, "unless it is essential" -> and right there, it is essential for google to do lookups of phone numbers to correct account ownership information based on another-companies paid services. "whenever possible try to provide" ... nope, it is never possible; phone validation or bust. edit: i gotta change my first guess that it will be modified soon. google does not set the goal to not be evil, so they'll likely just leave the repo as-is, unattended. quote: 1. An individual has a phone number Some people do not own phones, or do not wish to provide you with their telephone number when asked. Do not require a user to provide a phone number unless it is essential, and whenever possible try to provide a fallback to accommodate these users.
- ycombinatrix 2y ago
  That is insanely pathetic
- throwaway290 2y ago
  One programmer's falsehood is another manager's kyc/regulations.
mindslight 2y ago
Falsehoods Programmers Believe About the Surveillance Industry? Entry #1: Do no evil.
diggan 2y ago
Falsehoods Programmers Believe About Google: - Projects under the `google` GitHub organization is from Google itself (Google for some reason force projects from Google employees to be umbrellaed under their own organization for some reason, even if it's a personal project) - Google follows their own rules (applies to any "Big Tech" company) - Google actually cares about correcting mistakes unless they hit the news/social media - YouTube and Google tries to make the experience for you, the consumer (on YouTube: consumer = creators + viewers), as good as they can
- lelandfe 2y ago
  > Google's common Java, C++ and JavaScript library for parsing, formatting, and validating international phone numbers It does seem this repo is “from Google.”
  - mtlynch 2y ago
    I think they mean that just because code is under github.com/google, it doesn't make it an "official" Google thing. For example, yapf[0] is under the Google Github org but has the disclaimer: >Note YAPF is not an official Google product (experimental or otherwise), it is just code that happens to be owned by Google. libphonenumber doesn't have any similar disclaimer and does seem to be an "official" Google product, but it's hard to tell what Google considers official or not. [0] https://github.com/google/yapf https://github.com/google/yapf
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    - Ferret7446 2y ago
      Google does not offer (m)any developer facing "official" products. Google offers "official" products for consumers or enterprises (e.g., Gmail, Cloud Platform), but all of their FOSS code, of which there are many, are all "unofficial"; they are FOSS projects that happen to be developed by Google employees but come with a normal zero liability FOSS license (as opposed to their "official" products, which do come with some liability user agreements/contracts).

by kylec 2y ago

Link to the Falsehoods article, it's a good read: https://github.com/google/libphonenumber/blob/master/FALSEHOODS.md https://github.com/google/libphonenumber/blob/master/FALSEHO...

foota 2y ago

Um... Does anyone else see the repo owner?

