WHY THE FUCK IS IT SO FUCKING HARD FOR THESE CUM SUCKERS TO UNDERSTAND THAT CHANGING REQUIREMENTS 2 DAYS BEFORE THE DEADLINE IS JUST GONNA BREAK EVERYTHING!?!?
I DOUBLE DARE ANYONE TO TELL ME ITS NOT WORKING TOMORROW...
STUPID MOTHER FUCKER PMS CANT PLAN ANYTHING

tl;dr stupid clients with their stupid requirements.

Client: (on Monday) hypothetically could you implement "A"?
Me: (on Monday) yeah I could do that by Friday, let me know if you want me to start it.
Client: (on Thursday) hey remember we talked about "A" well do "B" instead and I'll need it by Friday still.
Me: "B" is completely different than "A" and will take probably twice as long.
Client: but you told me you could do it by Friday.
Me: ............ I want to smash your face.

So devRant shows me a frontpage feed based on my ++/--/follows/etc.

Does this mean there is a niche bubbled hidden corner, some place where some dev is currently looking at his feed thinking: "Wow everyone agrees with me, Windows is much better than Linux, VBscript is amazing, and Git is for tryhards who hate on dropbox for no good reason"

By now, that bubble and mine have drifted so far apart that they will never meet again, and if you see this specific rant, you will not ever see that content again either.

For all you know, the majority of devs love changing requirements and clients who call them in the middle of the night, the consensus is that testing is for noobs, and everyone loves jquery.

You will never know, because you clicked ++ on the wrong rant, right when you signed up, and forever sealed your fate.

Hope my client will understand & stop changing the requirements again and again in midway :|

My boss gave me a project without any meaningful requirements and asked:
boss: can you finish this in 9 months?
me: well I really can't give you any estimate.
boss: well just do it.
8 months later I summarize all weekly requirements that the client has given and estimated I should be able to finish the project with just 3 months, if only the requirements are ready and not changing from time to time. What a f***ing waste of my time? Why the f*** people do this? And after all this my boss said:
boss: I think we should be able to finish this project faster.
YOU THINK!

Those developers working under non-technical bosses, i understand your pain.

1. Pain when they don't realise that output != number of hours put in. Aaaaaaand that acting busy doesn't mean someone's working.
2. Pain when chilling out in office is necessary, because mind jobs don't work same as other jobs. Wherein if you don't vent it out you're gonna screw up the code. Them not getting that.
3. Pain of "meetings".
4. Pain of changing the feature when you're done, and them acting as if its a minor change.
5. Pain of vague requirements.
6. Pain of a product not thought through, and them trying to blame the implementation.

Client: "My proposed deadline can't be met? Maybe we should go to your office and sit right next to you to see how you work."
Yeah right, that surely speeds things up. Even if the ever-changing requirements require at least triple of the time allowed.

Last week, the team lead told me that he can't merge because my code has code smells and going forward, can't have that. We use Sonar and well the way to "fix it" according to him is to mark the line using //NOSONAR.

Most of the issues are minor like Unused imports and for me incomplete TODOs.

And before the "verbal" rule was only need to fix Major + issues. And well the reason I use TODOs is to mark code that probably needs changing in the future. I know there's going to be some feature that these lines have to be changed. But the requirements are fully defined yet from business.

But I sort of blew up on him. YOU WANT TO ENFORCE ZERO CODE SMELLS NOW?!?!?! AND THESE MINOR ISSUES? MARK THEM WITH NOSONAR?

HERE'S WHAT I THINK FOR THE LAST X YEARS... THE CODE DESIGN IS SHIT, MINOR CODE SMELLS AND MANUALLY MARKING THE ONES U NEED TO KEEP... ARE THE LEAST OF OUR PROBLEMS...

THE OTHER PROBLEMS I'VE MENTIONED BEFORE EVER. MOS YEAR BUT YOU DIMWITS NEVER LISTEN.

YOU THINK MY TODOS ARE BAD... 90% OF THE CODE AND FEATURES (THE ONES NOT DONE BY ME) LOOK AND SMELL LIKE MONKEY SHIT. UNDOCUMENTED, MESSY, FULL OF BUGS.

AND GUESS WHAT? NEW FEATURE, SOME DEV FORGETS TO CHANGE SOME COMPONENT THAT DEPENDS ON IT. WOULDN'T IT BE GREATE IF THERE WERE BOOKMARKS... O WAIT...

i just was catching up on comics again and saw this one... with triggered my memory and this rant... My first thought was to forward it to him...

Everyone talks about their hate of js but like python is honestly just as bad.

