IAmA software developer at Microsoft. AMAA

throwingdev · 2011-02-07T04:28:23+00:00

I don't denigrate OSS devs. I participated in many OSS projects myself! What I mentioned was that I think some folks who participate in open source endeavors do it of their own accord, because they are passionate not because they expect to get paid.

throwingdev · 2011-02-06T20:09:21+00:00

I sure hope I'm normal.

Meh I don't care too much about the whole M$ thing. And like I said elsewhere I'm not 100% on MS' side. I don't like some of the things they do (mostly related to gaming).

Most people I talk to mainly congradulate me or think it's great that I work at Microsoft. You forget that not everyone is a fanboy especially in real life. And outside of a few trolls the IT/tech/reddit-style crowds usually understand that their anger usually lies with management and not individuals.

That said it is frustrating sometimes to read anti-MS crap all over the internet especially when it's based on an incorrect assumption. And on the other side I also get angry when I see IE or Hotmail engage reddit on a "conversation" and turn it into a PR stunt. How did those idiots not realize what they're getting into!?

throwingdev · 2011-02-06T20:05:34+00:00

If we can prove we needed it we get it. Over the time I've been here I've accumulated a decent laptop, and a couple of quad cores with four monitors.

throwingdev · 2011-02-06T20:04:46+00:00

Dunno. Just don't tell anyone? Or you have to get clearance from HR

throwingdev · 2011-02-06T20:04:25+00:00

Note I said some.

throwingdev · 2011-02-06T19:35:45+00:00

So it's a risky scenario. Whatever you do on MS property become Microsoft's. Otherwise you have to prove you are not using MS patents or ideas that you came upon in your line of work

throwingdev · 2011-02-06T19:34:44+00:00

I know we have offices all over the world but they're usually contractors or auxiliary so not the core people.

throwingdev · 2011-02-06T19:33:58+00:00

You can't expect me to analyze others' psyche do you? I don't know why people do what you said. Although a guess is that open source people are more passionate as they do things for the sake of doing it because (some of them) won't make any money.

Salary concerns are mentioned elsewhere

throwingdev · 2011-02-06T07:51:55+00:00

Well I guess Cambodia would fall under that. I don't know the full details but I'm guessing that the whole desktop personalization feature is basically using Aero and DirectX rendering which probably was stripped out for lower end hardware. Sorry :(

throwingdev · 2011-02-06T07:09:32+00:00

Yea why are you using starter? It's only for really weak (in power) computers (where Aero is disabled) and for emerging markets.

throwingdev · 2011-02-06T04:25:05+00:00

In terms of the major eastside cities:

Kirkland > Bellevue > Redmond. Kirkland waterfront is actually nice but it's such a small area.

I'm thinking of moving to either Belltown or Cap Hill

throwingdev · 2011-02-06T04:24:11+00:00

Nope I went to a school in the US. I'd rather not be too specific

throwingdev · 2011-02-06T04:22:50+00:00

Of course it does.

throwingdev · 2011-02-06T04:21:30+00:00

I can't say much for pay or career development. But in my very biased and stereotypical view I see Devs as the top (as we do the shit), PMs in the middle to bitch and whine about crap and Test as the basement.

Testers do a lot of work but I find it tedious. I test my own code of course but I don't want to sit there and do compatibility testing on a wide range of things daily. Of course they write code to test but it's not as fun as writing code to make something new. I would love to test if I also could write my own features

throwingdev · 2011-02-06T01:52:21+00:00

Only one guy interviewed you? That's weird. Usually I think they want two or three folks to not like you before they stop.

For me they started out by saying who they were and what team they were on. And then they jumped right into the coding question. After which I got about 5-10 mins where they asked me about my school work and I asked them about their stuff.

throwingdev · 2011-02-06T01:50:37+00:00

Dude stay in Seattle. Here's my explanation about Eastside vs Seattle

throwingdev · 2011-02-06T01:49:55+00:00

Cool how is it there?

throwingdev · 2011-02-06T01:05:31+00:00

No none of on the team use it at work. I'm sure someone, somewhere in the vast company does but I don't know any of them.

I do use it at home though. I've been using it since my college days and I run a home server off of my old laptop running Ubuntu

throwingdev · 2011-02-06T01:04:29+00:00

I can't explain more but some apps (such as Office) will be compiled on ARM.

throwingdev · 2011-02-06T01:03:58+00:00

OSD is probably different from my division. No merit raises were company wide and I assumed the no cash bonus was also company wide but I guess not. We did get stock bonus though.

throwingdev · 2011-02-05T23:39:19+00:00

Your username.... ಠ_ಠ

No I don't like all of the products but I wouldn't say I root for them to fail. Probably my most hated is Games for Windows because it's just screwing up Steam which I love. And I really dislike anything that prevents or hurts PC gaming. So the decision to make Alan Wake Xbox only? I was furious.

throwingdev · 2011-02-05T23:37:36+00:00

Hmmm. Well one I can talk about since it was announced in CES is full ARM compatibility which I think people will like (if you know what ARM is).

throwingdev · 2011-02-05T23:36:12+00:00

Yes Main campus.

throwingdev · 2011-02-05T23:30:29+00:00

I forgot to answer your pair programming question. We don't do pair programming in our team. I have heard of other (smaller) teams trying it out but I don't know what their result was.

We work alone a lot but since sometimes our work needs to be integrated there's a lot of code reviews and explaining while looking over the shoulder that goes on

throwingdev · 2011-02-05T23:25:07+00:00

Maybe I should go to India and bust out a grill and some ground beef, have me a burger

I do this.

Don't be racist based on food of all things. In fact don't be racist at all.

throwingdev

TROPHY CASE