Technical Smart vs Bussiness Smart in Programmers

Discussion in 'App Development' started by Aquarians, Dec 8, 2022.

  1. This is a programmer rant, posting in "App Development" because here's where you find programmers on ET.

    In my 20 years of software development experience what I can say with certainty is that there's a very high inverse correlation between the level of "technical smart" of an implementation and the level it actually solves the business problem it was intended to.

    Every time when the guys used the latest and greatest, most bleeding edge template metaprogramming and memory management in C++ that only appeared in 2022 September, like everything we had before that in programming was monkeys hanging from a tree banging their heads with rocks, making their own Domain-Specific-Language in Java, everything littered with design patterns and coroutines in Kotlin... 100% of the times they missed the mark, only tangentially touching the problem the fucking software was supposed to solve.

    It's clear to me that these guy are only "smart" in a way that a crook is smart in deceiving you and taking your money. I'm sure they realize from the very beginning that they totally don't understand the business domain nor are they interested in understanding it, but they just throw in crap like monkeys at a wall, for as long as the equally retarded managers keep them employed.

    Which is like clockwork, always until the product actually needs to be delivered case when they disappear like mist after sunrise, both developers and managers.
     
  2. You (or the people in your team who were responsible) were probably not clear in what you were asking for, or asking for too much in one go.

    Best to break it down, and take delivery in increments.

    A basic Minimal Viable Product on the first iteration. If they cant get that right why ask for more?
     
    Last edited: Dec 8, 2022
    BehindTheTicker likes this.
  3. spy

    spy

    ...in my 35 years of experience I can say with certainty that managing expectations is extremely difficult.

    For example, I wasn't expecting to see this:
    Code:
    Error: Unable to connect to MySQL and select database. MySQL reported:
    Access denied for user 'mbunea_fbb2'@'localhost' to database 'mbunea_fbb2'.
    here. But, I know keeping everything running smoothly isn't always easy.
     
    Last edited: Dec 8, 2022
  4. MarkBrown

    MarkBrown

    op is an amateur lol at getting screwed:

    projects 1 thru 100+

    money and time "about" 20 years wasted on shit code and stupid projects. lessons learned invaluable!

    learn to program and do it yourself getting help when you need it, for some scripts along the way.
     
  5. schizo

    schizo

    There are two sides to everything and programming is somewhat like trading IMO. An amateur trader only knows how to execute a trade. A smart trader, on the other hand, knows how to both execute and manage risks.
     
    MarkBrown likes this.
  6. MarkBrown

    MarkBrown

    true i started out in the 80's as a contract programmer for some traders and quickly i learned there were so many things that they just took for granted - it was an eye opener how detailed they had to be in order to just get close.

    failure of the trader to convey their wants is the primary reason coders fail at meeting expectations.
     
  7. Most programmers don't or cant keep it simple, KISS, Occam's Razor etc.
    This is the why code turns into garbage quality or if not complete garbage it is still over engineered and confusing to follow, spread out over too many classes and files.

    One thing i noticed early in software development, if you take the time to deliver a clean simple codebase, no one appreciates it or even notices it or even cares. They will just assume it must been very easy to do it that way. In reality you have to constantly keep asking yourself "how can i simplify this" for every line of code or class you write. And even if you make the effort and have the discipline to do that, other devs on your team wont, they will eventually pollute your code because they are not thinking that way.
     
    Last edited: Dec 8, 2022
    spy and MarkBrown like this.