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You've only added two lines – why did that take two days?

mrlacey.com

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Re: You've only added two lines – why did that take two days?

#42

The assumption that asking for more information to recreate the bug is a lazy tactic to get out of the bug fix is also a terrible assumption and discredited the opinion IMO. Often times asking for more information can speed things up and lead to a quicker resolution.

In my experience sometimes this is true, sometimes it is not. In some cases when asking for more information it takes much longer. Some of the reasons:

After asking the question I get a meeting schedules where design by committee happens. The story or bug your working on gets completely redesigned. Sometimes in an illogical way. Requiring more questions.

When working remote, like most of us right now, now I will end up waiting for a long time to get a response. I then must start some other story/task/bug. Trying to context switch multiple complex tasks at some point your productivity slows down.

I have also received criticism for asking when I could figure it out myself even when figuring it out may have taken hours more time then just asking a yes/no question.

Re: You've only added two lines – why did that take two days?

#43
post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know someone that worked at some skeezy company in Menlo Park that got passed up for a raise after spending months navigating the bureaucracy to save the company millions on their operating costs because they didn't write enough code. This was in the last four years. Edit: And they quit right afterwards.

It’s better to find ways to make more money than to save it. There’s a floor but no ceiling in much of what we do.

Thanks. This comment blew my mind. This perspective is so far on the other side of things that I never considered it.

Re: You've only added two lines – why did that take two days?

#47
Actually this is one of the upsides of web development: Since every line contributes to the file size of your software and therefore to the loading time there is a motivation for keeping the code base small.

Sadly, there are many projects out there which obviously failed to reach this target at some point.

Re: You've only added two lines – why did that take two days?

#49
post #5

Do people actually have fights like this with management at their companies? Not trying to knock the author, but I'm just surprised anyone would actually hear this kind of comment in 2020. I'd think by now any and all metrics tying lines of code to productivity would be long dead.

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