Do developers have to get everything approved from the product manager. Even the name of a function and explain why you chose to pass something as a parameter? Isn't this micromanagement?

It is, and nope not all devs deal with that crap, some even quit and refuse to be micromanaged.

Code reviews are one thing, but they can lead into micromanagement if done wrong.

No, that's total BS. The PM shall do his fucking job, and if he has nothing to do at that, the company should find something useful or fire him.

Well you dont have to do anything you are a free person. If however your manager is a programmer, maybe he has a precise idea of how the thing should work and it may be good to follow his advice. Usually 1 idea works out better than 2. Depends really

No, that's complete crap, and I'd be looking to exit somewhere like that ASAP if I were bound by those rules.

The norm these days is for your code changes to be checked by one or more technically minded peers in a code review format, and changes suggested if necessary.

Upper management should be able to define *what* you work on, sure, but extreme examples aside, not the technical details of how you implement it.

@Pyjong if the manager can't delegate, then either he has hired the wrong people, or he is not doing his job.

@Fast-Nop I understood the manager IS delegating. Except being a bit control freaky at that.

@Pyjong Discussing details like function names isn't delegating. Delegating means to tell people what they should achieve, not telling them how to do it down to detail level.

That wastes so much time that the manager could as well develop himself, in which case he should be developer and not manager.

@Fast-Nop Yeah function names and parameters does sound as a bit too much. I think the manager in fact should be able to develop the thing himself though, but for time management reasons delegates. The level of detail should depend on the experience of the completer of the task I would say. But yeah as I said function names and parameters, that's weird.. a doc with guidelines + some codereview would do

@Pyjong he is not a developer anymore and he is like that with everyone. It's not like I was writing the function wrong I had to explain the damn thing to him for him to get it. If it is working like the way he wants why is he asking about implementation details at all?

@valium123 i can imagine it's not pleasant. Being a senior I'd just tell him nope xD read it if you care and then wouldn't budge. I think you'd get away with that.

I've never had so much as a code review in like six years. Hopefully that'll change soon.

There’s an absolute fuck tonne of other shit the PM could be doing rather than riding you like a code pony so the answer is no.

@Root same boat, 10 years later still reviewing my own work.
How I would love to be in a team of devs that actually gave a shit!

@Fast-Nop I agree, implementation shouldn't be a managers problem, unless it's creating performance issues and the manager has a dev background to assist.

I mean, if you’re in a code review and he points it out then I wouldn’t see an issue with it. Your code might need to be taken over by someone else and if he/she doesn’t understand what a variable is for because it’s abbreviated or something similar then they have every right to tell you to rename it appropriately. Same goes for passing a parameter in and so forth. For example if you’re software is restricted in memory and you are copying instead of referencing.

However, with how you’re making it sound, if they’re being nazis and going through everyone’s code or standing behind you and wanting you to explain every step you’re taking then that’s ridiculous. Sorry if that’s the case =\

The fuck?

That is several orders of magnitude beyond micro management. nano management ?

Normal manager is "what did you do yesterday", "what will you do today"

A PM should be at sprint planning/ backlog refinement.

GTFO of there.

No, its not normal. A product manager has no business with the code. Thats like if he asked you to aprove all management ideas before he makes them. You're the programmer, you are supposed to program, he's the manager, he should manage. If he's a programmer too he can be part of the code review process, but code review is about giving meaningful feedback, not asking why which parameters were passed into functions. I'd also recommend you either explain the situation or leave. The way he micromanages is effectively costing you hours of time and money. You're supposed to get a product out. No amount of micromanagement will prevent bugs and architectural mistakes. Its gonna be the same result just with tons of wasted time. Instead he should make sure you're writting correct tests and that should also be part of a code review anyway

@Hazarth Yes I resigned and you are right a LOT of time was wasted in exchanging emails. In the end the feature was late and they were blaming me. His questions were redundant and kind of stupid and I was frustrated as hell. Glad I left.

@valium123 good for you! You rock :)

@valium123 Well done for doing the right thing.