4 ms·

The Worst Work Day of My Life So Far

21 points by Nurdok 13y ago

Fuzzwah 13y ago
Sounds frustrating for sure.... but worst work day of your life? I take it the author is young or has had fairly good jobs up until this point. edit: I originally commented after misreading the title, somehow failing to see the word "work". Still, hyperbole?
- Legion 13y ago
  Worst work day. The post is clearly titled as such.
  - rpicard 13y ago
    Funny, I didn't see that either. I just figured it was a little hyperbole.
  - ojbyrne 13y ago
    It still seems pretty trivial, say, compared to seeing 80% of a company laid off. He's essentially dealing with designers. A lot of them are like that. Wait till he has dealt with a few executives.
  - jhund 13y ago
    Very interesting, I didn't notice the word 'Work' until I read the comments about it. I wonder what's going on here, perceptually... Maybe the similarity of the two words "Worst" and "Work" causes our brain to merge them... Or maybe because it's getting late...
ddoolin 13y ago
The people at hand are ridiculous for sure, but the OP seems similar to the guy who suggests rewriting the company's code base in a new language/framework after the first week. We don't write any kind of tests at work...but I don't really take a condescending attitude towards it.
- csixty4 13y ago
  And likewise I've only worked at two places where everybody was on-board with version control. Three if you count my freelance business. Usually it's the front-end developers who resist until a lead or manager evangelizes/forces the issue.
coderzach 13y ago
In their defense UI tests are usually the most brittle and provide the least value. I don't think I've ever seen UI testing done right. I usually avoid it.
- protomyth 13y ago
  If you set it up right, automated UI testing works pretty well. You need someone who knows their stuff. I knew a Win Runner guy who did really good work and save us a lot of time in testing.
speedyrev 13y ago
I don't have a lot of respect for any coder who is afraid of leaving the pretty GUI of Windows. They would rather fragment the project than get their hands dirty.
- greenyoda 13y ago
  They don't even have to leave Windows to use Mercurial, since there's a GUI Mercurial client for Windows, TortoiseHg.
vinceguidry 13y ago
Expertise is rare in the tech world. So rare that you have to assume that whoever you're working with doesn't have it. In this case I would have made it so the front-end guys's workflow didn't touch the back-end. That means coding up an admin interface centered around their needs and storing the templates they're working on in the database, exposing only the helper methods they need. Obviously this takes time, so in the meantime, the broken workflow would have to suffice. I would have analyzed the workflow carefully to understand exactly what they needed to do their jobs. As soon as the admin interface is finished, I'd have slid it in after hours one day and sent a nice friendly email about how we're improving the system for them. If I did my job right, they'd love it, if not, then it would be a few days /weeks tweaking the workflow so they do. But no way would we go back to the broken workflow. If your boss doesn't let you do this, then it's resume-updating time. That situation will only get worse.

21 points by Nurdok 13y ago

Sounds frustrating for sure.... but worst work day of your life? I take it the author is young or has had fairly good jobs up until this point. edit: I originally commented after misreading the title, somehow failing to see the word "work". Still, hyperbole?

Legion 13y ago
Worst work day. The post is clearly titled as such.
- rpicard 13y ago
  Funny, I didn't see that either. I just figured it was a little hyperbole.
- ojbyrne 13y ago
  It still seems pretty trivial, say, compared to seeing 80% of a company laid off. He's essentially dealing with designers. A lot of them are like that. Wait till he has dealt with a few executives.
- jhund 13y ago
  Very interesting, I didn't notice the word 'Work' until I read the comments about it. I wonder what's going on here, perceptually... Maybe the similarity of the two words "Worst" and "Work" causes our brain to merge them... Or maybe because it's getting late...

ddoolin 13y ago

The people at hand are ridiculous for sure, but the OP seems similar to the guy who suggests rewriting the company's code base in a new language/framework after the first week. We don't write any kind of tests at work...but I don't really take a condescending attitude towards it.

csixty4 13y ago
And likewise I've only worked at two places where everybody was on-board with version control. Three if you count my freelance business. Usually it's the front-end developers who resist until a lead or manager evangelizes/forces the issue.

coderzach 13y ago

In their defense UI tests are usually the most brittle and provide the least value. I don't think I've ever seen UI testing done right. I usually avoid it.

protomyth 13y ago
If you set it up right, automated UI testing works pretty well. You need someone who knows their stuff. I knew a Win Runner guy who did really good work and save us a lot of time in testing.

speedyrev 13y ago

I don't have a lot of respect for any coder who is afraid of leaving the pretty GUI of Windows. They would rather fragment the project than get their hands dirty.

greenyoda 13y ago
They don't even have to leave Windows to use Mercurial, since there's a GUI Mercurial client for Windows, TortoiseHg.

vinceguidry 13y ago

Expertise is rare in the tech world. So rare that you have to assume that whoever you're working with doesn't have it. In this case I would have made it so the front-end guys's workflow didn't touch the back-end. That means coding up an admin interface centered around their needs and storing the templates they're working on in the database, exposing only the helper methods they need. Obviously this takes time, so in the meantime, the broken workflow would have to suffice. I would have analyzed the workflow carefully to understand exactly what they needed to do their jobs. As soon as the admin interface is finished, I'd have slid it in after hours one day and sent a nice friendly email about how we're improving the system for them. If I did my job right, they'd love it, if not, then it would be a few days /weeks tweaking the workflow so they do. But no way would we go back to the broken workflow. If your boss doesn't let you do this, then it's resume-updating time. That situation will only get worse.