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Boeing's 737 MAX Software Outsourced to $9-an-Hour Engineers (2019)

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Re: Boeing's 737 MAX Software Outsourced to $9-an-Hour Engineers (2019)

#41

Post by jkic47 »

rednerrus wrote: post #24
jkic47 wrote: post #2

The article seems to conflate engineering salaries in a low cost of living country with the quality of the software. As I understand it, the software performed exactly as designed, forcing the nose of the plane downwards to counter the upwards torque produced by the engines being offset relative to the centre of gravity of the plane. Mentour Pilot had a great episode on the two tragic accidents. It appears that Boein…

The biggest problem with offshore engineering teams is their dedication to delivering exactly what you ask for. One of the qualities of a good software developer is to take the requirements and interpret what needs to happen then deliver appropriately. Delivering exactly what's written without thinking about the implications is a huge problem and one of the biggest issues I've run into working with offshore teams.

I agree with you on the problem with offshoring, having done this myself in a previous role in a regulated industry.

However, the offshore team are usually not intended to act as domain experts. In fact, they were very likely explicitly proscribed from interpreting the specifications handed to them to guard against them trying to act as domain experts and delivering something different from expectations.

As such, they were (likely) not the ones who specified that MCAS should silently turn itself on after a pilot turned it off. That misjudgment probably lies with the engineering team who made that design decision, and it had tragic results.

Re: Boeing's 737 MAX Software Outsourced to $9-an-Hour Engineers (2019)

#42

Post by zero_shift »

fwungy wrote: post #27

[flagged]

If xhe is that good and contracting for $15/hr, then xhe is extremely foolish.

There are great engineers in non-Western countries. It's just that they realise talent is so rare, they can charge more than local rates.

Re: Boeing's 737 MAX Software Outsourced to $9-an-Hour Engineers (2019)

#43

Post by datavirtue »

struant wrote: post #38
rednerrus wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The biggest problem with offshore engineering teams is their dedication to delivering exactly what you ask for. One of the qualities of a good software developer is to take the requirements and interpret what needs to happen then deliver appropriately. Delivering exactly what's written without thinking about the implications is a huge problem and one of the biggest issues I've run into working with offshore teams.

If just deliver exactly what you are told to, you aren't doing any "engineering" at all.

Right,I just spend a little extra time on prompts and get much better, faster, work done completely stress free.

Re: Boeing's 737 MAX Software Outsourced to $9-an-Hour Engineers (2019)

#44

Post by datavirtue »

karmakaze wrote: post #34
jkic47 wrote: post #2

The article seems to conflate engineering salaries in a low cost of living country with the quality of the software. As I understand it, the software performed exactly as designed, forcing the nose of the plane downwards to counter the upwards torque produced by the engines being offset relative to the centre of gravity of the plane. Mentour Pilot had a great episode on the two tragic accidents. It appears that Boein…

Yep, the problem with the software wasn't the implementation, it was the spec: to operate contrary to the expectations and experience of pilots. The problem was that they didn't outsource the design spec. I doubt an externally developed design would be so contrary, with a flippant we'll document it and include it in the short brush up training.

The umpteenth comment trilling on as though MCAS was built by contractors when it was explicitly stated in the article that it was developed in-house by Boeing employees.

Re: Boeing's 737 MAX Software Outsourced to $9-an-Hour Engineers (2019)

#45

Post by adriancr »

wannacboatmovie wrote: post #28
jkic47 wrote: post #2

The article seems to conflate engineering salaries in a low cost of living country with the quality of the software. As I understand it, the software performed exactly as designed, forcing the nose of the plane downwards to counter the upwards torque produced by the engines being offset relative to the centre of gravity of the plane. Mentour Pilot had a great episode on the two tragic accidents. It appears that Boein…

> As I understand it, the software performed exactly as designed This is very likely correct. People on HN don't seem to understand how software is created in regulated industries outside the tech bubble. In a complex system such an aircraft, the behavior of the system is modeled and detailed requirements are generated. These models are created by the system engineers. The models and requirements are then handed off…

The software engineers job is also to think about what happens in corner cases.

What if sensor malfunctions?, how should software act?, will it crash the plane?

If yes, then raise problem and refuse to implement / avoid killing people.

Then you have QA which should have the same questions and test plan to make sure corner cases are covered. QA is also responsible.

