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Why Fogbugz lost to Jira

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Re: Why Fogbugz lost to Jira

#201

Post by philliphaydon »

simoncion wrote: post #197
philliphaydon wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree. Things for some people, they don't work for others. But you cannot blame users and say "oh its how you configured it" "its good out of the box" etc. If its failed for 1 user, its a shit product. If its a success for 1 user, it's a great product. It's GOOD for a user to say they find it easy and why. It's GOOD for a user to say they find it hard and why. 1 helps the user give a product a second chance by lear…

> If its failed for 1 user, its a shit product. That is a dangerous over-generalization. Let's say -ferinstance- you have kick-ass , seriously best-at-what-it-does software that's only localized in Japanese, and a uniglot USian attempts to use it. They're gonna have a hard time. The software will very likely fail them, because they will be unable to understand anything they're being told by the software. Does that ma…

Maybe I'm being misunderstood.

From the perspective of the user, if the product fails for that user, its a shit product.

I don't mean the product itself is actually shit.

Like I say:

If its works well for a user. It's a great product. If its fails for a user. It's a shit product.

From the perspective of that user.

But we can learn from both the users who like it, and the users who hate it. But we cannot blame the problems the user has, solely on the user.

Re: Why Fogbugz lost to Jira

#202

Post by Chipchipperson »

tptacek wrote: post #174
btilly wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You may have arrived at this view now, but it isn't believable that you never saw them as direct competition with you. For example http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2009/07/20.html makes it clear that you were adding features so that people wouldn't have to switch to "THE AUSTRALIANS". Which is a pretty clear reference to Atlassian.

The whole quote you're referring to: FogBugz 7.0 will include a long list of simple improvements that will make life dramatically easier for people trying to get things done, especially when they want to do things just a wee bit differently than we do here in the Land of the Fog. Every little feature will be a delight for somebody, especially that person who keeps emailing us because he can't believe that the feature…

A compelling theory, but the Inc article he wrote in 2009 pretty clearly states that he considers them direct competition and laid out a plan to beat them.

This did not happen.

Re: Why Fogbugz lost to Jira

#203

Post by hliyan »

jeffmk wrote: post #130

Has anyone had experience with Redmine [1]? It's quite easy to use and extend via its plugin system, but I don't see many people who have encountered it in the wild. I think its horrendous out-of-the-box look-and-feel detract heavily from its appeal. Nowadays I'd probably lean toward Gitlab, which seems to offer much of the same but appears much more modern. [1] https://www.redmine.org/

We recently scrapped Redmine (yes, the UI is horrendous) and started using Gitlab issues with our own labeling system. Working out fine so far.

Re: Why Fogbugz lost to Jira

#204

Post by aetherson »

Vendan wrote: post #145
spolsky wrote: post #121

Sorry, Prashant, you lost track of the plot of the story somewhere along the way. (creator of FogBugz, here) FogBugz won and Jira won, but they were playing different games. I wanted to make software development better for programmers. When I started creating Fog Creek Software in 2000 programmers were treated like typists. They were not paid very well (my starting salary was $33,000). There was almost no thought aro…

wow, $33,000 15 years ago? That really puts a spin on me making $36,000 6 months ago, working in 4 languages and 2 platforms to build a really complicated SPA web app and mac flash content player system. Glad I got out of that job!

I started my career in 1999 at $55,000/yr. Not at a particularly prestigious company or in an important position.

Re: Why Fogbugz lost to Jira

#205

Post by simoncion »

philliphaydon wrote: post #201
simoncion wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If its failed for 1 user, its a shit product. That is a dangerous over-generalization. Let's say -ferinstance- you have kick-ass , seriously best-at-what-it-does software that's only localized in Japanese, and a uniglot USian attempts to use it. They're gonna have a hard time. The software will very likely fail them, because they will be unable to understand anything they're being told by the software. Does that ma…

Maybe I'm being misunderstood. From the perspective of the user, if the product fails for that user, its a shit product. I don't mean the product itself is actually shit. Like I say: If its works well for a user. It's a great product. If its fails for a user. It's a shit product. From the perspective of that user. But we can learn from both the users who like it, and the users who hate it. But we cannot blame the pro…

> From the perspective of the user, if the product fails for that user, its a shit product.

