• (disco)

    Awww, the story ends on a cliffhanger...

    How long did this go on (or did it make it to production) and how many gaskets were blown?

  • (disco)

    And of course The Architects are without blame.

  • (disco) in reply to leus
    leus:
    And of course The Architects are without blame.

    Fuck knows. But if the junior devs aren't writing the code according to the architecture, they're definitely in line for a lot of blame.

  • (disco)
    The first thing they did was spend several months
    The new architecture was heavily documented
    And the project was doomed...

    ...yet denial was strong..

    The project was off to a good start.

    ... to ensure its fate was sealed...

    QA folks could be brought in later
    doing detailed design
    architects started working on building

    ...and still there was denial...

    Come time for the first sprint check-in
    ...since the first sprint starts at the conception of the project, and lasts 2-4 weeks..
    architects pointing out implementation flaws and shortcomings that would not support the requirements
    ...Where were the tests attached to the PBI's that drove the tasks that the developers did?
    asked some of the business users to write business-level tests
    ...ahh, they finally showed up.

    ..but to no avail..

    The product hadn’t even been deployed yet
    (but where was continuous deployment? (ironically there is an ad for Puppet at the bottom of the article...
  • (disco) in reply to TheCPUWizard
    TheCPUWizard:
    continuous deployment

    Read carefully and you'll see that they're in a regulated industry. Continuous deployment is difficult when you've got to get a bureaucrat to sign off on each push to production…

  • (disco)

    The usual stages of a project:

    1. Hope of success
    2. Disenchantment when the hopes fail to be realized
    3. Confusion, noise, blood, sweat, and tears
    4. Search for the guilty
    5. Punishment of the innocent
    6. Distinction of the uninvolved

    So in this case, I'm guessing the aftermath included the promotion of the offshore lead and an expansion of the offshore team, and the firing the entire architecture team. Management will then pat themselves on the back for correctly identifying and fixing the problem, and give themselves bonuses.

  • (disco)

    I don't like the overall message "offshore is bad".

    I am "offshore" and I have to correct many projects started by very expensive US or UK talents. And many times, their overpriced work could go easily to TDWTF

  • (disco) in reply to dkf

    ALL industries are regulated. What we call "regulated industries" now are the Big Brother ones like health care and banking. Let's face it people, the hell we've created is one where a 7 year old has to get a $50 permit to open a lemonade stand. And that's in USA, home of the free.

  • (disco) in reply to operagost
    operagost:
    ALL industries are regulated.

    Not in the sense I meant. There are regulations that apply to all (things like “don't kill your employees for shits and giggles”) but most industries don't require sign-off on a plan prior to starting to implement it; that's a mark of close regulation, a step usually taken because of a significant history of past abuses. Alas…

  • (disco) in reply to operagost
    operagost:
    Let's face it people, the hell we've created is one where a 7 year old has to get a $50 permit to open a lemonade stand. And that's in USA, home of the free.

    I don't know which state you are in, but in my state of Ohio all you need to do to operate as a sole proprietor is start selling stuff. You can open up a "Doing Business As" bank account if you like, which makes the accounting easier, but even that's entirely optional.

    Becoming a separate legal entity isn't that much harder: Fill out some paperwork, pay a registration fee of something like $100, and poof you're an LLC.

    The only regulation you're subject to basically amounts to:

    1. Pay taxes on your income from the business (although most jurisdictions will overlook petty profits in cash, like your 7-year-old's lemonade stand).
    2. Don't screw over your customers - make sure your product is what you say it is, be willing to work with them if there's a problem.
    3. Don't screw over your employees - hire based on their ability to do the job (and not any other factor like race or religion or gender), pay them on time in full for their work, don't fire them without a good reason.
  • (disco) in reply to operagost

    Not true in Washington State.

    I don't know which bit of "the USA" you're in, but I suggest moving.

  • (disco) in reply to operagost
    operagost:
    Let's face it people, the hell we've created is one where a 7 year old has to get a $50 permit to open a lemonade stand. And that's in USA, home of the free.
    EatenByAGrue:
    The only regulation you're subject to basically amounts to:

    1. Pay taxes on your income from the business (although most jurisdictions will overlook petty profits in cash, like your 7-year-old's lemonade stand).

    2. Don't screw over your customers - make sure your product is what you say it is, be willing to work with them if there's a problem.

