In 8 months at Microsoft, I learned these things

Granted I don't work at Microsoft so I don't see their internal code. I have worked a bit with their .NET and older Visual Studio suites, and found that their documentation there was probably some of the best I've ever seen (better than Analog Devices, which I've used as a hardware documentation standard for a while). MSDN is a fantastic resource, and is extremely well organized (or was 10 years ago, I imagine it hasn't changed a ton since then).

And I more meant that they have to stick with technologies that they know work for two reasons: legacy & reliability. If Microsoft changes something within their legacy code, that could cause absolutely massive problems around the globe. If reliable features in their code breaks, same problem.

[Edited to fix redundant sentence].

Matches my experience as well. I was there for nearly a decade, with several years in windows client, and I was always amazed that nobody there ever seemed to learn anything outside of microsoft tech. It's stunning how there are two almost completely separate worlds. Just taking web development as an example, outside microsoft, there's this whole culture of github, ruby, python, node, various open source frameworks, gems/eggs/npm. If you're a web dev outside of microsoft and you are completely ignorant of all this stuff, you're stunted. Whereas inside of microsoft, most people will stare at you blankly if you mention ANY of that stuff.

Mind you, none of this says anything about developer competency. There's no shortage of great developers at microsoft. They're just very insular and good at using microsoft tech and that's it. Oh, and these great developers are obviously hamstrung by the fact that microsoft isn't in the business of making great software, but that's a whole other rant.

Windows has a package management system (Windows Installer). It's crufty and quirky and gets abused (package files that are just wrappers around standalone installer programs, for example) but is generally pretty usable. I've always wished more Windows developers would use it.

As a community, we should react responsibly and warn our members against sharing posts like this. There is almost no useful insight, clearly parts of it are exaggerations, and the whole thing looks like it was written for 15 minutes of HN fame.

Couple of karma points isn't worth pissing your co-workers. If you really want karma, just make an empty post with title "If you don't vote up, I'll write a stupid post that will ruin my career." I promise I will vote up.

I'm not sure where to start. This is a person at his first job out of college and he's been there for less than a year (two if we're being generous). And yet he has the audacity to say "I learned that one will see this sort of problems in all large scale companies."? Really? This is absurd. I can't wrap my head around the sort of arrogance and myopia that makes a 21 or 22 yr old think that he can describe an entire world from such limited experience.

I've been working for over 20+ years now. During that time, I've worked at half a dozen large corps, a few medium sized ones, and a few startups. I've seen both great teams with great practices and bad teams with poor practices. One thing that I can say though: the size of the company didn't seem to have much to do with it. Even with my experience, I don't think I've seen much more than a thin slice of the variance in practices that is out there.

Note, I'm not saying that this guy didn't experience what he wrote about at Microsoft. But at a corporation that size, you'll likely find that different groups have different practices. This was certainly true at the large companies I've been at. Some teams were super-sharp, others were sloppy beyond words. Even if all teams at MS suck (which I doubt, but I will admit it's possible), this says nothing about how other companies operate and very little about how large corporations operate.

Word of advice: don't mistake the worlds you extrapolate inside your head for reality.