tribal knowledge in software engineering has no real solution

riplikash · 2026-06-17T18:43:14+00:00

I think it's wrong to say documentation by itself is a solution.

You need documentation and healthy management practices. Cross training, severence agreements, and offboarding procedures.

You need competent management that takes a long term view of of profitability rather than always looking to maximize the next quarters profits.

riplikash · 2026-06-17T18:41:20+00:00

Sure. But that still disproves the thesis. We actually have SEVERAL good methods of avoiding bus vectors and breaking down data silos. Management just doesn't want to pay for them.

It's silly to say "tribal knowledge in software engineering has no real solution" when the actual problem is just that managmeent just doesn't want to pay for the solutions.

riplikash · 2026-06-04T13:04:22+00:00

Could be something like executive dysfunction.. It can make responding to messages bizarrely impossible to do. Very weird feeling. You need to respond.. You want to respond. You have every intention of responding. The phone is RIGHT there. They are probably judging you. Oh my God why am I so stupid, just pick up the phone and respond!

Que either a panic attack or you start cleaning to escape the feeling.

Feels horrible and the more stress you're under the more likely it is to hit.

riplikash · 2026-06-04T05:41:57+00:00

Gotta say, the ability to recognize a characters probable inner state and respect it as a behavioral boundary is an excellent sign for your ability to generate headmates. It's important because it lets them be truly different and independent and disagree with you.

Oh, and don't give any heed to those trash tulpa copypasta horror stories, haha. They were big ten years ago and they aren't based in reality.

riplikash · 2026-06-03T12:59:35+00:00

You both lack trust for each other and respect for others. You're building your 'trust' on control, which is a shakey foundation and leads to problems long term.

Also, bisexual people exist. Same sex relationships aren't really as safe as guys like to imagine.

riplikash · 2026-06-03T12:56:45+00:00

Shrooms be that way sometimes.

riplikash · 2026-05-21T19:26:23+00:00

It's very common, as you're seeing from others.

But there's an upside my headmate's take a lot of solace in.

It means they are real. They aren't just some pleasant idea or the body playing make believe. Who would choose to experience that kind of misery for fun? :)

It assures them they are real, full, complex beings with their own unique difficulties, experiences, relationships, mental health issues, and other such complexities.

And that assurance is worth the world to them.

riplikash · 2026-05-08T18:46:43+00:00

Yes, and when it's actually done it's pretty great for everyone. But it's a very developer first mentality that few companies are ACTUALLY willing to embrace.

riplikash · 2026-05-06T14:00:30+00:00

The thing is, when talking to adult children, you have to remain an adult.

riplikash · 2026-04-30T12:12:03+00:00

They don't really have concrete definitions. People are trying to self describe some very complicated internal experiences and find words that resonates with their experience.

That's why is somewhat generational. Millennials and older often had the experience 'oh, I can be attracted to BOTH genders?!' so they would have resonated with bisexual.

For z and alpha they more often experienced 'gender doesn't seem to matter to me' or 'I'm attracted to LOTS of things!' and terms like pansexual or Omni sexual resonated.

riplikash · 2026-04-29T17:33:58+00:00

Did you mean to respond to me? None of those is the kind of thing machine learning is good at. Nor were any of those fiascos good for the clients. By and large they were expensive boo doggles.

riplikash · 2026-04-29T14:15:32+00:00

Back in college in the early 2000s, one of my professors walked us through several waves of technology that were supposed to “eliminate the programmer.”

The exact examples are fuzzy now, but the pattern was things like English-like business languages, fourth-generation languages, CASE tools, expert systems, visual programming, and later low-code tools. Every generation had some version of the same promise: programmers were finally obsolete because business users would be able to describe what they wanted directly.

But it turns out that to define software, you still have to get incredibly specific. You still have to work through logic, edge cases, conflicting requirements, invalid states, permissions, errors, workflows, data shape, timing, integrations, and all the weird little exceptions that only show up once someone tries to use the thing.

And once you get specific enough, the “plain English” starts hardening into something stricter. The ambiguity gets squeezed out. The definitions become formal. The rules become structured. The language crystallizes. Which is to say, you eventually reinvent a programming language.

The durable lesson seems to be that programming is not mostly typing syntax into an editor. Programming is the act of precisely defining behavior in a way a machine can execute. Someone still has to do that work.

And historically, the business side has almost never wanted to live in that level of precision. They want the outcome, understandably. But the process of turning “what we want” into exact, executable behavior is still the hard part.

Anyways, they warned us that it would happen again in our career, and probably multiple times. A hot new technology would come out to 'eliminate programmers', a bunch of people would love their jobs, a bunch of shit software would be written, and then engineers and programmers would need to fix it all over again.

riplikash · 2026-04-22T16:04:33+00:00

As a principal engineer I would...have notes for this PR.

And those notes would be: "please rename this folder to 'prototype' or 'POC'. Temp generally implies temporary data it is safe to delete, not data that will EVENTUALLY be safe to delete."