    3. Don't screw over your employees - hire based on their ability to do the job (and not any other factor like race or religion or gender), pay them on time in full for their work, don't fire them without a good reason.

    I suspect that @operagost's quote has to do with health permits... (i.e. you need a permit to run any sort of foodservice business in the jurisdiction he's in)
  • (disco) in reply to tarunik

    While it's true that you just need a DBA for most businesses, there are certainly exceptions.You can't start your own bank, health insurance company, restaurant, college, and many many other business types without proper permits.

    In particular, there have been some widely publicized shutting down of lemonade stands, unless they get vendor/food permits: http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2011/08/03/the-inexplicable-war-on-lemonade-stands/

  • (disco) in reply to operagost
    operagost:
    Let's face it people, the hell we've created is one where a 7 year old has to get a $50 permit to open a lemonade stand. And that's in USA, home of the free.

    Once upon a time, there was a country where anyone could go into business, and run it anyway they saw fit, without interference from government.

    Of course, in that day and age, there was honor in business.

    Then the charlatans, thieves, con artists, fraudsters, and quacks; the selfish, disinterested, and malignantly grasping became the norm. These characters needed to be regulated, because people were being deceived, robbed, conned, defrauded, and mistreated.

    So now even the kid with the lemonade stand has to be regulated. Because if we don't regulate the kid, the characters above say, "You're not treating us fairly." As if they had any concept of fair treatment themselves...

  • (disco) in reply to CoyneTheDup

    Forget Slashdot, now FoxNews.com is leaking.

  • (disco) in reply to CoyneTheDup

    Law is like a fence - a tiger will jump over, a snake will sneak through, and cattle doesn't go where it's not supposed to.

  • (disco) in reply to CoyneTheDup
    CoyneTheDup:
    Of course, in that day and age, there was honor in business.

    Then the charlatans, thieves, con artists, fraudsters, and quacks; the selfish, disinterested, and malignantly grasping became the norm. These characters needed to be regulated, because people were being deceived, robbed, conned, defrauded, and mistreated.

    Because fraud never happened in the glorious country called The Past, right? If anything there is less fraud and embezzelment now, because of regulation. Back then you had no idea whether the alleged bank you deposited your money with was going to still be there tomorrow, or whether the nice man with the shiny top hat was just going to take your money and spend it on a first class steamboat trip to Rio...

  • (disco) in reply to grkvlt
    grkvlt:
    Back then you had no idea whether the alleged bank you deposited your money with was going to still be there tomorrow, or whether the nice man with the shiny top hat was just going to take your money and spend it on a first class steamboat trip to Rio...
    And in modern age, you can be sure that any money exceeding €100,000 on your bank account is as good as gone, because 97% of deposits aren't actually deposited. Progress!
  • (disco) in reply to Gaska
    Gaska:
    And in modern age, you can be sure that any money exceeding €100,000 on your bank account is as good as gone, because 97% of deposits aren't actually deposited.

    Is this based on some bizzarely distorted and confused understanding of a talk-radio explanation of Fractional-reserve banking, by any chance? Beacuse that's not how it works.

  • (disco) in reply to grkvlt

    IDGAF if the bank actually has it in cold cash, as long as I can reasonably expect to be able to take that money out if I need to spend it

  • (disco) in reply to Jaloopa

    In the UK, I believe you're only guaranteed up to about £50k; anything over that, tough titties.

  • (disco) in reply to grkvlt
    grkvlt:
    Fractional-reserve banking

    This actually caused one of our banks (Saambou Bank) to close down, as there was a run on the bank after it was announced that the bank had financial difficulties and were being placed under curatorship

  • (disco) in reply to RaceProUK

    the government guarantees around that much per account, as a safeguard against the banks going bust. If you're paranoid about that, you'd need to split your money so you don't have more than £50k in any one account.

    But barring a run on the bank, if I have £1000000 in my account and I want to take it out that should never be a problem given enough time for a branch to get the money together, verify the request, etc.

  • (disco) in reply to Gaska
    Gaska:
    and cattle doesn't go where it's not supposed to.

    Correction -- cattle barge right through and don't care. It's why things like barbed wire and electrified livestock fencing were invented...

    Filed under: what fence? :cow:

  • (disco) in reply to dkf
    dkf:
    Read carefully and you'll see that they're in a regulated industry. Continuous deployment is difficult when you've got to get a bureaucrat to sign off on each push to production…

    I have done work with major banks (and yes, these are actual financial applications that transfer money) and healthcare firms (including HIPPA information) where automated nightly deployments are the norm. The first was a major stock management firm (handled IPO's etc.) and that was nearly a decade ago.

