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Normalization of Deviance (2015)

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Re: Normalization of Deviance (2015)

#51

Post by DiggyJohnson »

chaps wrote: post #21
aliqot wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's what I never understood about this story; did you guys have any suspicion it would dump radiation into the patient all at once, or was this like a concurrency bug

We weren't able to reliably install security daemons on a client's machine because the entire automation system didn't account for autoscaling. The issues were raised well before I joined and the project head legitimately didn't understand it as a problem that needed solving. The hosts were for a presidential candidate's webserver, and they noticed the webservers were missing security daemons days before the election…

Maybe I'm missing a joke, but was your client HRC's campaign?(?!)

Re: Normalization of Deviance (2015)

#52

Post by chaps »

a4isms wrote: post #42
chaps wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was once told this after raising the issue that "hey maybe an API that responds with root ssh passwords is a bad idea, and our clients are going to be pissed once they find out." And.. I was right. So often, citing Chesterton's fence is significantly more naive than what it attempts to criticize.

How is being right about wanting to make a change a refutation of the idea that knowing why people made a decision in the past is an excellent idea? Nothing about Chesterton's Fence asserts that people in the past always made good decisions, nor does it assert that perhaps what was a good decision then is a bad decision today. It simply asserts that understanding why a thing is the way it is is valuable when making a…

  We can still say it was a bone-headed choice to do that because it opened a massive back door to every user's system. And? What is the problem with looking into why they made that choice before arguing that the choice should be reversed with maximum prejudice?
Because I was suggesting a different method for the specific task at-hand.

  I don't see where you're coming from that quoting Chesterton's Fence is even "criticism." It's a suggestion to take out a little insurance by doing a little homework.
Every time I've heard someone quote Chesterton's Fence, it's always been as a means to halt the conversation. Essentially, "shutup" -- an indirect critique of critique itself in dismissive form. There's possibly some meta point here about you not knowing the full circumstances of the situation to warrant bringing up Chesterton's fence.

Re: Normalization of Deviance (2015)

#53

Post by aidenn0 »

chaps wrote: post #30
a4isms wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Making good decisions, therefore, requires understanding past decisions. Without knowing how things came to be, it’s easy to make things worse." — https://thoughtbot.com/blog/chestertons-fence

I was once told this after raising the issue that "hey maybe an API that responds with root ssh passwords is a bad idea, and our clients are going to be pissed once they find out." And.. I was right. So often, citing Chesterton's fence is significantly more naive than what it attempts to criticize.

I can think of a dozen reasons why such an API might exist. Chesterton's fence doesn't say "don't make changes" it says "If you can't think of why something might exist, you are not qualified to say that it shouldn't exist."

Re: Normalization of Deviance (2015)

#54

Post by JackFr »

dec0dedab0de wrote: post #6

I'm still reading, but I just got to the part about flaky, and I got annoyed because there are clear use cases for flaky or pytest-retry. If you have an integration test that relies on an unreliable system you do not control. Sure you can mock it out for a unit test, but if you want to make sure you catch breaking API changes, you need to hit the actual system. And if it works after retrying it a few times, then so b…

I'm going to push back and say that test is not a valuable automatic test. The phrase "relies on an unreliable system" captures that lack of value.

Re: Normalization of Deviance (2015)

#55

Post by pizzaknife »

i routunely remind everyone,"we're all mercenaries."

i have marginal control over who i manage. The Product isnt saving the world, but it is allowing us to live reasonably and with a clear soul at the end of the sprint. The reason i say the "mercenary" bit is simple: weigh your dreams against blood and gold and compromise.

Re: Normalization of Deviance (2015)

#56

Post by chaps »

aidenn0 wrote: post #53
chaps wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was once told this after raising the issue that "hey maybe an API that responds with root ssh passwords is a bad idea, and our clients are going to be pissed once they find out." And.. I was right. So often, citing Chesterton's fence is significantly more naive than what it attempts to criticize.

I can think of a dozen reasons why such an API might exist. Chesterton's fence doesn't say "don't make changes" it says "If you can't think of why something might exist, you are not qualified to say that it shouldn't exist."

I never said I didn't understand why the API existed.

Re: Normalization of Deviance (2015)

#57

Post by aliqot »

DiggyJohnson wrote: post #51
chaps wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We weren't able to reliably install security daemons on a client's machine because the entire automation system didn't account for autoscaling. The issues were raised well before I joined and the project head legitimately didn't understand it as a problem that needed solving. The hosts were for a presidential candidate's webserver, and they noticed the webservers were missing security daemons days before the election…

Maybe I'm missing a joke, but was your client HRC's campaign?(?!)

That's not important and this ain't the place to ask otherwise they'd have told us.

Re: Normalization of Deviance (2015)

#58

Post by aidenn0 »

chaps wrote: post #56
aidenn0 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can think of a dozen reasons why such an API might exist. Chesterton's fence doesn't say "don't make changes" it says "If you can't think of why something might exist, you are not qualified to say that it shouldn't exist."

I never said I didn't understand why the API existed.

Then Chesterton's fence doesn't apply. People wrongly using arguments to enforce blind conservatism doesn't make the underlying arguments wrong...

Re: Normalization of Deviance (2015)

#60

Post by chaps »

aidenn0 wrote: post #58
chaps wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never said I didn't understand why the API existed.

Then Chesterton's fence doesn't apply. People wrongly using arguments to enforce blind conservatism doesn't make the underlying arguments wrong...

Then we agree!!
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