- shitty package manager,
* need to recreate python environments to keep workflows seperate as oppose to just mapping dependencies like in maven, npm, cargo, go-get
* Can't fix python version number to project I.e specify it in requirements
- dynamic typing that gets fixed with shitty duck typing too many times
- no first class functions
- limited lambda expressions
- def def def
- overly archaic error messages, rarely have I gotten a good error message and didn't have to dive into package code to figure it out
- people still use 2.7 ... Honestly I blame the difficulty of changing versions for this. It's just not trivial to even specify another python version
- inconsistent import system. When in module use . When outside don't.
- SLOW so SLOW
- BLOCKING making things concurrent has only recently got easier, but it still needs lots of work. Like it would be nice to do

runasync some_async_fcn()
Or just running asynchronous functions on the global scope will make it know to go to some default runtime. Or heck. Just let me run it like that...

- private methods aren't really private. They just hide them in intelisense but you can still override them....

I know my username is ironic :P

doNotMessWithITTeamInAFuckingProject();

Last night me with my team have a discussion with my project team. Currently we have a project for our insurance client building a Learning Management System. The project condition already messed up since the first day i join a meeting. Because since its a consortium project with multiple company involved, one of company had a bad experience with another company. It happened few years back when both of company were somehow break up badly because miss communication (i heard this from one of my team).

Skip..skip... And then day to day like another stereotype IT projects when client and business analyst doing requirements gathering, the specs seems unclear and keep changing day by day even when I type this rant I'm sure it will change again.

Then something happened last night when my team leader force our business analyst to re index the use case number (imho) this is no need to be done, and i know the field conditions its so tough for all team members.

So many problems occured, actually this is a boring problem like lack of dev resource, lack of project management and all other stereotype IT projects had. Its sucks why this things is happening again.

Finally my fellow business analyst type a quite long message in our group and said that he maybe quit because its too tired and he felt that the leader only know about push push pushhhhhy fcking pussy, he never go to the client site and look what we've done and what we struggle so far.

I just don't know why, i know this guy earlier was an IT geek also, but when he leading a team he act like he never done IT project before, just know about pushing people without knowing what the context and sound to me like just rage push!

Damnit, i maybe quit also, you know we IT guy never affraid to quit anytime from the messed up condition like this. Even though we were at the bottom level in a project, but we hold the most main key for development.

Hope he (my leader) read this rant. And can realize what happened and fix this broken situation. I don't know what to say again, im in steady mode to quit anytime if something chaos happen nearly in the future.

doNotMessWithITTeamInAFuckingProject();

For the past two years, I worked my balls off to deliver a project that eventually went live months ago.

But boss announced that no bonus is going to be paid because project got delayed.

Its not even my fault that project got delayed because customer cannot confirm requirements and keep changing.

All of my assigned tasks were also met on time, if not earlier.

QA: “not accepted since text differs from specs.”

Me: “but... the text comes from specs, I copy pasted it yesterday, wtf?”

*checking specs versioning*
Specs updated 1 hour ago

Having to input text from jira to the language strings cause design’s too lazy to do it themselves is stupid enough, but the good old “specs changed after the feature is done” gig is a must... to remember you why you hate working for someone.

Probably the MOST complete software book on a very broad subject.

This is book to read for those of you are near college grad, first job in the industry. But to the level of detail and broad coverage this book has I think it’s actually a great book for everyone in the industry almost as a “baseline”

From requirements, project planning, workflow paradigms. Software Architecture design, variable naming, refactoring, testing, releasing the book covers everything, not only high level but also in reference to C.

Why C ...because in the consumer electronics, automotive industry, medical electronics and other industries creating physical products c is the language of choice, no changing that. BUT it’s not a C book... it contains C and goes into dept into C but it’s not a C book, C is more like a vehicle for the book, because there are long established, successful industry’s built around it. Plenty of examples.

When I say it’s the most complete on a broad subject seriously like example the chapter about the C language is not a brief over like many other books, for example 10 pages alone are dedicated to just pointer! Many C books have only a few paragraphs on the subject. This goes on depth.

Other topics, recursion, how to write documentation for your code.

Lots of detail and philosophy of the construction of software.

Even if you are a veteran software engineer you could probably learn a thing or two from the book.

It’s not book that you can finish in weekend, unless you can read and comprehend over 1000 pages.

Very few books cover such a broad topic ALL while still going into great detail on those subtopics. the second part is what lacks in most “broad topic books” ..

