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[#] Mon Nov 28 2016 13:57:46 EST from IGnatius T Foobar

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"Hey [IG], I understand you have been making changes to the firewall. Please fix the following things which broke."

[ followed by a list of things which have been broken for months or years, when I made the firewall changes three weeks ago ]

Yeah buddy, sure thing. Watch me whip out a tennis racket big enough to deflect the albatross you just tried to lob my way.

[#] Fri Dec 02 2016 14:29:52 EST from fleeb

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I'm in the odd position of leading development on something that has people pinning very high hopes.

I didn't realize the degree to which people want this to work. Maybe because all I ever see are obstructions (since I focus on getting things done, and I keep running into occasional impediments caused by lack of funds).

I've been in this sort of position before. It's just ... the scale seems a bit more massive this time.

And yet, I feel calm and unconcerned. I know I will do my job well, and we'll put out something of the best quality we can muster given the limits imposed on us. And I feel comfortable that we're doing the right thing, that we're ahead of any competition out there. It's mostly a patience game.

It's just odd to learn a bit of what is going on around me. Contracts failing, other technologies our company sells becoming obscolete, competitors beating us in marketing the other products we sell, etc.

Our office is just working on something weird that just might be what the rest of the company needs, and it lacks serious competitors.

I thought working for a larger company would suck balls, but when this kind of stuff happens, it's interesting.

(Not that I hate sucking balls, but it's an expression).

[#] Sun Dec 04 2016 09:14:48 EST from LoanShark

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That's usually a good position to be in--so long as you get the support you need from the rest of the team.

[#] Tue Dec 06 2016 09:18:17 EST from fleeb

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I have a decent team, as far as I can tell. Everyone wants this to work, and are attempting to make this happen.

I worry a bit about marketing, as we have never had a good team to help us with that, but even there, I'm starting to see people working on it.

I think there will be pressure to do this on a shoestring budget, though, as there isn't a lot of money available. I'm hoping, though, as we start to pull in money, we can use at least some of that to feed back into it to give us some resources we lack. I expect, though, some resistance to that, at least starting out.

[#] Tue Dec 06 2016 14:58:58 EST from fleeb

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Meanwhile, solved two problems today... one of which only involved changing a single character in the code.

I shouldn't feel this elated.

[#] Tue Dec 06 2016 16:02:05 EST from Ladyhawke

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Ha!  That sounds like "maximization of efficiency" to me!



[#] Tue Dec 06 2016 22:07:48 EST from anonymous

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Uh oh. A clueless micromanager just landed in our organization. Must make it a mission to scare this person away. Micromanagement will not be tolerated.

[#] Wed Dec 07 2016 13:25:10 EST from LoanShark

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2016-12-06 09:18 from fleeb @uncnsrd

Don't worry about Marketing. They'll be the first with their backs against the wall then The Revolution comes.

[#] Wed Dec 07 2016 13:28:03 EST from LoanShark

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2016-12-06 16:02 from Ladyhawke @uncnsrd
Ha!  That sounds like "maximization of efficiency" to me!

A sentient being's optimal chance at maximizing their utility is a long and prosperous life. It also helps to minimize unnecessary keystrokes.

[#] Wed Dec 07 2016 15:54:04 EST from IGnatius T Foobar

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Let's see if these people have a sense of humor.

I am writing a "design document" based on one of those bobblehead templates that middle managers love to require. One of the sections I have to fill out is marked "Limitations."

In this section I wrote "None. You can do anything at Zombo.com. The only limit is yourself."

[#] Thu Dec 08 2016 09:32:15 EST from fleeb

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Re: Maximization of efficiency...

I strive only to create errors that require single character fixes.

Unfortunately, I repeatedly fail at that. In this last case, it was our webdev who pulled off that amazing piece of engineering.

Re: Clueless Micromanager

Surely, you have a rabbit hole in which to dump it. Some long, windy mess of something that your team wisely elected not to poke until that day you have the time to do so, at which you can casually point for the micromanager's benefit, so when s/he forces you to do something with it, the resulting mess can squarely be blamed upon him/her for waking the dragon.

Re: Zombo.com

The unattainable is unknown...

[#] Thu Dec 08 2016 11:15:44 EST from fleeb

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This lady in the open conference room near me has a voice that annoys me enough that I am very, very thankful I need not work directly with her.

[#] Thu Dec 08 2016 11:46:00 EST from fleeb

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Days like today, I have to resist the urge to wander around the office singing lyrics like:

Be my wife, or you
will be cut in two
Said the villian to poor little Vera.

[#] Thu Dec 08 2016 11:51:28 EST from fleeb

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Said Vera, "Nay nay, though you cut me in twain,
The angels would put me together again.

As the great big saw came nearer and nearer and nearer and nearer and nearer.

[#] Thu Dec 08 2016 14:17:05 EST from Ladyhawke

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Thu Dec 08 2016 09:32:15 AM EST from fleeb @ Uncensored

Re: Clueless Micromanager

Surely, you have a rabbit hole in which to dump it. Some long, windy mess of something that your team wisely elected not to poke until that day you have the time to do so, at which you can casually point for the micromanager's benefit, so when s/he forces you to do something with it, the resulting mess can squarely be blamed upon him/her for waking the dragon.


FTW of the week!



[#] Fri Dec 09 2016 12:32:16 EST from LoanShark

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I strive only to create errors that require single character fixes.

The more clever your code, the greater the likelihood of this being a reality... but you'd have to be "too clever." Like, everything you write would be compressed to the point of completely atrocious style, like RSA-in-4-lines-of-perl.

[#] Fri Dec 09 2016 12:34:08 EST from LoanShark

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for the micromanager's benefit, so when s/he forces you to do
something with it, the resulting mess can squarely be blamed upon
him/her for waking the dragon.

Truely some dragons should NOT be woken, but inevitably somebody from Sales will promise a client (as a condition of a go-live, of course) some feature that will be so disruptive to implement...

[#] Fri Dec 09 2016 14:18:57 EST from Ragnar Danneskjold

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A missing punctuation mark in a guidance equation led to a much greater national embarrassment when the rocket carrying the Mariner 1 space probe exploded shortly after liftoff on July 22, 1962, in what is widely believed to the most expensive typographical mistake of all time. Some reports attributed the rocket failure to a misplaced decimal point, an extra semicolon or a comma that was entered in place of a period in the coded mathematical instructions that guided the steering systems on board the spacecraft. However, NASA investigators traced the cause of the accident to the omission of a single hyphen (or superscripted overbar) in the guidance control software, which transmitted a series of incorrect course correction signals that threw the vehicle off its flight trajectory. The range safety officer had no choice but to order the intentional detonation of the spacecraft less than five minutes after liftoff to prevent the vehicle from crashing into a populated area.

[#] Mon Dec 12 2016 11:31:47 EST from fleeb

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A year ago, we moved our office to another office in a cramped city where you can't easily find software professionals.

This year, we're moving again, to an office in a city where you can find more software professionals, about 5 miles from where I live. At least, when I'm not put out of my home by flooding.

So, that's kinda surreal.

[#] Tue Dec 13 2016 11:15:50 EST from wizard of aahz

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So you're working closer to where you live??

fooker.

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