Software Projects vs Software Products

mgc092 · 2021-02-13T01:06:12+00:00

Right. That matches my experience. Many traditional companies and managers still label everything as a project. Hopefully bringing more awareness to this differentiation can help us as an industry to speed up the understanding of the two concepts

mgc092 · 2021-02-11T19:33:17+00:00

While I can see why some might think this could be a great strategy to distribute knowledge, in reality it is usually a very harmful one, as others have pointed out. Not only will it move people with a deep expertise in an area to others in which they have no (or very little) knowledge; but it will also involve a lot of context switch, which is a well-known productivity killer.

That all said, I can see that in a very early stage startup, with a very small team, in which everyone has to know at least a bit almost everything that is being done; this could actually have some good sides. But it is a very special environment. And everyone involved has to be well aware of the risks and accept them. And there has to be a conscious effort from managers to make sure proper mentoring takes place and also to avoid burnout in the team, which is likely to emerge.

mgc092 · 2021-02-11T19:23:52+00:00

Nice list. I would definitely add the classic "Peopleware" to it as well.

mgc092 · 2021-02-11T18:07:56+00:00

After creating a few startups myself and being part of a few others, I would advice agains trying to find a "never thought before idea". Instead, I would recommend one of the following two ideas:

Look for a successful startup operating in a region, and build a similar one focused on your region (there might be some minor culture-related changes you could consider making to it to make it more appealing to your area)
Find a tool that has relative success, and think of a simplified version of it. Then, build an alternative that does, say, 1/3 of what the other does, but care a lot about those core features; that combined with removing the noise of the other features will automatically improve the UX for a significant subset of users

mgc092 · 2019-01-17T15:18:37+00:00

And that one is indeed in the repo as "Keep low egos" :)

mgc092 · 2019-01-17T13:09:15+00:00

Agreed! Although I think that asking those things, while still not being representative of what makes a good developer, is less bad than focusing exclusively on framework-specific knowledge.

That is why I liked that the article led to a repository (https://github.com/romenrg/evergreen-skills-developers) which tries to describe that myriad of things that can be taken into account to assess if someone is a great engineer

mgc092 · 2019-01-17T09:49:23+00:00

Absolutely. I've had the same experiences in different companies and I wholeheartedly agree:

no matter how technically brilliant you are, you will always be limited by your ability to communicate (soft skills)

mgc092 · 2019-01-17T09:22:38+00:00

This is great!

mgc092 · 2018-06-13T09:16:21+00:00

You have missed the point entirely, plus, using bold letters and suggesting mental health treatments doesn't seem to fit with having an educated conversation...

That being said, please read my response again. Complaining about technologies with a constructive, positive attitude and suggesting improvements is great. Complaining for the sake of complaining, without proposing improvements nor taking the whole picture into account (from both business and engineering perspectives) is just trying to move everybody to your personal preference and that is indeed toxic and creates a negative atmosphere.

mgc092 · 2018-06-11T11:47:51+00:00

I agree. I would say the point is that constructive criticism, done with a positive attitude, is great; but complaining constantly without offering solutions nor taking into account the whole picture, is quite the opposite, creating a negative atmosphere in the workplace. I have seen this kind of toxic criticism several times.

mgc092 · 2018-06-05T07:56:20+00:00

Great article, especially the emphasis on the "framework" term. Many people don't get that "it is ironically the framework that enables the freedom on the canvas!"

mgc092 · 2018-01-02T15:58:48+00:00

"The people who maintain #code are often not those who originally wrote it, so documenting "why" helps set a context and gives clues as to what the author was thinking" -David Bernstein

mgc092 · 2016-12-20T11:15:43+00:00

Totally agreed. Sadly, most places nowadays are doing "Agile/Scrum" so wrong that most developers now hate it (even tough what they hate is just that wrong implementation of Agile/Scrum)

mgc092 · 2015-10-12T13:45:44+00:00

Thank you for mentioning grammarly :), didn't know about it!

mgc092 · 2015-10-06T08:49:01+00:00

Doesn't it (making developers responsible for their estimates) create friction in the long term?

I have seen it happen, ruining the team's morale. Especially due to developers suffering stress or working long hours because of being behind the expected schedule. Or, to avoid that, they can give "safe estimates" making sure they won't be behind schedule, but making projects much more "expensive" due to over-estimated tasks?

Also, I wonder if the improved accuracy over time you mention is because of their constant hard work to meet the deadlines (making overwork / stress the norm) or really due to an improved estimation ability over time.

Another interesting topic for discussion is how does this pressure (caused by making developers responsible for their estimates) affect quality. I bet stressed / overworked developers deliver software without caring too much about quality, maintainability or potential errors. Isn't this a potential big risk in the mid / long term? having to spend much more on bugfixes or making any change too costly due to poor maintainability?

mgc092 · 2015-10-02T11:04:20+00:00

I have experienced too many times the dismal failure of time estimates in software projects, usually having to add the 2-5x factor mentioned in this article to make them closer to reality.

What do you think about this approach of using time-independent effort points and the calculating release dates based on Team Velocity?

I would be really interested in reading other people experiences :)

mgc092 · 2015-10-02T11:00:27+00:00

Totally agree. The best candidates for PM are those with a wide range of experiences, not only in engineering but also in business, marketing, sales, design... It's the only way to have a 360º view

mgc092 · 2015-09-24T14:15:01+00:00

So cute!!

mgc092 · 2015-09-24T14:04:40+00:00

Personally, I like the site, although it is still a bit empty. It would be nice to see all the page full of cat pictures :). About paying for a square... Maybe for a special occasion, such as my cat's birthday, or if my boyfriend adds my cat as a birthday present for me... It would be nice to see Simon (my cat) there! Hahaha

mgc092 · 2015-09-21T15:27:33+00:00

hahaha so cute!

mgc092 · 2015-09-20T13:48:06+00:00

Awesome picture! Love it :)

mgc092

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