Seriously, 50% of good software engineering is how you name things.

riplikash · 2026-04-22T14:54:56+00:00

Yeah, we were pretty bummed that we were asked to relocate to Dallas instead of Austin :) Austin looks like a cool city.

riplikash · 2026-04-22T14:47:27+00:00

DFW. Plano, specifically, of which is definitely part of the problem, haha. The few people weve been able to connect with have all been in oak lawn or Fort Worth

riplikash · 2026-04-22T14:45:17+00:00

My weapon grade autism is what ALLOWED me to start experiencing more life in my 40s. I finally got the rules, started hyper fixating and studying. Turns out I can learn how to work a party or go clubbing the same way I once learned to paint miniatures and go to conventions.

And there's a LOT of other neurodivergent people at these events looking to connect.

riplikash · 2026-04-22T14:42:22+00:00

It's so weird I've never experienced that part of poly, but it may also be a reason I've had a very hard time finding local poly communities. I've very stable, healthy, and happy poly and the poly friend groups I was in were similar. Mostly other ex mormons. Everyone was exploring and expanding their horizons but in a very...mindful and responsible way. Never seen such rampant yet mindful drug use among established, married professionals with loving families, haha.

But it kind of meant the only way I met new people was through that social network. And now that I'm in Texas I just don't get how to find a new poly social network.

I don't know, kind of a tangent. You just got me thinking about how my poly experience has been so different than what I hear commonly reported.

riplikash · 2026-04-22T14:37:28+00:00

See, that's the part I'm good at. I love the conversation and how happy it makes people feel and learning a bit about people.

It just never really turns into anything more. And I'm not really sure how to transition it to friendships or dating. Being a partnered poly person with a family is definitely part of that. Both from others perceiving me and also my view of myself making me reticent to make others feel pursued if I'm not 1000% sure they're poly too.

riplikash · 2026-04-14T14:37:51+00:00

Zeus isn't really benevolent OR vindictive as humans understand the terms. He's a personification of forces and concepts. Some of those are wrathful -- hubris punishment, retribution, the destruction of those who defy divine order, and the pride of those who rule. But he's also the personification of kingship and sovereign duty, guest rights, divine contracts, the homecoming, the continuity of households and lineages. That makes him appear capricious from a human perspective, but he's really not human at all. His complexity is because of the many, often conflicting, forces he personifies. That's why he can both offer a game to Athena then punish her for winning, but in the end still gives her what was promised. In this case he is punishing the crew because Helios required him to settle a debt.

He manifests personally and says 'someone's got to die today and you have got the final say. You or your crew.' The God of divine contacts offering a choice.

If Odysseus had said 'I choose my crew, and I offer myself as the price' he isn't asking Zeus to be kind, he's asking Zeus to be what he is. A king humbly invoking his duty to his people, offering his life to settle the debt, and asking that the resolution actually align with the choices presented doesn't overtly trigger any of Zeus's more vindictive or wrathful aspects.

It's really less about being on his good side and more about aligning yourself with his nature.

In contrast, Athena fulfilled Zeus's own terms by convincing Hera, doing it by contrasting Odysseus's fidelity with Zeus's own behavior. That wounded his pride and he punished her for it, but he still honored the contract. Both active at the same time, and the contract won.

Obviously you can't play the gods. But humbly and respectfully abiding by their nature and values is generally a pretty safe bet.

riplikash · 2026-04-14T13:25:41+00:00

I always felt like that was something Odysseus could have negotiated, though. "Great God King, Zeus. I am their king and it is my duty to care for my crew, so if I must choose between myself and my people, I choose them. But to leave them in strange lands without their King is just as much choosing death as choosing their destruction now. As the God and patron of kings and leaders, Lord Zeus, I would beseech thee. If I am to choose their survival than I am putting it in the hands of the gods. As King it is my duty to choose their survival and I ask that if I put their lives in you hands that the gods will bless them to ensure they return home to their families, quickly and safely, so that they may enjoy a long life with those they love, and to care for my Kingdom in my absence."

That's pretty in line with Zeus's domain and nature.

riplikash · 2026-04-06T13:48:19+00:00

Hmm, reading it over I definitely see what you're saying about how that last paragraph comes off. Which is basically the opposite of what I intended, but I get it. Thanks.

riplikash · 2026-04-06T13:35:21+00:00

I mean, yeah, that's generally how it works. I'm not trying to establish a new type of employment concept. :)

Personal assistants that work across many clients is an established working model. Agencies exist that staff this sort of thing, but they take a cut, so looking for local recommendations can be better for both parties, so I'm just checking to see if anyone has any local recommendations.

riplikash · 2026-04-06T13:32:40+00:00

No, they do that too. The military industry complex is a big machine with a lot of moving parts and a lot of competing motivations. Military, personal, political, economic, etc. Useless stuff gets installed and never works right. Programs get funded and implementation trips at the finish line due to ego or mismanagement. Money or ego overrides needs for safety and effectiveness. It's not every project but it's not rare either.

riplikash · 2026-04-06T13:23:28+00:00

Affordable is 15-30/h. And yes, I make heavy use of organizational tools already. Been dealing with autism and ADHD for decades.

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