51–60 of 77 posts
Even if you deliver a system with a lot of features and no known bugs, if they aren't the right features, it's not valuable software.
I am going to get my drum out and bang on it again. Software is a form of literacy - and we measure literacy completely differently. In fact we measure it like we measure science - you are not a scientist unless other scientists agree you are, and you are not a coder unless other coders say you are. What Fowler wants to measure is not the top echelons of productivity but the lower bounds - presumably to winnow out th…
you are not a coder unless other coders say you are Not everybody needs the approval of an external entity. I couldn't care less what other coders think of me. What I ship speaks for itself. What I write speaks for itself. What studies scientists publish speak for themselves. The rest is politics.
Coders must get jobs to continue coding if they are not independently wealthy. Bias abounds in this case, as other coders with influence must vouch for you, and...in this case your projects can influence their opinion of you.
We are social creatures: we don't live as hermits (most of us anyways).
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Can you elaborate on why you believe this to be the case? Saying that a scientist is one who does science seems like a truism bordering on being tautological. I'm curious why you disagree.
Does knowing a bit of physics make you a physicist? Does praying make you a monk? Does mixing a few chemicals make you a chemist? Does having some theories about people's motivations make you a behavioural psychologist? Does balancing a budget make you an accountant? "Scientist" implies a certain amount of knowledge, training, discipline, etc. I'm not implying that every scientist needs to have undergone academic tra…
Also if you procrastinate a lot, you might end up learning something useful and get new insights that will make you more productive in the long run.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
you are not a coder unless other coders say you are Not everybody needs the approval of an external entity. I couldn't care less what other coders think of me. What I ship speaks for itself. What I write speaks for itself. What studies scientists publish speak for themselves. The rest is politics.
Scientists must pass peer review to publish, and peer review can be very harsh. Double blind helps winnow out political bias. Coders must get jobs to continue coding if they are not independently wealthy. Bias abounds in this case, as other coders with influence must vouch for you, and...in this case your projects can influence their opinion of you. We are social creatures: we don't live as hermits (most of us anyway…
In the days before the Web, I created two good-sized adventure games without ever having interacted with another programmer (save maybe 2 book authors). Nobody vetted me. I just made and released them. The lone wolf programmer has always been a thing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coastline_paradox
productivity of working on a software is like measuring fractals.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Scientists must pass peer review to publish, and peer review can be very harsh. Double blind helps winnow out political bias. Coders must get jobs to continue coding if they are not independently wealthy. Bias abounds in this case, as other coders with influence must vouch for you, and...in this case your projects can influence their opinion of you. We are social creatures: we don't live as hermits (most of us anyway…
It was still an inflammatory thing to say, given that there's nothing stopping a person who does live as a hermit from learning to write working code. In the days before the Web, I created two good-sized adventure games without ever having interacted with another programmer (save maybe 2 book authors). Nobody vetted me. I just made and released them. The lone wolf programmer has always been a thing.
The sad part is that even after decades of technologists debating this, the reality is that most non-technologists working in the industry don't know, don't care, and really just want their pet features. The real measure of productivity in organizations with non-technical stakeholders therefore becomes whether or not a stakeholder feels like they are getting what they want. Attempts to measure productivity, whether v…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It was still an inflammatory thing to say, given that there's nothing stopping a person who does live as a hermit from learning to write working code. In the days before the Web, I created two good-sized adventure games without ever having interacted with another programmer (save maybe 2 book authors). Nobody vetted me. I just made and released them. The lone wolf programmer has always been a thing.
But if you are working alone as a hermit, why do titles even matter? Titles are just something someone uses to classify you, and in isolation mean nothing (unless you have split personalities; joking, schizophrenia is a serious subject).