Code Complete.. is definitely “Complete”

So the image doesn’t match the rest of my book images because I tried to make an amage to cover of the book, inception style kinda haha 😂

Question to all you web developers out there: how do you survive long term in this job without going nuts? I have been working in this industry for almost 7 years and feelings of frustration have accumulated, to the point where I honestly feel like laying g bricks as a job would be more rewarding. Here are the main reasons why:

1) The fact that your job is never "finished" and it looks like and endless stream of tasks. Either the project has money being rolled in or is pretty much dead. Ever changing requirements ensure that most of what you do will be rewritten in 6 months or so. This is ok for the most part, but overtime it does give you the feeling that most of your effort was wasted, and you have the same website/app to show for it, slightly different...

2) The never ending churn of tech, particularly in the Javascript/node ecosystem. Sure, there is a good side of learning new approaches of doing things and it brings variety, but there is the dark side that you never feel you are getting better at doing your job, as every new project does not look anything like the previous. Even if all the stack pieces are the same (never happens), everyone sets it up and organises the project differently enough that you have to spend loads of time solving things you have done before. This makes it difficult to get a sense that you are mastering something...

So, if autonomy, purpose, and mastery are the keys to fulfilling work, I find this career lacking in mastery and purpose...does anyone feels/felt the same? How did you counter it?

Sprint planning:
PO: I have a great idea for a new game changing feature
Team: cool, let’s talk requirements, etc
PO: nah, I trust you can come up with the best implementation possible
Sprint demo:
Team: presents the feature
PO: Why are you guys always doing it your way, instead of following my vision?!

Every single sprint...

Ever dealt with people who don’t understand a damn thing they’re coding and just copy and paste stuff around and say that it works? It’s amazing how long people can skate by with only knowing 50% of how what they’re working on works.

We had some dumb know it all on our team who would regularly ship half-done stuff to production and then scramble to fix it after the users bitched about how it didn’t meet the requirements.

This stupid person changed an else to an if having no idea what any of the logic did in this section of code, didn’t adequately test it, and it somehow made it through code review because the better devs were out of office.

This bullshit goes to production, fucks up 200,000 records, and users start complaining about it. Shitty developer refuses to revert the offending code until multiple people on the team overrule them. They spend the next week unfucking the data and decides to just take a day off on Wednesday because it’s been “too much mental energy to fix.” The shit wasn’t even fully resolved yet.

Some people seriously do not belong in this industry. This person’s thought process was:
“Changing an else to an if can’t possibly have significant consequences. Let’s just change this so my code change executes to see what happens.”

Still not sure how they weren’t fired when this happened. They unfortunately got to quit on their own two months later.

My Little Pony, season 1 episode 14, "Suited for Success". Rarity wants to make dresses for her friends, but strives too hard to get it just how they really want it. The project becomes a stressing problem when she tries to make each dress specific to its wearer's taste. Each of her clients has requirements that don't necessarily allign with Rarity's vision, so she has to cope with changing demands and finish them before the Galloping Galla.

Rainbow Dash: I just want my dress to be cool.

Rarity: Do you not like the color?

RD: The color's fine, just make it look cooler.

R: Do you not like the shape?

RD: The shape's fine, just make the whole thing, you know, cooler. It needs to be about 20% cooler.

🎵
All we ever want is indecision.
All we really like is what we know.
[...]
Even if you simply have to fudge it,
make sure it stays within our budget.
🎵

Rarity first makes dresses that she herself loves, but her friends don't, and in the end she makes dresses that her friends love, but she doesn't.

I have sympathy for her.

Been developing a Java app for 3 months, including basically everything from aop to rest services.

Meeting with po:
Me: So, guess how many loc I wrote.
Po: 400?
Me: *laughs* I'll get to 10.000 this week.

MAN COMES IN WITH CHANGING REQUIREMENTS ON AN HOURLY BASIS YET STILL DOESNT UNDERSTAND HOW MUCH WORK ALL THIS SHIT IS!!

I’m working at an architecture firm these days, so I don’t have many “dev” stories to tell. However, I’d like to share this anecdote to reassure (or demoralize) you all that the kind of nonsense we’ve all dealt with as software developers isn’t limited to the software industry.

I’ve been working on a project to build townhomes and apartments on vacant lots in an urban environment.
Space is limited, so the client assured us early on that they would be centralizing all the mechanical equipment (water heaters, air conditioners, etc.) in the basement of each building. We finally got all the apartments laid out and presented them to the client last week. During that meeting, we get a casual “oh, by the way, we need a 3-foot by 3-foot mechanical closet in each apartment.” Did the project manager push back? Of course not. Have our deadlines been adjusted as a result of changing requirements? Don’t be silly! Starting tomorrow morning, the team gets to feverishly search for an extra 9 square feet in each of a couple dozen different apartment layouts that are already “cozy” in time to meet our next deliverable.

Clients suck.
Changing requirements suck.
Pushover PMs suck.
In every industry.

I like what I do for a living.