Honestly, even this is a hazardous over-generalization.

I've looked at gobs of software that failed to do what I needed it to do. Much of that software was good-to-great at what it was written to do, but it -like a lot of software- wasn't written to do what I needed it to do.

That doesn't make the software shit, that makes it unsuited for my needs. I am -and many others are- clever enough to distinguish between the two categories. :)

Re: Why Fogbugz lost to Jira

#206

Post by simoncion »

jeffmk wrote: post #130

Has anyone had experience with Redmine [1]? It's quite easy to use and extend via its plugin system, but I don't see many people who have encountered it in the wild. I think its horrendous out-of-the-box look-and-feel detract heavily from its appeal. Nowadays I'd probably lean toward Gitlab, which seems to offer much of the same but appears much more modern. [1] https://www.redmine.org/

I've used Redmine. It's a MUCH better Trac.

Out of the box, it's ugly, but -frankly- who cares? We're all programmers here, and value proper function much more highly than lacquered handles. :)

Re: Why Fogbugz lost to Jira

#207

Post by hravnx »

radmuzom wrote: post #198
hravnx wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"There was almost no thought around how software should be developed." Really, Joel? So all the various software methodologies of the seventies and eighties, all the CASE tools of the nineties, Extreme Programming etc etc etc - all of this does somehow not count as "thought on how software should be developed"?!

He is not talking about software development methodologies, he is talking about the role of people (mostly developers) in the software development process.

If you think the software methodologies of Olden Times did not consider the role of people in the software development process you are mistaken.

They might seem archaic (and even wrong) when we look at them today, but still: smart people put a lot of thought into the methods, they were hotly debated among professionals, books were written, and consultants made money teaching and preaching them.

In other words, not that different from today.

Re: Why Fogbugz lost to Jira

#208

Post by rukuu001 »

Meekro wrote: post #94
solutionyogi wrote: post #29

Having mainly done line of business applications my entire life, I have a slightly different take. Jira won because it was not opinionated. You can use it however you want. FogBugz had the philosophy to make bug entry super easy above anything else. Jira will let a manager define new custom fields and make them all compulsory. It perfectly fits how manager at big companies think. FogBugz provides Completion Date Prob…

They set a project delivery date and you just have to hit it. Do you find that this really works out, in practice? Joel has argued[1] that the only schedule worth anything is the one set by the developers themselves. Management can set relative priorities (X is twice as important as Y), but trying to force a faster deadline on the developers is like trying to make your Linux box run faster by renice-ing every process…

> Do you find that this really works out, in practice?

We often worked for clients that had media advertising booked and paid for. The product had to be ready.

So you make it work. Reduce scope, phase the releases, whatever it takes.

Re: Why Fogbugz lost to Jira

#209

Post by stephen_g »

amyjess wrote: post #162
MichaelGG wrote: post #6

Yet FogBugz still feels way easier to use. Every time I'm in an Atlassian product, mainly Stash and JIRA, the UI sucks. I use them several times a week and still get lost. Maybe I'm dumb, but I don't seem to have this problem on other systems. But hey, at least JIRA isn't the craptastic laggy pos that is Podio. Certainly right that I've never seen FogBugz outside of myself or customers. Also, I think the name must hu…

Yes, I've never liked anything about JIRA's UI. I much prefer the UI used in Trac and its clones (e.g. Redmine), which is simple and straightforward.

That's interesting - I wonder if it's just because I've used JIRA so much and I'm more familiar with it but I find Redmine's interface super frustrating to use and it just feels unpolished.

Re: Why Fogbugz lost to Jira

#210

Post by afsina »

julianz wrote: post #200
afsina wrote: post #8

Also Atlassian products are multi platform. Whereas fogbugz is windows only for the server side. That is a deal breaker for many.Additionally unlike Fogbugz Atlassian products are DB agnostic.

Huh? We've been running Fogbugz on a Debian server with a MySQL database for years and years. Fog Creek may encourage Windows now but it still runs on Linux just fine.

They are no longer selling Linux versions. Also only MySQL and mssql are supported. MySQL is not recommended. http://help.fogcreek.com/7389/fogbugz-system-requirements
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