Ask HN: Do you hate software engineering but love programming? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Do you hate software engineering but love programming?

#731

Post by learningstud » Tue, Jan 24, 2023, 2:30 AM UTC

Rarely is software engineering as currently practiced actually "engineering" and "problem solving". We are mostly creating even more problems due to unreliable methodology forced down our throat. Hell, we can't even reliably identify bugs given extensive testing, fuzzing, and code review. Fashion trends like microservices cannot contain the impact of bugs in one service; all hell break loose. Instead, microservice practice aligns the software layout with HR layout (a la Conway) even more faithfully than monoliths did, and this outcome is the antithesis of engineering.

This is what Albert Camus described as "absurd". I suggest reading "The Myth of Sisyphus". That book will shed some light on how one should live in this funny world.

Re: Ask HN: Do you hate software engineering but love programming?

#732

Post by ornornor » Thu, Jan 26, 2023, 10:45 AM UTC

__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #499

xyst wrote: post #491

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Some software companies can turn even the simplest tasks into a grueling series of processes, endless meetings, and joint work across a big number of “stakeholders”. These companies will take the joy and productivity out of programming and replace it with a series of rituals and set of language that people use to go through the motions every week so they can collect paychecks. god - this is so true at my last compa…

I'm confused. Aren't all companies that got a round of funding ~1 yr ago going to have a large cohort of <1 yr tenure employees? What connects this to death-by-process?

High churn company. Grind them out, throw them away when they’re not performing anymore, and replace them with a new batch of fresh meat to wear down. Standard playbook for an alarming number of (VC funded) companies.

Re: Ask HN: Do you hate software engineering but love programming?

#733

Post by TranquilMarmot » Thu, Jan 26, 2023, 5:31 PM UTC

cutemonster wrote: post #728

TranquilMarmot wrote: post #721

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was a very slow creep of changes. For the first year, they really didn't change much (except gutted our health insurance plan and got rid of "unlimited" vacation). Eventually, they tried to get us to integrate with more and more of their other products, which introduced a TON of extra "stakeholders" on every single project. With every extra stakeholder they also had to introduce extra meetings and extra process un…

How interesting! (And sad, I hope that / guess that the new place is/was better) > integrate with more and more of their other products, which introduced a TON of extra "stakeholders" That scenario I hadn't heard about before. Good to know about that way for things to fail, too. If you haven't seen: "Excess management is costing the U.S. $3T per year (2016)" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34290539

The company we were acquired by is massive ($2bil annual revenue, 7.5k employees). If you live in the US, I can guarantee that you've used their products before but don't know the name of the company. They basically just go around acquiring other companies and absorbing them into their other products. I'm talking like 10+ acquisitions a year (at least for the last few years).