I build software, mostly from scratch or early stage products. Those are different industries, different companies, different technologies, frameworks and languages. Systems that impact economy in a different way.

When I develop software I am picking different parts of same project and try to understand how companies earn money and what are advantages of their software. What are required regulations and requirements to sell the stuff.
How the money flows from client and what they’re changing for. I especially try to understand stuff from business perspective.
When I pay my debts and luckily be still alive but unemployed and with minimum income from stocks / properties rental I will have plenty of time to duplicate many of those businesses.

I picked programming cause it’s touching all parts of economy basically without any skill requirements and certifications. It’s young impactful industry that is luckily not yet regulated. You just need laptop, like to solve puzzles and have plenty of free time and you can create everything. Never forget about it.

Cloud corporations try to make people think differently but it’s just that simple.

"We need this project done by friday"

When:

Requirements changing on a daily basis.

No standards whatsoever, anywhere.

5 different people commiting changes with no code review.

Original team leader quit a month ago.

Current team leader doesn't know our own deadlines.

QA looking at layout through a microscope at every single possible resolution. (please move this 2 pixels to the left between 934px and 936px range)

QA being too vague some times (this looks weird some times)

Same thing being changed back and forth because no-one could agree on how exactly should it look.

PM implying at every chance that I did nothing and what little I did broke everything all the time.

Pulled into an 'emergency' meeting with a group of web designers deeply concerned a particular service wasn't going to meet all their requirements.
DevA: "For each page, Its going to be A LOT of work to retrieve all the data and store it's state. Every page load will require a round trip to the service."
DevB: "Yes, we aren't sure how the service should be changed to do what we need."
Mgr: "What is it not doing now? Doesn't the service already returns all the necessary data?"
DevA: "Well...um...its all the boolean fields. Some may be defaulted from the database or false because the user unchecked the box. We have to know which is which"
Me: "Why? Are you doing anything different in the UI? Checkbox will be true or false. What or who set that value is irrelevant"
DevC: "Well, it matters if the user didn't fill out all other other values."
Me: "How so?"
DevA: "Its matters because the values in the other fields. Its going to be A TON of work to figure out."
<mgr goes to the white board>
Mgr: "Lets map this out...what fields are you needing to trigger the state on?"
DevA: "Um...uh...the 'Approved' field...and um...'OK to Contact' field"
Mgr: "Just those two?"
DevA: "Yea..um...there are other fields, but whether or not to show the edit box depends on those two."
Me: "The service already returns data, you only have two fields to check? I don't see a need to change the service at all."
DevA: "Returning all that data, we are going have a serious scaling problem. We'll be hitting the service A LOT. All that javascript could cause performance problems too"
Me: "How much data are we talking about? Name, address, couple of booleans?"
DevA: "I have to serialize the data. All that logic is going to be reeeaaallly complicated. It might be better if the service returned only the data I need."
Me: "$64,000 question, how often is this feature going to be used on the web site? Maybe once? Few hundred a week?"
Mgr: "We have no idea. A lot of the data will be pre-populated and we're only sending out a few thousand invitations. More around the holidays...but honestly, not very many."
Me: "Changing that service only for this particular area of the web site isn't going to happen. Changing the UI is the only course of action."
DevA: "Oh frack I can't wait until this project is over."

DevA...how the funck do still have a job here? You wasted about half-hour of my time with your cry-baby crap. Where is my hammer...no...no..don't go there...ahhh...thanks devrant. Prison sentence diverted.

I’m 2 months into my current job at a startup, and I’m starting to lose it. My PM doesn’t have any background in tech, features keep changing every week, and more requirements are added every other day.

To make things worse, I’m the only dev on board right now, despite the company burning ~$80k on a sweatshop to deliver code that’s barely half working.

When I asked if they’re getting another dev onboard, the co-founders said they couldn’t justify another dev since they blew a fat load on that sweatshop…

Time to get on the leetcode grind again 🙃

!rant this is just a shoutout, how fucking happy I am. Clean code valued over fast but hacky push of features!

Backstory. I work for a startup. Long story short a guy with an idea needed a developer. I've worked for about a year without pay but now since we're live I get paid. Recently a new field of bussiness came up. I told tge guy with the idea (a.k.a. my boss) that we either could just "hack" the current code to just make it "fit" well kind of... Or refactor our main code base, as requirements where changing at least monthly and we just built on top of the monolith.
Don't get me wrong. It still isn't perfect. However I was able to refactor the main business logic for the last few days, as he understood, it's an investment into the future.
Good guy!

P.S. On another note: happiness or happyness? :O

So, you are telling me that I should motivate myself? For working in a dead end job with no scope of promotion, no imminent raise, ever changing job requirements, layoffs, empty cubicles, zero SDLC process in place, no oversight from upper management, it is somehow my fault for me being late to work everyday?

