June 21, 2009 at 9:55 pm
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Grown Up Software
June 22, 2009 at 4:55 am
Interestingly enough, I am facing this exact thing right now. Where I work, we have a critical software web application for the plant I work at. Originally this was going to be a company-wide effort and the application was going to be delivered to or 30 other plants. I am NOT a DBA or software developer as a full-time job. I am a jack-of-all-trades, but I do software development 75% of the time. I would say the other 25% is network, IT related jobs.
Anyway, this big project started with our Quality Manager as he was faced with a need. It was quickly discovered that this need was apparent for the whole company, not just our plant. This communication quickly spiraled up the ladder to the VPs. Early on, I had myself and a couple of others working on the project. During the following weeks, we went through a "Lean manufacturing" process and my small team because just me.
Over the past couple of months (making delivery of the project WAY behind) I have been the sole person to work on the application. We are now in the "pilot" phase of the application, working out the kinks, but I still do not have the faith that I am going to be able to deliver a 100% fully working, pretty substatial, web application at the end of the day. Because it is just myself delivering the product, I will be the accountable party.
June 22, 2009 at 6:22 am
What you seem to be touching on is the discussion as to whether software development is an art, or a regimen. Thinking about this a slightly different way; are software developers artists whose talents and abilities produce masterpieces (or something close to it), or are they soldiers who march in lock step and perform each and every duty the same as every other software developer.
In the end, its a little of both. But I also look back on the early days of my career when development was fueled by excitement, talent, and love of the trade. I think we have almost killed that off completely with our "great advances" in trying to make software developers into robots by following these often silly "development theories and practices", which in my experience, more often than not, simply squash creativity and rarely result in some perfect-package-development.
If you look today at the "cool" applications that come on the market, more often than not these come from small companies, or even one-man-show developers. People who are still excited about bringing a solution to some challenge. In short, people who love what they are doing.
On the other hand, if you look at the failures, its usually big teams all marching to the Agile, Scrum or whatever tune - all following some book-based idea on "how" you do something, and many producing either boring software, or utter flops. In short, a bunch of uninspired robots doing things "this way" because someone said thats how to do it (without ever thinking about it).
Somehow or another, we have to get back to creativity - because in the last 10-20 years, we have done a pretty good job of killing that off and turning software developers into robots not unlike those that spot weld cars on a production line. All endlessly doing the same thing, day in, day out, bored to death, and uninspired to produce anything truly good - simply because some brainchild wrote a book stating "this is how the world should do this".
Humans don't work like that. And if they do, you build boredom and kill creativity. And the result you get, is often exactly what you set yourself up for: either uninspired software, or a failed project.
June 22, 2009 at 8:32 am
I'm not sure that's true, Blandry. There are plenty of day-in-and-day-out systems that need building, plenty of grinding job. Which things we produce in the world don't need that? That vast majority of things, from simple cabinets in a wood shop, to cars, to a large portion of our medical work, is boring, repeatable, do the same-thing-over-and-over.
Those "cool" apps you mention, are a different thing. That is creativity, but that's the idea and often those companies that get popular find themselves in a mess because the system wasn't build well. Twitter, MySpace, Facebook, Amazon, many have struggled because of poorly built systems.
It's a few people that creatively come up with ideas in all industries, and then many people that end up doing the daily grind.
June 26, 2009 at 2:14 pm
What would be a "mature pace"? Just curious.
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