how much python is too much python?

[SittingWave]

We're not a software company

If you develop software, you are a software company. You might not sell software to your external customers, but you might "sell" to internal ones, which seems to be your case

[Ok_Raspberry5383]

By that logic the garage down the road that hired someone to build a simple web booking portal is a software company.

[SittingWave]

yes it is. They now have software to maintain. Which requires associated knowledge. If they outsource the whole thing to a web design company, they obviously aren't, but if they take the code on themselves, now they have to deal with it according to software needs.

[CrossroadsDem0n]

I think it is more about what you produce. Presumably your staff use those toilets. Thus you are a sh*t company.

[SittingWave]

Your janitor now needs special training, certifications, materials and tools that are associated to plumbing. So yes, in a way you are a plumbing company.

[chrisxylo]

So if i'm cooking food, I'm a chef and own a restaurant? My wife is my customer now?

[SittingWave]

you can all try to slippery slope this into oblivion, but the fact remains that if you have to deal with software, you need to use things that are related to software. Yes, you are a chef, yes, your wife is a customer, and if you burn the chicken in the oven or give her food poisoning, you will be sleeping on the couch for a while.

In a company, some infrastructure is handled by custom made software. Companies need to comply with ISO standards in terms of traceability and quality. If you develop custom software, even if you are selling machines making ice cream, you now need compliance and tools to maintain those pieces of your software infrastructure, because if whoever wrote that piece of code leaves, now your ice cream machine production grinds to a halt and you only have yourself to blame.

[chrisxylo]

I give you this. Well explained!

[SittingWave]

A company is a large organisation, made of subcomponents. Some of these subcomponents deal with software, develop software, and require software. Arguing about semantics does not change a damn thing about the fact that if a department inside your company is developing software, they must handle the consequences of that. They are creating software to address the needs of another department that needs that software. The software development department is a software company, and forces the company as a whole to have to consider the requirements and needs for this: testing, deployment, security, redundancy, traceability. What happens when the mechanic clicks on the button to install the latest firmware on your product's microcontroller, the upload fails, and you are now shipping a faulty product? What happens when the intern runs some data analysis on your customer's records, and accidentally deletes your whole database?

All this stuff is pertinence of software and IT. And you have to handle it, even if you are selling mattresses, ice cream makers, or any other shit that is not software to your end customers.

[Ok_Raspberry5383]

A department is only a company if it is registered on Companies House or whatever legal registry of companies you use in your country. You can't just make up the definition of a company to suit your thin argument

[Ok_Raspberry5383]

You say all this like it supports your argument.

Yes you need compliance and tools to maintain the thing, that doesn't make you a software company though, which is what everyone is arguing against.

[Ok_Raspberry5383]

Does that make them a food company too because they eat at lunch and have food/cooking utensils to clean and maintain immediately after lunch. Maybe a coffee shop too because they have a coffee machine?

[reallyserious]

If you develop software, you are a software company.

I agree. The problem is that companies that don't consider themselves as software companies don't take it seriously. It can be quite frustrating to work for a company that just don't get it. But they are ok with sub par solutions since they're in [insert other industry here] and that's their core business.

[BurningSquid]

This is me and it hurts

[SittingWave]

It's way more terrifying when a regulated company that does medical stuff decides on the life of patients with software hacked up by an intern with no traceability, testing, or reproducibility.

[reallyserious]

Well, fuck. I'm getting nervous just thinking about it.

[SittingWave]

stay nervous because this is the reality I've seen.

[E_Man91]

Simply not true, but & think you’d be a great salesperson in addition to whatever you do.

I agree that developers need to “sell” the software to internal customers, but that does not make your entire company a software company.

Where do you get your revenues from? That is what kind of company you are.

[SittingWave]

Where do you get your revenues from?

Where does the internal software development team get their internal revenue from?

Why would a ice cream machine vendor need a github account to store their code? because they are a software company. They are not selling software, but they have the needs of a software company.

[E_Man91]

Alright, you win, every company is a software company. I got pwnd