  • (disco) in reply to Jaloopa
    Jaloopa:
    you'd need to split your money so you don't have more than £50k in any one account.

    In the USA, that split must occur across separate banking concerns, not just accounts, branches or even "brands"

  • (disco) in reply to TheCPUWizard
    TheCPUWizard:
    I have done work with major banks (and yes, these are actual financial applications that transfer money) and healthcare firms (including HIPPA information) where automated nightly deployments are the norm. The first was a major stock management firm (handled IPO's etc.) and that was nearly a decade ago.

    Yeah -- I'd have a simulated or T-tapped (i.e. gets the same data sources as prod, and is configured identically except for not sending its output anywhere) "mirror production" environment running for applications that critical; bonus points if you can use it for training purposes as well as a target for deployments. Better yet, this works even if the bureaucrats must sign off on the actual production deployments ;)

  • (disco) in reply to TheCPUWizard

    Only really a concern if you're worried about all of them going titsup simultaneously.

  • (disco) in reply to tarunik
    tarunik:
    Correction -- cattle barge right through and don't care. It's why things like barbed wire and electrified livestock fencing were invented...
    Barbed wire is just another kind of fence. Unless I'm using a wrong word here - I'm not native speaker and I make such mistake sometimes - for which I'm sorry.

    Also, that's proverb - you shouldn't read it literally.

  • (disco) in reply to Gaska
    Gaska:
    Also, that's proverb - you shouldn't read it literally.
    Are you sure you logged onto the right forum?
  • (disco) in reply to Gaska
    Gaska:
    Also, that's proverb - you shouldn't read it literally.

    I'm saying that whoever wrote the proverb hasn't ever seen or heard what cows are known to do to plain wire fencing...

  • (disco) in reply to Gaska

    Don't worry, I never read before replying.

  • (disco) in reply to tarunik
    tarunik:
    I'm saying that whoever wrote the proverb hasn't ever seen or heard what cows are known to do to plain wire fencing...
    Proverb writers are known of ignoring real world. "A watched pot never boils", hm?
  • (disco) in reply to Gaska
    Gaska:
    Proverb writers are known of ignoring real world.

    Very true. Some of Aesop's stories are pure 100% bullshit.

  • (disco) in reply to tarunik
    tarunik:
    Yeah -- I'd have a simulated or T-tapped (i.e. gets the same data sources as prod, and is configured identically except for not sending its output anywhere) "mirror production" environment running for applications that critical; bonus points if you can use it for training purposes as well as a target for deployments. Better yet, this works even if the bureaucrats must sign off on the actual production deployments

    Those are typically (in continuous deployment scenarios) updated as the result of each validated build, then the main production (sends it's output everywhere) is updated approx. daily. Unless someone pulls the cord on it, it just happens.

  • (disco) in reply to martin

    I don't like the overall message "offshore is bad".

    I am "offshore" and I have to correct many projects started by very expensive US or UK talents. And many times, their overpriced work could go easily to TDWTF

    Yes. I'm one of the "local talents". I don't think I work much smarter than you, but I have the advantage of being able to talk to my customers directly - to walk the twenty steps over to their desk and ask what they mean by a particular reqirement. Or do a "hey, check out what I just made - was this what you were after?"-type instademo.

    I think the major issue in the story is bad communication. Combined with "big design up front", bad communication typically leads to this kind of mess. The offshore team didn't help the matters, but I think the major problem was in bad communication.

  • (disco)

    "In the real world, if a student thinks the teacher is wrong, he doesn’t get to change his grade... Experience speaks with exclamation points. Inexperience speaks with question marks.

    Except on this “team”."

    I've seen it elsewhere. This is where management secretly think all the people with experience are too expensive, and the new people, having been to college more recently, know more about better stuff (they read the articles in CEO magazine about how five years after college everything you knew is out of date, and they don't know any real engineers socially.) So encourage the youth because hopefully in a year or two they will be all we need and we can get rid of the old guys.

    Oddly, this doesn't apply to senior management. The CEO, for instance, doesn't plan to replace himself with a 25 year old with an MBA. (Though he isn't above replacing his wife with a bimbo.)

  • (disco) in reply to kupfernigk
    kupfernigk:
    Oddly, this doesn't apply to senior management. The CEO, for instance, doesn't plan to replace himself with a 25 year old with an MBA.

