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There is an interview with Joel Spolsky on GeekWire which reports that companies should Just shut up and let your devs concentrate:
If you want to attract and keep developers, don't emphasize ping-pong tables, lounges, fire pits and chocolate fountains. Give them private offices or let them work from home, because uninterrupted time to concentrate is the most important and scarcest commodity.
That's the view of Joel Spolsky, CEO of Stack Overflow, a popular Q&A site for programmers, who spoke this morning at the GeekWire Summit in Seattle.
"Facebook's campus in Silicon Valley is an 8-acre open room, and Facebook was very pleased with itself for building what it thought was this amazing place for developers," Spolsky said in an interview with GeekWire co-founder Todd Bishop. "But developers don't want to overhear conversations. That's ideal for a trading floor, but developers need to concentrate, to go to a chatroom and ask questions and get the answers later. Facebook is paying 40-50 percent more than other places, which is usually a sign developers don't want to work there."
[Continues...]
Spolsky, who in 2011 created project-management software Trello, said the "Joel Test" that he created 16 years ago is still a valid way for developers to evaluate prospective employers. It's a list of 12 yes-no questions, with one point given for every "yes" answer:
- Do you use source control?
- Can you make a build in one step?
- Do you make daily builds?
- Do you have a bug database?
- Do you fix bugs before writing new code?
- Do you have an up-to-date schedule?
- Do you have a spec?
- Do programmers have quiet working conditions?
- Do you use the best tools money can buy?
- Do you have testers?
- Do new candidates write code during their interview?
- Do you do hallway usability testing?
"The truth is that most software organizations are running with a score of 2 or 3, and they need serious help, because companies like Microsoft run at 12 full-time," Spolsky said when he created the test. He said that remains true today.
How well does your organization support its developers? If new or better equipment would improve your productivity, is it made available to you? How is your work environment? How well does your organization score on the 12-point "Joel Test"? What is the biggest thing blocking your company from improving?
(Score: 4, Interesting) by VLM on Monday October 10 2016, @05:02PM
The Joel test is a little obsolete but its heart is in the right place.
So when I git push changes to gitlab, I have a pretty typical system with Jenkins that both builds and critiques and tests my projects. So its kinda hard to git push if you don't have unit tests to run. I guess I could pencil whip it with some good ole "does 1 = 1?".
Why would I need a daily build if Jenkins automagically makes a build for every single "push"?
People confuse "best tools money can buy" with things like paid editors. Emacs is the one true religion ... oh wait. Whatever. My point is physical tools. My fancy chair is pretty cheap compared to my salary, as is my large spacious desk and natural window lighting. Not to mention my large high resolution monitors (note the plural) And my mechanical keyboard and favorite trackball (yeah I'm weird I like trackballs because I don't use them much and muscle memory is the same place).
As for up to date schedule I think they mean a development plan and due to business needs that seems to change and reorder every couple hours so there's not much point. I have a nicely organized todo list as part of the bug tracking system that links to jenkins and gitlab?
I work in a 8x8 cube in an office of 6 cubes, but due to work requirements and work at home and comp time and vacations and occasional hiring vacancies, I'm often alone and only on the rarest of times do I have more than two or three people in my room. Its quiet. I could never work in an open office, just physically can't with all the distraction. Maybe I can get disability payments for that? Guess my next job will be one I create or contract under my terms or remote. I work for a very huge company with like 50K other people and most of my direct coworkers work in other states, not next to me. I have three work-cousins who work for different people in the same division in my office, and two people who I are so organizationally distant I can't place them on an org chart. The last time I worked physically next to coworkers was I believe in the early 00s a couple jobs ago.
My Joel test score is pretty decent. Probably why I'm not interested in looking for work. Its statistically likely where ever I'd go, it would be much more F-ed up.
Around the turn of the century I had the stereotypical bookcase of corporate paid Oreilly books, but now a days everything is learned by google or online. I kinda miss bookcases. Also when I had local coworkers I had a whiteboard. I kinda miss whiteboards too. Maybe a decade or two ago I'd have claimed ownership of the bookcase or whiteboard should result in an honorary Joel-point. But not anymore.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Nerdfest on Monday October 10 2016, @06:20PM
I think the "daily build" is at a minimum. Having build on commit, as well as deploy and test is pretty much a solved problem with the tools available now.
Also, people who *don't* use trackballs (thumb operated, not fingers you heathen) are the odd ones. A trackball is always in the same place, uses less space, and doesn't cause carpel tunnel syndrome. They're also nice for gaming in some cases. I'd getting disappointed in the Logitech series though, as the buttons only last about 6 months. They do have a good warranty and will occasionally even let you keep the old one, but it's inconvenient.
(Score: 1) by Dachannien on Monday October 10 2016, @08:59PM
I finally ditched Logitech for my trackball after the umpteenth one's buttons started flaking out (random double clicks, etc.) after six months. My most recent purchase was a Japanese import from a company called Sanwa (available through various Japanese importers on Amazon or wherever), and I liked it well enough that I bought a second one for the office. Doesn't beat my dear old MS Optical, rest its soul, but it's still better than the crap Logitech is churning out.
(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Monday October 10 2016, @11:23PM
Thanks, I have one of those sitting in my cart at Amazon. I was hoping I'd run into a first-hand user of one.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by davester666 on Monday October 10 2016, @06:22PM
"The truth is that most software organizations are running with a score of 2 or 3, and they need serious help, because companies like Microsoft run at 12 full-time," Spolsky said when he created the test.
And yet, the software Microsoft produces still consistently sucks. They actually had to trick users to get them to install their latest OS. They still, after more than 30 years, don't know how to make a UI that doesn't frustrate the end user. For end users, it's still "you just have to remember how to do X, once someone else shows you how".
(Score: 4, Insightful) by AndyTheAbsurd on Monday October 10 2016, @08:36PM
Did you miss the part where he wrote that in 2000? Back then, Microsoft actually *were* vastly improving Windows with each new version. They started going off the rails in 2007, when the Ribbon interface was introduced - although fortunately that corruption had not spread to the OS department yet, which is Windows 7 is so much better than their other offerings - and went full retard in 2012 when Windows 8 was introduced.
Please note my username before responding. You may have been trolled.
(Score: 3, Informative) by captain normal on Tuesday October 11 2016, @12:09AM
Oh you mean during the Windows Millennium build? And before that Win 95 (remember plug and pray), then 98 (which needed 3 versions). They finally made a decent OS with XP, but then went wacko with Vista. Then reverted to a slimmer version of XP in Win 7 which was pretty decent. Till they started running out security patches every couple of days (only Mozilla FF was worse at that). God only knows who (or What) was in charge in the" let's go totally mobile" Win 8 and 8.1 developments and 40~60 megs of patches every 30 days. Then last year totally jumped the shark with Win 10.
So how can you say Windows Devs were "improving" the OS?
Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts"- --Daniel Patrick Moynihan--
(Score: 2) by lgw on Tuesday October 11 2016, @01:19AM
Windows ME wasn't where the talent was. Windows 2000 was great - a proper multi-process desktop OS with a solid GUI for the masses. Remember, back then Gnome and KDE were barely viable. 2003 XP came out. Office was also still making progress in the early 00s. Microsoft was making real progress in 2000, and was a great place to work.
Ballmer started wrecking the company in 2000, but it was several years before the downtrend was really noticeable. It was really after 2003 when MS lost the thread.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 12 2016, @09:13AM
Whatever it's still bullshit that Microsoft is 12 out of 12. Or most organizations for that matter.
See this part:
Do you fix bugs before writing new code?
There's no way that has ever been true for Microsoft or most organizations that create complex software.