One of these days, I'm going to fling my resignation paper at your face and drop the mic!

Man, Fuck you son!

Manager keeps fucking changing the requirements on me.

All day yesterday I couldn't even do any programming because I was so fucking tired. It wasn't until 2 pm and physically removing myself from my office that I finally could think about the problem I was having and move on. I was seriously really annoyed with myself and annoyed that scope creep keeps fucking up my shit.

Learned an important lesson today- Never be sentimental towards your code.
The only thing common in all clients is the habit of changing their requirements, how sure they are about the unsurity of what they want. And if you are sentimental towards the code you write, about a difficult algorithm you implemented you will be in a mess

FUUUUUCCCKKKK!!! I WASTED 2 WEEKS ON A PROJECT BECAUSE I COULDN'T GET THE RIGHT SPECS UNTIL THIS MORNING.......

I SPENT THE LAST 2 WEEKS BUILDING AND TRYING TO GET THINGS TO WORK THAT I DON'T NEED....

This code is due today.... So tell my again why you're changing the requirements /now/?

A little background on project fubar:

Project fubar was started a couple of years ago, by an entirely different set of devs, against an entirely different set of requirements which were never made transparent to this day, on a new platform and framework.

That means it had APIs either outdated or deprecated, front-end logic that did things it wasn't supposed to be doing and lots of scope creep and technical debt.

I had to support and fix fubar for the last few months to prime it for UAT. It was the equivalent of plugging leaks which created more leaks.

Finally, I couldn't take it and asked for a week off. I timed it so it would be right after what would have been the final UAT deployment and I'd be back after they completed their test rounds, so I could fix any new or returning defects.

Today I just found out that fubar got put on hold, that UAT was a failure and all fubar-related work had to stop. I have some mixed feelings on this: I worked hard to get fubar working as business wanted, and I was proud of that. But I also didn't like that fubar was constantly changing in scope and function.

I wonder if anyone else has ever felt the same thing?

When client keeps changing requirements..

I want to quit. I don’t feel like writing code anymore. I feel burnt out. As fuck. People keep changing requirements leaving me to do the impossible. And honestly do their dirty work.

I got the requirements specifications today.... for something I've worked on for a year and is 9 months delayed due to design constantly changing and management always lagging behind.
Best part is specifications have requirements we have no chance of meeting in time.
Yet another failed deadline. Yafd

Some of you know I'm an amateur programmer (ok, you all do). But recently I decided I'm gonna go for a career in it.

I thought projects to demo what I know were important, but everything I've seen so far says otherwise. Seems like the most important thing to hiring managers is knowing how to solve small, arbitrary problems. Specifics can be learned and a lot of 'requirements' are actually optional to scare off wannabes and tryhards looking for a sweet paycheck.

So I've gone back, dusted off all the areas where I'm rusty (curse you regex!), and am relearning, properly. Flash cards and all. Getting the essentials committed to memory, instead of fumbling through, and having to look at docs every five minutes to remember how to do something because I switch languages, frameworks, and tooling so often. Really committing toward one set of technologies and drilling the fundamentals.

Would you say this is the correct approach to gaining a position in 2020, for a junior dev?
I know for a long time, 'entry level' positions didn't really exist, but from what I'm hearing around the net, thats changing.

Heres what I'm learning (or relearning since I've used em only occasionally):

* Git (small personal projects, only used it a few times)
* SQL
* Backend (Flask, Django)
* Frontend (React)
* Testing with Cypress or Jest

Any of you have further recommendations?

Gulp? Grunt? Are these considered 'matter of course' (simply expected), or learn-as-you for a beginner like myself?

Is knowing the agile 'manifesto' (whatever that means) by heart really considered a big deal?

What about the basics of BDD and XP?

Is knowing how to properly write user-stories worth a damn or considered a waste of time to managers?

Am I going to be tested on obscure minutiae like little-used yarn/npm commands?

Would it be considered a bonus to have all the various HTTP codes memorized? I mean thats probably a great idea, but is that an absolute requirement for newbies, or something you learn as you practice?

During interviews, is there an emphasis on speed or correctness? I'm nitpicky, like to write cleanly commented code, and prefer to have documentation open at all times.
Am I going to, eh, 'lose points' for relying on documentation during an interview?

I'm an average programmer on my good days, and the only thing I really have going for me is a *weird* combination of ADD and autism-like focus that basically neutralize each other. The only other skill I have is talking at people's own level to gauge what they need and understand. Unfortunately, and contrary to the grifter persona I present for lulz, I hate selling, let alone grifting.
Otherwise I would have enjoyed telemarketing way more and wouldn't even be asking this question. But thankfully I escaped that hell and am now here, asking for your timeless nuggets of bitter wisdom.