    That's a shame; it might actually help a little given the current standard of decision making. Or maybe not. We're talking an MBA after all. The only reason I put up with them round here is they've got a cheap cafeteria and coffee shop.

  • (disco)

    Job one was to hire the development part of the team. For this, they looked (very far) offshore to find the cheapest possible talent.

    The article could end right here. Not because the offshore team will be necessarily bad (even though in 99% they probably are, if they are the "cheapest possible") but just because it reveals a completely naive unfixable broken view of software development. This is as big as an WTF as it can get.

    Given that, it's only to be expected that management doesn't do anything about upcoming problems. Fleshing it out was nice but redundant.

  • (disco) in reply to grkvlt
    grkvlt:
    Because fraud never happened in the glorious country called The Past, right? If anything there is less fraud and embezzelment now, because of regulation. Back then you had no idea whether the alleged bank you deposited your money with was going to still be there tomorrow, or whether the nice man with the shiny top hat was just going to take your money and spend it on a first class steamboat trip to Rio..

    There's one indication of the difference in times: people actually rarely waste time regulating good behavior.

  • (disco)
    The department saved a lot of money by using cheap labor, no QA folks and the politically expedient database.

    ... which will no doubt be spent several times over on fixing the issues which didn't need to occur in the first place. That's the joke, right?

  • (disco) in reply to Jaloopa
    Jaloopa:
    IDGAF if the bank actually has it in cold cash, as long as I can reasonably expect to be able to take that money out if I need to spend it

    This is only ever a problem if everyone simultaneously decides "fuck it, I need my cold hard cash right now..."

  • (disco) in reply to RaceProUK
    RaceProUK:
    In the UK, I believe you're only guaranteed up to about £50k; anything over that, tough titties.

    If I lived in the UK, then I would have (£assets/50,000) bank accounts...

  • (disco) in reply to tar

    If you've got much more than £50k floating around you're doing it wrong. Keep a float for liquidity and invest the rest

  • (disco) in reply to martin

    It's not "offshore is bad", it's "cheap offshore is bad".

    Had the lead of offshore team have the sane mind to tell their programmers code according to specification, the situation would probably be a lot better. (If the writer don't lie about the part that the spec. is okay)

  • (disco) in reply to martin

    I don't like the overall message "offshore is bad".

    I can certainly see what you mean here. Whenever offshore developers are mentioned in these articles, they are invariably bumbling amateurs from Kerbleckistan who hardly speak English. It's a stereotype, it doesn't hold in practice, and as a European I can see why you don't like it.

    Having said that, it's not like Americans are spared on this site. The protagonists in these stories are often the only sane people in a sea of morons with DBAs, ridiculously overpriced HPCs, clueless PHBs and let's not forget the stinky developers who don't know how to talk to people and instead churn out bad code with management's blessing because of their seniority.

    And let's not pretend that there exist no stereotypes about Americans on the other side of the pond, please.

    Also, I think that ultimately @snoofle tried to make it clear that the offshore developers in this story weren't bad because they were foreigners, they were bad because there were a dozen of them with a combined total of 17 years of experience, and they didn't give a flying fuck about requirements. At the end of the day, the blame for the failure of the project doesn't even go to the offshore developers, it's assigned clearly and firmly to the project managers who knew, or should have known, they were doing a shitty job and failed to act.

    The message here isn't "offshore is bad", it's "don't put in a lot of time and money to start a good project, and then allow a few guys to fuck everything up, because they want to save a buck by getting the cheapest work possible". Offshore developers in these articles are employed because they're cheap, and they're made to look really dumb and shitty to explain that if you pay peanuts, you get monkeys. Because they're invariably made to look very bad, but they're also invariably the cheapest ones management could find.

    I daresay if you get the cheapest American consultant around, he/she'd be just as shitty as the cheap ones in Kerbleckistan, and I don't think there's anyone here who doesn't understand that.

  • (disco) in reply to toon

    https://i.imgflip.com/jailz.jpg

  • (disco) in reply to martin

    It's only the bit where they were the "cheapest possible" talent that suggests the off-shore development team wasn't in the U.S.

  • (disco) in reply to tar
    tar:
    If I lived in the UK, then I would have (£assets/50,000) bank accounts...
    Rounded up or down?
  • (disco) in reply to Gurth
    Gurth:
    Rounded up or down?
    Sideways?

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