Then you have management which is supposed to make sure there are people skilled enough doing the above and the initial systems parts and encourage this environment.

Then you have business people to ensure sufficient resources to hire competent people above.

So what is happening is a massive problem everywhere...

Re: Boeing's 737 MAX Software Outsourced to $9-an-Hour Engineers (2019)

#46

Post by FirmwareBurner »

aslihana wrote: post #17

> recalled one manager saying at an all-hands meeting that Boeing didn’t need senior engineers because its products were mature. Shame. Industrial companies, if you decide as pincher, you will be doomed in your little world... as it always has been :)

Most big "industrial-like" product companies are pinchers when it comes to SW. They offshore a lot hence why they pay SW devs so little. And it mostly works for them.

It works for them, because like Boeing said, they have old battles tested processes which usually means big mistakes can easily get caught ahead of time. And if big mistakes don't get caught they usually can't kill anyone and generate a huge public scandal.

Re: Boeing's 737 MAX Software Outsourced to $9-an-Hour Engineers (2019)

#47

Post by gostintheshell »

FirmwareBurner wrote: post #46
aslihana wrote: post #17

> recalled one manager saying at an all-hands meeting that Boeing didn’t need senior engineers because its products were mature. Shame. Industrial companies, if you decide as pincher, you will be doomed in your little world... as it always has been :)

Most big "industrial-like" product companies are pinchers when it comes to SW. They offshore a lot hence why they pay SW devs so little. And it mostly works for them. It works for them, because like Boeing said, they have old battles tested processes which usually means big mistakes can easily get caught ahead of time. And if big mistakes don't get caught they usually can't kill anyone and generate a huge public scan…

I don't think it works for them, I think they are just entrenched with good moats.

What I think actually happens is they get to prove all sorts of ridiculous things are good management and that all sorts of managers need to be coming up with complex ways to manage what would be obvious in a situation where reality was still visible underneath.

In the end they pay a lot more than if they had competent individual contributors and less darwinian fights to the death in their org charts. But having a better organization is not really compatible with the incentive system involved.

Re: Boeing's 737 MAX Software Outsourced to $9-an-Hour Engineers (2019)

#48

Post by jiggawatts »

NullPrefix wrote: post #20
uuddlrlrbaba wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Weird take. The theme throughout has been cost cutting and poor oversight for the sole benefit of shareholder profits. A proper in house team would probably say, hey what happens when the sole sensor feeding our software is obstructed by a birthday balloon? Maybe we need an exponentially backoff instead of every 30 seconds. Maybe nose down actions shouldn't be automatically executed at low altitude. What we see playi…

birthday balloon? In front of a landing plane at 170mph?

Yes. It happens. In a recent news clip a pilot was interviewed about the MAX and he raised the risk of bird strike and birthday balloons as something that “happens all the time”.

Re: Boeing's 737 MAX Software Outsourced to $9-an-Hour Engineers (2019)

#49

Post by jiggawatts »

hgfghj wrote: post #12
jkic47 wrote: post #2

The article seems to conflate engineering salaries in a low cost of living country with the quality of the software. As I understand it, the software performed exactly as designed, forcing the nose of the plane downwards to counter the upwards torque produced by the engines being offset relative to the centre of gravity of the plane. Mentour Pilot had a great episode on the two tragic accidents. It appears that Boein…

My experience is that contract work like this ends up being done by ordertakers; the contractors execute the design, no matter how stupid. Whereas, the best performing companies hire engineers who are empowered to understand the goals, understand the problem, and push back when appropriate. The results are much better, because the people working on each system, understand it deeply and care. A low-cost contractor isn…

Often this is the entire point. The in-house staff are seen as obstructionists, whereas outsourcers provide the equivalent of meat robots.

Many managers far prefer the latter over the former.

Re: Boeing's 737 MAX Software Outsourced to $9-an-Hour Engineers (2019)

#50

Post by karmakaze »

datavirtue wrote: post #44
karmakaze wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep, the problem with the software wasn't the implementation, it was the spec: to operate contrary to the expectations and experience of pilots. The problem was that they didn't outsource the design spec. I doubt an externally developed design would be so contrary, with a flippant we'll document it and include it in the short brush up training.

The umpteenth comment trilling on as though MCAS was built by contractors when it was explicitly stated in the article that it was developed in-house by Boeing employees.

Still blame the ones defining the spec rather than implementing it.
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