341–350 of 424 posts
Snark aside, if the post was headed "Software developers need to understand the environment where their code will be running or they may not build it properly", which is the point being badly made by conflating "environment" with "some kind of commodity x86 with a standard OS", it would be a lot more applicable.
Hi, I'm a Sysadmin, and I've been a grumpy one through a larger part of my 15 years experience. My main issue was that Developers were acting like Users: they don't care about what you have to deal with, they want things to 'just work'. In return, I've treated them like children, in some instances yelled at them when they did dumb stuff. I've tried to educate them when possible, and was angry when the education didn'…
Having been an admin myself, gradually moving more and more towards development, I understand what things in software are annoying for an admin to have to deal with. Most developers simply don't care. Grant full permissions or don't expect anything to work. Any objections and you're a troublemaker. A better attitude would have gone a long way, but firsthand experience works best.
In addition, it helps me greatly when there is no (decent) admin around. I know whether to suspect the software or the system it's running on, how to keep things running on a less than ideally configured/maintained system without completely compromising security, can help users when the problem they're having is not a problem with the software, but a problem to them anyway – they love the extra mile – et cetera.
It must be said that some admins are just as shortsighted. Knowing what kind of measures actually work for stability, security, and so on, I've come to strongly dislike those who only complicate the situation to no benefit, as well as those who point their finger at the software when it really is their system that's causing problems.
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> In fairness to the folk who can't install Visual Studio - it's a genuine pain in the butt. It takes a while but I've never found it to be a pain in the butt and I've used it, off and on, since version 6 in the late 90s. If the install errors out it gives you an error message, you google for it, figure out what the problem is (most common messages are easy to find solutions for), fix the problem, reinstall, done.
Then you were lucky. I remember on the first day of a new job being given a folder containing all the MSDN subscription disks in the mid-2000s and being told to install visual studio. I'd only ever used notepad as an editor before. This is a massive stack of DVDs with multiple disks, but worse there are a bunch of cds listing different versions of a thing called "visual studio". After 15 minutes of struggling and sur…
I worked in 3 Microsoft dev shops and 1 that had a mixture. As far as I know I hadn't heard of anyone having issues getting it installed except for the rare, occasional error that could be Googled and fixed. I'm not sure I'd call that luck, sounds like you just had a bad experience.
But yeah back in the day it was a stack of discs (I think the last disc version I used had 2 discs for visual studio and 4 for the msdn) but they were always clearly labeled. One for Visual Studio, one for additional add ons and stuff and the rest for MSDN documentation.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
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Then you were lucky. I remember on the first day of a new job being given a folder containing all the MSDN subscription disks in the mid-2000s and being told to install visual studio. I'd only ever used notepad as an editor before. This is a massive stack of DVDs with multiple disks, but worse there are a bunch of cds listing different versions of a thing called "visual studio". After 15 minutes of struggling and sur…
> Then you were lucky. I worked in 3 Microsoft dev shops and 1 that had a mixture. As far as I know I hadn't heard of anyone having issues getting it installed except for the rare, occasional error that could be Googled and fixed. I'm not sure I'd call that luck, sounds like you just had a bad experience. But yeah back in the day it was a stack of discs (I think the last disc version I used had 2 discs for visual stu…
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Backwards compatibility is seriously under appreciated. When I tell developers to ensure that their changes are backwards compatible, they tend to look at me like I'm green. I do not understand the disconnect that developers have with understanding all of the benefits that it brings. Yes, you have some extra code in your code base so it's less clean. You also have a stable environment as a result. The first affects o…
> Yes, you have some extra code in your code base so it's less clean. You also have a stable environment as a result. The first affects only your personal preference. The latter affects all of your developers and users. No, the former results in a bloated code base full of old legacy crap that no one understands and is afraid to touch because it might break. You have to insert weird workarounds because that bug is no…
I don't think so.
Its just plain arrogance to believe your are a better developer than the guy who came before. Having some fear of breaking the code base is healthy, the same way that having a little fear that the chainsaw is going to cut off your leg makes you safer.
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As a Sys Admin turned Automation/Tools Engineer, I think you're missing part of the point. You've got the beginning of it right in saying that Sys Admins used to be involved in pinning down versions, and even in why that was necessary, but I believe you're incorrect in saying that the containerization technologies are bad for removing that. Those technologies don't exist so Developers can get around Sys Admins and ig…
> They aren't kids playing with toys that we need to nanny over In my experience (university), yes they are, and they should do that at home. Why do you need the latest bleeding versions in the first place? In my sysadmin experience, people believe software gets bad and deprecated as soon as the glory next breaking version appears. I don't think I need to argue why this is an illogical stance. With my developers hat…
I don't particularly care about having my software on the latest version. I personally prefer using the old version for six months while the newest version gets the bugs worked out of it.
I know sysadmins value reliability and security, but it's really frustrating when every upgrade takes dozens of hours of work to approve. Questions like "What features do you need in the new version" miss the point. It isn't about the features of the software, it is about maintaining a modern code base.
Upgrades always have the potential to break things, but when you keep up with the upgrades it is easier to achieve the stability and security goals the sysadmin wants. When you upgrade often, it is easier to read the documentation and find where changes might break something, and when things do break it is easier to fix them. Upgrades that jump over several versions at a time are a nightmare to debug, and it creates a lot of technological debt that you have to work out later.
Ultimately, sticking with a version of software because it works is trading a little stability now for an absolute mess down the line.
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I agree. I also think it should work both ways. The worst jobs I've ever had is when the sysadmins have the mindset where they own the servers and are unwilling to deviate from what they've read at the behest of the developers. "I will force AV on reads on the developer boxes." "I will install AV on the production DB servers without telling anyone in the development group, then make the developers prove AV was the ca…
> I half believe the reason developers are embracing cloud architecture so much is to remove so many sysadmins out of the equation. It was literally true at one of my previous jobs. We couldn't install anything on our own dev machines without approval from Net Ops, not even Notepad++ (I don't think I ever got that installed, never got approval). We once asked for a new server which mirrored the software of an existin…
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Those technologies don't exist so Developers can get around Sys Admins and ignore your helpful advice. They exist to solve that problem that makes the Sys Admins role there necessary. It removes the underlying need for a Sys Admin to worry about the versions. Admins should see this as a good thing, but in my experience many dislike it because it takes them out of their Gatekeeper role. We shouldn't WANT to stop the D…
and we get yelled at when we can't deliver a feature because some gatekeeper is sitting atop his little throne in the kingdom of servers saying no. ;) This is institutional failure.
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> but I don't think you get to be a half decent developer without being a reasonable sysadmin I think you've just described me. And I don't see the argument against sysadmin. > leaving $800/day contract developers waiting for builds that run in 20 seconds on their laptops take nearly an hour. Sorry I just can't take you seriously.
Honestly, I've heard worse out of sysadmins in some places.
As a grumpy evil sysadmin, I think the good Professor misses where the real disconnect is, at least nowadays: stack management. Why do things like Docker exist? Because developers got tired of sysadmins saying "sorry, you can't upgrade Ruby in the middle of this project". Why does virtualenv exist? A similar reason. Containerized ecosystems (which is to say basically all of them now) are really a sign of those of us…
That's terrible. If I'm a Python dev, why should a sysadmin who doesn't even know Python tell me what version of a library I will use? I have regression tests to catch if an upgrade breaks anyyhing. What does a sysadmin have to approve or deny an upgrade? A little beard stroking and changelog reading? I think the movement towards containers is like you said, to keep sysadmins off the code. Sysadmins add value in sett…
What if the sysadmin can code in the same language as you, faster and with less bugs?