2016/03/08 01:41:39
Vastman
WORD
2016/03/08 02:17:12
Zargg
Good one
2016/03/08 04:30:53
Kylotan
"Man who makes money by writing software wants you to stop complaining that it isn't good enough".
 
Excuses.
2016/03/08 05:29:21
subtlearts
Kylotan
"Man who makes money by writing software wants you to stop complaining that it isn't good enough".
 
Excuses.



Disagree. Man who has a long track record writing useful software, running successful software companies, and writing influential bestselling books about software and business, and arguably understands these things as profoundly as anyone, explains his viewpoint - backed by all of that experience - of how software developers and companies (at least those likely to stay in business) view the subject. You think he's whining, so we should believe you? Riiiiiight. 
2016/03/08 06:05:31
ChristopherM
Complacent.
 
2016/03/08 06:41:39
BobF
The easy way to exceed expectations.  Set them low to begin with.
 
Of course all software has bugs.  It's where and how many that matters.  We all have our own level of tolerance for bugs.  Personally, if I get bit by a bug more than a couple of times over an extended time frame, resulting in enough wasted effort to make me say lotsa naughty words, then I *need* that particular bug fixed.  Sure, workarounds are a good way to keep moving forward UNTIL THE BUG GETS FIXED.  When enough workarounds become part of the standard procedure, the path from A to B is no longer direct.  How many extra miles are you willing to drive every day to avoid potholes in the road(s)?  What if EVERY ROAD has potholes?
 
Unfortunately, like other aspects of life in current times, we often hold our noses while we make choices for whatever is least aggravating.  It would be great to have really great choices.  To choose something because of its inherent awesomeness instead of it being the least bothersome to deal with.
2016/03/08 06:58:42
patm300e
Yep, as a software developer myself II have to agree with this one.
2016/03/08 07:56:59
azslow3
As a software developer I want to write my view on software bugs:
1) there are useful big programs with rather small set of bugs, for example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TeX
2) every identified and proved bug with known origin should be fixed
3) while every program has bugs, there is a big different how the software package in general deals with them. For example modern OS is not crashing when the bug is in user application. In other words, the program should be prepared to hit a bug (of any kind except computer hardware related) and have clear approach what to do in this case.
 
Not live critical applications normally ignore (3).
 
Marketing force to ignore (1) and (2) since users are ready to accept the consequences. For many peaces of quite expensive hardware there was no "released" drivers at all. Software is crashing or not working as expected. Still people pay money. So, why spend time and effort for fixing?
 
But proposing to lower the expectation level is wrong. The fact something exists "everywhere" can not justify the proposal to be quite about that. There are many killers, thefts, etc. They always was, are and will be. Should we propose to remove the laws against them?
 
2016/03/08 08:34:55
mettelus
The critical nature of bugs is definitely a massive factor, and this article seems to want to lump them into one big bucket, which is definitely not true.
 
Imagine a financial institution with a bug which would compromise your money... I have overhauled such systems, and not a single customer would say "All software has bugs" to such an incident, especially since a catastrophic one would earn you front and center at a Congressional hearing.
 
Bugs which have risk of catastrophic loss (loss of life, loss of property, et.al.) definitely do not get lumped into "all bugs are the same." Even smaller ones are not as forgivable when large quantities of time are lost. From a marketing perspective, one cannot give themselves a bigger black eye than to knowingly release a bug, be it product or service... things like the Ford Pinto, Challenger disaster, and the like were all known (and evaluated) prior to "release"... the most extreme examples to be sure, but if you aim high and miss you still hit a lot higher than aiming low and being on target.
 
The mindset of "good enough, get it out" ends up snowballing more often than not in my experience... there comes a time when a person not familiar with what was done is turned to to fix it... as long as the product has a defined end-of-life this can be gotten away with, but if the product is perpetual the snowball grows.
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