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Tesla engineers were on-site to evaluate the Twitter staff’s code, workers said

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Tesla engineers were on-site to evaluate the Twitter staff’s code, workers said

#351

Post by MangoCoffee »

fleddr wrote: post #301

I think most are missing that this is a code review + loyalty review. For sure a software engineer from Tesla, or even a manager, can get an idea of how valuable/productive a coder is without fully understanding the code in detail. How many PRs? What does the code do? How was it reviewed? What value does it bring to stakeholders (users, business revenue)? Sure enough this way you can get a rough idea of how much work…

"The note continues, “Please come prepared with code as a backup to review on your own machines with Elon.” Later, people inside the company reported that Tesla engineers were in fact reviewing the code."

Can anyone verify this story?

Re: Tesla engineers were on-site to evaluate the Twitter staff’s code, workers said

#352

Post by closeparen »

Aeolun wrote: post #232
lohii wrote: post #154

If someone completely new to my codebase came along and tried to evaluate my code I'd laugh. You can't jump in and "evaluate" without knowing context and being familiar with the features.

New people regularly join our company and evaluate our code. Why do you think you couldn’t do that without joining?

New people regularly join our company and take a few weeks to become productive at making small changes to one or two modules out of 5,000+ in the enterprise.

Re: Tesla engineers were on-site to evaluate the Twitter staff’s code, workers said

#353

Post by Nathanba »

antipaul wrote: post #150

Working as a coder in a non-tech industry for a multinational, I appreciate that someone so high up cares about something as “rudimentary” as code.

I think so too, I'm impressed that he wants to personally look at code at all. His ability to evaluate it deeply is not relevant, one thing is for sure: he can ask deeper questions than if he had no code to talk about. That alone is a big bonus when you need to do an evaluation of a person, having something concrete to talk about.

Re: Tesla engineers were on-site to evaluate the Twitter staff’s code, workers said

#354

Post by greenthrow »

fleddr wrote: post #301

I think most are missing that this is a code review + loyalty review. For sure a software engineer from Tesla, or even a manager, can get an idea of how valuable/productive a coder is without fully understanding the code in detail. How many PRs? What does the code do? How was it reviewed? What value does it bring to stakeholders (users, business revenue)? Sure enough this way you can get a rough idea of how much work…

> How mang PRs?

For a junior engineer sure this is probably a reasonable gauge of your productivity. As you become more and more senior number of PRs and LOCs becomes a worse and worse measurement. This is basic software engineeting.

> What does the code do? How was it reviewed? What value does it bring to the stakeholders

These things are impossible to accurately assess without a lot of context. Context which outside engineers are entirely lacking.

If the accounts of what Musk is doing are an accurate reflection of his leadership -- and based on accounts we have heard from Tesla and Space X in the past it sounds like they are -- he is a terrible leader and his companies are successful despite that deficiency.

Re: Tesla engineers were on-site to evaluate the Twitter staff’s code, workers said

#355

Post by pwthornton »

Tesla is a hardware company not known for stellar software. Both its self-driving/driver assist capabilities are suspect, and the functionality of the giant tablet UI could be better. You hear a lot of requests to be able to use Apple CarPlay in Teslas.

Teslas are probably better than the vast majority of car companies, particularly the UI of the touch controls and system, but it still seems weird to me to have engineers from a company perform a review in an area that they aren't known for. Honestly, I would assume Twitter has better software engineers.

Re: Tesla engineers were on-site to evaluate the Twitter staff’s code, workers said

#356

Post by bigmattystyles »

nightski wrote: post #78
ipqk wrote: post #65

I'd be pissed off if I were a TSLA stock owner. Is Twitter paying Tesla to contract out these employees for their work? Otherwise, it's tons of thousands of dollars Tesla is pissing away on behalf of the CEO's side-hustle.

I'm not pissed and I am a stockholder. To me it makes a lot of sense. I doubt they are reviewing the entire code base. It seems like Elon is particularly interested in the automated systems that control content and detect bots. To that end, Tesla has a lot of expertise in AI systems.

Unless Twitter is paying the Tesla for Tesla’s employees time to Tesla, whether you care or not, doesn’t matter. A part time CEO of a public company is using the public company’s resources on one of his private project. If I owned a business with someone and found out the other owner was using our company’s funds but told our employees to go mow his house’s lawn, I would consider that misappropriation, embezzlement even. We don’t know the details here but I would hope it’s above board.

Re: Tesla engineers were on-site to evaluate the Twitter staff’s code, workers said

#357

Post by DontchaKnowit »

Gene_Parmesan wrote: post #262
AustinDev wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Might you think that they're not actually reviewing code and that the journalists are idiots? Because all evidence I've seen about journalism is that it's completely skin deep and often blatantly wrong. It's likely the engineers are reviewing architecture and looking at how the whole system works.

WaPo is not HuffPo. Generally, you can still trust the real news coming out of places like the Post and Times to at least be accurately fact checked.

That's a joke. Wapo is just as full of shit as any other news outlet these days

Re: Tesla engineers were on-site to evaluate the Twitter staff’s code, workers said

#358

Post by BoorishBears »

oska wrote: post #92
Havoc wrote: post #57

Surprised how sceptical all the comments here are. Dick or not the guy has a talent for building companies

Very broadly speaking, HN is the forum of choice for the 'Web 2.0' and VC backed startup culture that went along with it, i.e. what is commonly perceived now as Silicon Valley culture. This culture is becoming increasingly reactionary now that their power is threatened/fading. Musk, while part of the early rise of that culture in the late 90s is now well outside it (represented by his move from California to Texas) a…

As someone well outside that circle, has it ever occurred to you that some people just don't like Elon "Pedo Guy" Musk?

And same people double down on the dislike because his supporters are the kind of people to paint not liking him must actually be a sign that you're just upset that you're losing your non-existent grip on non-existent power?

-

Elon went from cool eccentric paypal/electric car/taking us to mars genius to arrogant "Great Value Joe Rogan without the social skills" very quickly with the general public.

Re: Tesla engineers were on-site to evaluate the Twitter staff’s code, workers said

#359

Post by Forge36 »

lgleason wrote: post #347
fleddr wrote: post #301

I think most are missing that this is a code review + loyalty review. For sure a software engineer from Tesla, or even a manager, can get an idea of how valuable/productive a coder is without fully understanding the code in detail. How many PRs? What does the code do? How was it reviewed? What value does it bring to stakeholders (users, business revenue)? Sure enough this way you can get a rough idea of how much work…

Number of PR's means very little with overall productivity. It's a vanity metric.

100%

I made 400 last year. It was two fixes across many files owned by many different teams.

Ideally it would have been two. Sometimes playing the politics game is required.

Re: Tesla engineers were on-site to evaluate the Twitter staff’s code, workers said

#360

Post by MetaWhirledPeas »

steveBK123 wrote: post #152
nightski wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not pissed and I am a stockholder. To me it makes a lot of sense. I doubt they are reviewing the entire code base. It seems like Elon is particularly interested in the automated systems that control content and detect bots. To that end, Tesla has a lot of expertise in AI systems.

That's absolutely insane. Tesla employees are paid by Tesla to do work for Tesla. Freelancing during the workday at Twitter, SpaceX, or any of the other company just because Musk is the owner or CEO is basically wage theft by Musk. How would you feel if he had Tesla assembly line workers renovate his house?

> That's absolutely insane. Tesla employees are paid by Tesla to do work for Tesla.

Unless Twitter is paying handsomely for the consultation?

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