layer8 2y ago
They meticulously document the falsehoods their programmers believe. ;)
- ffsm8 2y ago
  These decisions haven't been made by programmers in over 10 years. These lists made sense in 2000-2010 when programmers had the autonomy ( in most corporations ) to decide on what feature to develop and how it should behave. This hasn't been the case since the industry introduced roles such as product owner. I've had to implement my fair share of anti patterns that I was fully aware would degrade the experience for the user. At the end of the day, the programmers have been reduced to essentially blue color workers that just do whatever the MBAs decide on.
  - ketzo 2y ago
    Programmers are some of the most in-demand workers in the world. You wield significant influence. And any even-slightly-functional workplace will at least try to listen to the word of their experts. Perhaps it’s possible you didn’t do enough to explain why you didn’t believe it was the right work to do, or if you did, perhaps there were other factors in play than “user experience.” Also, uh, “I have to do what my boss says” doesn’t make you a blue collar worker.
    - ffsm8 2y ago
      > doesn’t make you a blue collar worker. I know, I was exaggerating. I thought it was clear from my usage of the word "essentially". > perhaps there were other factors in play than “user experience.” Of course there were. There always are - chief among them the profitability, because selling the customer on stuff they didn't need is profitable. Especially if you frame it "right". But that example is completely unrelated to this case, to very little value in getting deeper into it.
    - Mountain_Skies 2y ago
      If programmers are some of the most in-demand workers in the world, why do they have to send out over 1000 job applications and are still treated like trash by hiring processes? Hacker News is one of the few places on Earth where this belief that programmers are in control of everything still exists. Pretty much everywhere else has adapted to the reality where programmers are in great surplus, but the investor class won't be happy until it's a minimum wage job, or even better, an unpaid internship. No wonder HN has a reputation for being a bunch of out of touch Bay Area investors with little concept of the real world.
      - saagarjha 2y ago
        Do you think this accurately describes a Google engineer?
        smallmancontrov 2y ago
        Yesterday? No. Today? Maybe. Tomorrow? Yes.
      - ravenstine 2y ago
        Programmers have control over things product owners and management don't care about. Frankly, those are things nobody but programmers cares about. When it comes to meaningful decisions that would either improve or harm the user experience, I have only ever seen programmers treated as advisors at best and obedient little foot soldiers at worst. And why wouldn't they be treated this way by MBA types? Programmers are a necessary evil that management would rather not exist at all. Just because there are startups founded by programmers doesn't mean that's the reality of the vast majority of the software industry, or that said startups won't soon replace their leadership with MBA bozos whose only goal is making it to the next quarter.
  - antonvs 2y ago
    > programmers have been reduced to essentially blue color workers Papa Smurf will not be pleased to hear about this.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - rad_gruchalski 2y ago
    > These lists made sense in 2000-2010 when programmers had the autonomy ( in most corporations ) to decide on what feature to develop and how it should behave. Falsehoods programmers believe?
    - dingnuts 2y ago
      Which part? That programmers ever had that level of autonomy?
  - twic 2y ago
    Is anyone old enough to remember when Google was an aspirational place to work? They had the best engineers and were doing the best stuff, and people spoke their name with awe. Now it's just Microsoft with a salad bar.
out-of-ideas 2y ago
im sure it will be deleted/modified/adjusted/enhanced; though #1 is subjective, "unless it is essential" -> and right there, it is essential for google to do lookups of phone numbers to correct account ownership information based on another-companies paid services. "whenever possible try to provide" ... nope, it is never possible; phone validation or bust. edit: i gotta change my first guess that it will be modified soon. google does not set the goal to not be evil, so they'll likely just leave the repo as-is, unattended. quote: 1. An individual has a phone number Some people do not own phones, or do not wish to provide you with their telephone number when asked. Do not require a user to provide a phone number unless it is essential, and whenever possible try to provide a fallback to accommodate these users.
ycombinatrix 2y ago
That is insanely pathetic
throwaway290 2y ago
One programmer's falsehood is another manager's kyc/regulations.

mindslight 2y ago

Falsehoods Programmers Believe About the Surveillance Industry? Entry #1: Do no evil.

diggan 2y ago

Falsehoods Programmers Believe About Google: - Projects under the `google` GitHub organization is from Google itself (Google for some reason force projects from Google employees to be umbrellaed under their own organization for some reason, even if it's a personal project) - Google follows their own rules (applies to any "Big Tech" company) - Google actually cares about correcting mistakes unless they hit the news/social media - YouTube and Google tries to make the experience for you, the consumer (on YouTube: consumer = creators + viewers), as good as they can

lelandfe 2y ago
> Google's common Java, C++ and JavaScript library for parsing, formatting, and validating international phone numbers It does seem this repo is “from Google.”
- mtlynch 2y ago
  I think they mean that just because code is under github.com/google, it doesn't make it an "official" Google thing. For example, yapf[0] is under the Google Github org but has the disclaimer: >Note YAPF is not an official Google product (experimental or otherwise), it is just code that happens to be owned by Google. libphonenumber doesn't have any similar disclaimer and does seem to be an "official" Google product, but it's hard to tell what Google considers official or not. [0] https://github.com/google/yapf https://github.com/google/yapf
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - Ferret7446 2y ago
    Google does not offer (m)any developer facing "official" products. Google offers "official" products for consumers or enterprises (e.g., Gmail, Cloud Platform), but all of their FOSS code, of which there are many, are all "unofficial"; they are FOSS projects that happen to be developed by Google employees but come with a normal zero liability FOSS license (as opposed to their "official" products, which do come with some liability user agreements/contracts).