What are truly *entry level* web developers *expected* to know, *right out the gate*, obviously besides the language they're using?

Also, what is the language they use to program websites? It's like java right? I need to know. I'm in an interview RIGHT now and they left me alone with a PC for 30 minutes. I've been surfing pornhub for the last 25 minutes. I figure the answer should take about 5 minutes, could you help me out and copypasta it?

Okay, okay, I'm kidding, I couldn't help myself. The rest of the questions are serious and I'd love to know what your opinions are on what is important for web developers in 2020, especially entry level developers.

I would have liked to complete a task this week, however the one thing I've been working on has it's requirements changed every time I finish.
I get that things change, but all of this extra logic is far too complex for the issue at hand, and I don't have time to do other assigned things due to how laborious and intensive testing for this part of the application is.

I'm getting more frustrated every day. In the past 2 months the requirements have changed dozen of times, which resulted in so many unnecessary delay.

The date for the soft launch has changed multiple times as well. One moment there is going to be a soft launch, the next week they decide to launch earlier without a soft launch.

On top of all the annoying IT related issues, our CEO is on holiday. The only person left in the company remotely capable to replace him for a few weeks is me. So beside changing requirements and deadlines, I have to deal with a lot of other shit as well.

To make things even harder, most coworkers from our support department are on holiday. Just one person is left and his wife will be getting a baby very, very soon. Ofcourse, I'm happy for him, but taking over our support department as well is not what I'm looking forward to.

The soft launch is schedule for next Monday. I'm so tired and I'm distracted every day by non IT issues. The most important things work, but there is still so much to do and I can hardly concentrate. The two other parties who are involved are far from ready either and I have to find shortcuts for their problems every morning, because they can't fix it for themselves.

Well, at least writing it down here helped my stress a little bit :)

Changing requirements by week.

Data wrangling is messy

I'm doing the vegetation maps for the game today, maybe rivers if it all goes smoothly.
I could probably do it by hand, but theres something like 60-70 ecoregions to chart,
each with their own species, both fauna and flora. And each has an elevation range its
found at in real life, so I want to use the heightmap to dictate that. Who has time for that? It's a lot of manual work.

And the night prior I'm thinking "oh this will be easy."

yeah, no.

(Also why does Devrant have to mangle my line breaks? -_-)

Laid out the requirements, how I could go about it, and the more I look the more involved
it gets.

So what I think I'll do is automate it. I already automated some of the map extraction, so
I don't see why I shouldn't just go the distance.
Also it means, later on, when I have access to better, higher resolution geographic data, updating it will be a smoother process. And even though I'm only interested in flora at the moment, theres no reason I can't reuse the same system to extract fauna information.
Of course in-game design there are some things you'll want to fudge. When the players are exploring outside the rockies in a mountainous area, maybe I still want to spawn the occasional mountain lion as a mid-tier enemy, even though our survivor might be outside the cats natural habitat. This could even be the prelude to a task you have to do, go take care of a dangerous
creature outside its normal hunting range. And who knows why it is there? Wild fire? Hunted by something *more* dangerous? Poaching? Maybe a nuke plant exploded and drove all the wildlife from an adjoining region?
who knows.

Having the extraction mostly automated goes a long way to updating those lists down the road.

But for now, flora.

For deciding plants and other features of the terrain what I can do is:

* rewrite pixeltile to take file names as input,
* along with a series of colors as a key (which are put into a SET to check each pixel against)
* input each region, one at a time, as the key, and the heightmap as the source image
* output only the region in the heightmap that corresponds to the ecoregion in the key.
* write a function to extract the palette from the outputted heightmap. (is this really needed?)
* arrange colors on the bottom or side of the image by hand, along with (in text) the elevation in feet for reference.

For automating this entire process I can go one step further:
* Do this entire process with the key colors I already snagged by hand, outputting region IDs as the file names.
* setup selenium
* selenium opens a link related to each elevation-map of a specific biome, and saves the text links
(so I dont have to hand-open them)
* I'll save the species and text by hand (assuming elevation data isn't listed)
* once I have a list of species and other details, to save them to csv, or json, or another format
* I save the list of species as csv or json or another format.
* then selenium opens this list, opens wikipedia for each, one at a time, and searches the text for elevation
* selenium saves out the species name (or an "unknown") for the species, and elevation, to a text file, along with the biome ID, and maybe the elevation code (from the heightmap) as a number or a color (probably a number, simplifies changing the heightmap later on)

Having done all this, I can start to assign species types, specific world tiles. The outputs for each region act as reference.

The only problem with the existing biome map (you can see it below, its ugly) is that it has a lot of "inbetween" colors. Theres a few things I can do here. I can treat those as a "mixing" between regions, dictating the chance of one biome's plants or the other's spawning. This seems a little complicated and dependent on a scraped together standard rather than actual data. So I'm thinking instead what I'll do is I'll implement biome transitions in code, which makes more sense, and decouples it from relying on the underlaying data. also prevents species and terrain from generating in say, towns on the borders of region, where certain plants or terrain features would be unnatural. Part of what makes an ecoregion unique is that geography has lead to relative isolation and evolutionary development of each region (usually thanks to mountains, rivers, and large impassible expanses like deserts).

Maybe I'll stuff it all into a giant bson file or maybe sqlite. Don't know yet.

As an entry level programmer I may not know what I'm doing, and I may be supposed to be looking for a job, but that won't stop me from procrastinating.

Data wrangling is fun.

So I am a Software Engineer at a small scale company.
I need to coordinate with customers, understand the requirements and design and develope the solutions.
These sometimes include changing the current product a bit and customize it to fit the client needs or maybe creating a plug-in that could work with the current product and get the job done.

I love the research, design and planning part of the job, I would be super focused and will find solutions for complex stuff. Plan it all to the smallest things.
I know the solution so I can think of what code would be there what would be needede whats already there etc.

But when it comes to coding the solution my laziness kicks in.
My mind is like you already know the solution why you need to code it to.

Then I start procrastinating and end up putting myself under a pile of stuff when the deadline approaches.

FML

"You are fired!"

Is what I wanted to sent to all clients and third parties involved in the project. Stop making your problems my problems. My systems are ready, properly tested and well documented. Stop changing the requirements and stop adding requirements until you are sending valid requests to my API.

Everytime I applied long leave, my client and PM will plan for important feature, but they say start the sprint and for other new people i have to give KT, and they will take care. I know how that will screw up the system. So at the time it's nightmare​ late night at office, in office time KT, no weekends, stand-up for 1hr(every time QA will ask, what we get after this sprint). Stupid clients changing the requirements after stand-up.

Everytime code base screwed and need to refactoring. So as much as possible core functionality I'll complete and only bug fixing for newbie. I hate those days.

FCR - Frequently Changing Requirements

After a year of using mongo in prod and personal projects I have realised some things. Its really nice early on the project, especially when there are changing requirements and for small projects or proof of concepts.
But when you make commercial software things tend to get more complex and relational. Stakeholders want reporting and even a report building which a document store isn't the best at.
With most projects projects when they get big things get relational and this becomes more and more expensive to handle in terms of compute power and developer time.
I don't doubt mongo has its place, maybe as an secondary specialised data store or if the project is inherently document oriented.
Blog over.

Changing instances to arrays. So we've all had this issue:

Option 1 was the most flexible and abstract option where a lot of functionality could be built on this.

Option 2 was the fastest solution, that would solve only specific problems.

The whole Agile philosophy points to option 2. The problem is that clients will always want to add that functionality in option 1, and changing requirements makes us lose time, the precious resource that managers supposedly cherish, yet they always want us to choose the fast option.

We're at that point where the client wants to add functionalities, but since we already built with the previous requirements in mind. Ugh.

Changing instances to arrays.

client has no clue what he wants and keeps changing the requirements of the projects; wants to deploy "to a desktop app like electron but faster, but also as a lib for developer to use on a server like a CMS" 🤦🏻‍♂️; takes two hours in a call and literally tells me that he want to "hear himself speak" so he can clarify what he needs...
me: NOP

Blindsided by a project meeting 5 mins to end of day when I was super busy and I've spent all day dealing with shitty hacked together legacy code, requirements changing everyday and still no business solutions to some areas of the project. We already have one booked in for tomorrow at 10. What the fuck. Needless to say I pretty much shouted about everything to everyone. Fucking joke. Now I'm just mad at me for letting my blood boil externally

Dev goals for 2022? Best and worst DX in the past?

Wish to prioritize customers with useful business goals who are open to sustainable web dev, usability and accessibility.
Want to use even more CSS and find a way to use new features like parent selectors without sacrificing compatibility.

Continue learning and using Symfony, but also continue with my full-stack side project using JS or even better TypeScript for the backend also for the backend.

Best developer experience: getting new customers for my own business after leaving a company last winter.

Worst developer experiences:

Corporate customers with large budgets and design agencies seem to fancy all the antipatterns I thought bad and obsolete, like carousel content, animations everywhere, and autoplay videos on the home page. Poorly written, poorly thought, and sometimes contradictory, requirements. Customers and agencies changing their mind halfway through a project.

"Agile" daily meetings, not giving devops necessary repository permissions, and making Webpack mandatory for no real reason.

How do you think about unit testing/TDD when writing apps? (I'm working this at 3am so might be a bit messy... Just a thought I woke up to).

Whenever I write an app, I don't write unit tests but as I'm developing I may create test functions for specific parts that I run to validate a specific component is working before moving onto the next.

So first, when I get a problem, break it up into components based on the requirements. It's usually sort of input, processor, output sequence.

Where the processor is essentially the core app. And so I start coding it, referring to the input thru an interface, model objects, adding fields as I go along (assume no matter what the input, I will get these before the logic is called). I may add some more interfaces as well for other data I may need but I know won't be going in the first input.

So I write all the logic, functions needed to get a basic app to run that does what I am writing the app for.

Only then do I write a test functions passing in different parameters to make sure the logic and response is what I want and making fixes as necessary. At that point I basically have the simplest version of the app.
(I guess this is sort of like mocking?)

Then build outwards implementing and testing components as I go along and may do some simple refactoring/redesign. (I guess all these tests are functional then, have to start the whole app).

And finally when I have the basic requirements fully complete I will add the "nice to haves" on top via refactoring of specific logic in specific components. Again testing by running the app maybe with simple inputs.

I guess now I'm thinking how do you write unit tests/TDD if the app keeps changing (via adhoc refactorings) as you are creating it?

How do you implement TDD in reality?

Say you have a system that is TDD ready, not too sure what that means exactly but you can go write and run any unit tests.

And for example, you need to generate a report that uses 2 database tables so:

1. Read/Query
2. Processor logic
3. Output to file

So 1 and 3 are fairly straightforward, they don't change much, just mock the inputs.

But what about #2. There's going to be a lot of functions doing calculations, grouping/merging the data. And from my experience the code gets refactored a lot. Changing requirements, optimization (first round is somewhat just make it work) so entire functions and classes maybe deleted. Even the input data may change. So with TDD wouldn't you end up writing a lot of throwaway code?

A lot of times I don't know exactly what I want or need other than I need a class that can do something like this... but then I might end up throwing the whole thing out and writing a new one one I get a clearer idea of what i or the user wants or needs.

Last week I was building a new REST API, the parameters and usage changed like 3 times. And even now the code is in feasibility/POC testing just to figure out what needs to be used. Do I need more, less parameters, what should they be. I've moved and rewritten a lot of code because "oh this way won't work, need to try this way instead"

All I start with is my boss telling me I need an API that lets users to ... (Very general requirements).

Does anyone feel like their boss is always scheming behind your back. They are changing the requirements and rejecting you without even reviewing your work and are too good to attend any meetings. They’re trying their best but wouldn’t ever give you credit when you are trying your best and getting good results. At what point does the micro management and fear of failure make it so you can’t even take the simplest feature without melting down?

Working as a Dev for a while now, I tell new people not to bother with it. There is never any job satisfaction as people in charge never understand the basics.

Instead of learning to write efficient code, figure out how to solve real business problems, work towards a maintainable flexible product to quickly deliver value on changing requirements, write automated tests to improve quality, maintainability and prevent live issues - basically do anything a good Dev strives for - you will just constantly end up working for people with no interest beyond the next couple days, on a shit code base that no one can understand, with people that don't want to learn anything about software design and just check boxes off.

Apart from pay this must be the worst career possible in a technical field.

New ERP project has been going for 1.5 years. Project team comes to me asking to create an import process from old ERP to new ERP in 4 months, oh we need data loaded into Test today so we can complete end-to-end user testing. Project team doesn't have any requirements documented or know what data is needed in new ERP. I have never used/seen either ERP system. Project team keeps changing what is required in the new ERP weekly, and they don't understand why all the imports into new ERP are bad.

Everyone here rants about clients, and as far as I understand frustration, I understand client's side too.

For 2 years I have developed a tool for our company, my manager was responsible for outcome and was directly accountable to company's management, which made him a client for our product. Of course requirements changed many times, he pressured us much, but he is nice guy and gave us knowledge why we had to change things again. We had meetings with him, HRs, PMs and others to gain requirements for features to implement and that made me better understand client's point of view.

My point is that when you work for external companies, you only see changing requirements, pressure, deadlines, etc, but don't think that your work is just a part of process - your client is responsible for your delivery, wants to make good impression on superiors or company needs some feature ASAP. He does not have to know tech stuff, he wants outcome to be good and to be fast and cheap - that is business.

And yes - we had to tell people that X is impossible many times, had to tell Y people how things work over and over. It may seem easier when it is your own company, but note that every single employee knew that you developed that tool and you have answers for his questions.

Account Manager emails changing requirements...

None or changing requirements