It's very simple. If you develop anything for Windows that is successful in the marketplace, Microsoft is going to implement a competing product and kill you. Developing Windows software is corporate suicide. What does everyone think the antitrust suit was about, after all?
- The company needs a principal author/idea person: one who is aware what the product is supposed to do and how to evaluate whether or not it is successful (initial sales are fine, but, if the thing doesn't do what one expects it to, there will not be repeated sales. And this has nothing to do with bugs: it's general design). This person needs to have the final say over what feature proposals are approved and is to be the one to go to when developers and others have problems understanding the product. This person does not have to be a programmer but should have serious professional credentials (doctor, engineer, professor, etc - even marketer if it's a product to be used by marketers).
- User interface. This is just as important as the internal coding and needs to be handled just as seriously. Design, demo, test, design, demo, test.
- Testing: test the product design as well as the functionality. Developers need to test, then QA, then on-site betas. Lack of testing will kill even the best-designed and best-managed product.
- And, finally, if management is not honest with its staff about the financial condition of the company, all suggestions about software development practice become meaningless.
In the current economic climate, all the clueful people have been laid off. Testing is considered a wasted expense by the MBAs interested only in their personal profit.
The economy is in the toilet, no one is working, the machine you bought two years ago is just fine for your needs: revising your resume and dialing up Monster...
If you have the opportunity to go into management, take it. Don't screw around and whine about losing your coding skills. Remember this simple equivalence:
Coders are fired by managers.
Managers fire coders.
On what side of the equation would you rather be?
Re:Three words: options not exercised.
on
Microsoft's Future
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· Score: 1
In this economy??? They will hold the employees as long as they can keep paying them. What alternative is there, flipping burgers?
The current Microsoft development release (.NET) will be the last. It's not in Microsoft's interest to release development tools to producers of products not owned by and giving profit to Microsoft.
In the future, if companies want to develop software for their business needs, they will go to their local Microsoft office, who will send a consulting team in to assess requirements, code the software, and charge a nice fee. This process will appeal to managers who do not want to have the overhead of keeping developers on staff. Oh, and Microsoft will retain all rights to the product, of course; if it is commercially valuable they will sell it elsewhere. It's the old mainframe business model from the sixties once again - remember that's the environment Gates grew up with.
As for home software - what is left of it - forget it. There's very little remaining that isn't Microsoft or doesn't have Microsoft competition. For example, my former employer had a nice little niche market with $20 million/year in revenue. So, of course, Microsoft decided to move in. Guess who's still in business.
I also expect Microsoft to move into PC hardware very soon. Sometime next year they will buy some well-known but cash-starved PC distributor (Gateway?), or retool the game-machine plants in Mexico to produce PC boxes. Given the current administration's attitude toward antitrust, they will get away with it - especially if Microsoft can justify their moves as aiding the national war effort by increasing business efficiency.
The fact that the field is full of extremely stupid people without the brains of a HR droid shouldn't put you off making your own marketing work right.
Yeah, and they are the ones keeping their jobs in this economy while all the developers are being laid off.
Another in agreement here. You are screwed. If you leave there will be several hundred applicants for your job, and your boss knows that. That is, if they bother to hire a replacement at all. If you have other skills you might want to consider getting out of programming until the economy recovers (and no one realistically expects it to do so for at least three years).
Your idea has enormous potential and can make you billions if you have the proper management team behind you. Fortunately, Stephan Paternot and Todd Krizelman are available for work. Call them today!
Slashdot Mirror
I wonder what Linus is thinking of doing if his employer goes.
LINUX CREATOR HIRED BY MICROSOFT
"I couldn't refuse the offer", Torvalds says
It works for some people, Bill Gates for example, but it's not for everyone.
...
Bill Gates had a trust fund and a mother who knew the president of IBM
The finite automata class is useful, in the real world, for:
...
- state machines
- regular expressions
Both of which could be (and may well be, I'm long out of school) better covered in data structures or other courses.
On the other hand, if you want to write compilers
It's very simple. If you develop anything for Windows that is successful in the marketplace, Microsoft is going to implement a competing product and kill you. Developing Windows software is corporate suicide. What does everyone think the antitrust suit was about, after all?
so goatse.cx will expire?
Moderate this up!!
I would like to add to this:
- The company needs a principal author/idea person: one who is aware what the product is supposed to do and how to evaluate whether or not it is successful (initial sales are fine, but, if the thing doesn't do what one expects it to, there will not be repeated sales. And this has nothing to do with bugs: it's general design). This person needs to have the final say over what feature proposals are approved and is to be the one to go to when developers and others have problems understanding the product. This person does not have to be a programmer but should have serious professional credentials (doctor, engineer, professor, etc - even marketer if it's a product to be used by marketers).
- User interface. This is just as important as the internal coding and needs to be handled just as seriously. Design, demo, test, design, demo, test.
- Testing: test the product design as well as the functionality. Developers need to test, then QA, then on-site betas. Lack of testing will kill even the best-designed and best-managed product.
- And, finally, if management is not honest with its staff about the financial condition of the company, all suggestions about software development practice become meaningless.
1a) We ship when the money to pay the developers runs out.
1b) We sell the company before the prospective buyer realizes that no one can make money in technology anymore.
Long remembered will be his classic
The Voyage of the Jerle Shannara: ANTRAX
In the current economic climate, all the clueful people have been laid off. Testing is considered a wasted expense by the MBAs interested only in their personal profit.
Can we PLEASE get over the election fiasco
Sure. We're all so much better off than we were at this time last year, right?
when the Final Judgement comes Bill Gates will be going to Hell.
And soon afterward, he will be running the place and making progress toward taking over Heaven's markets.
The economy is in the toilet, no one is working, the machine you bought two years ago is just fine for your needs: revising your resume and dialing up Monster ...
I certainly don't. Today was the first time I've ever accessed the site. Nothing to attract me back, too.
"Low paying Web jobs" pay nothing, because there are no more Web jobs.
This program is backward. It should be training former Web developers to become drug dealers.
Who's unemployed now? Not the managers ...
If you have the opportunity to go into management, take it. Don't screw around and whine about losing your coding skills. Remember this simple equivalence:
Coders are fired by managers.
Managers fire coders.
On what side of the equation would you rather be?
In this economy??? They will hold the employees as long as they can keep paying them. What alternative is there, flipping burgers?
Gates has won.
The current Microsoft development release (.NET) will be the last. It's not in Microsoft's interest to release development tools to producers of products not owned by and giving profit to Microsoft.
In the future, if companies want to develop software for their business needs, they will go to their local Microsoft office, who will send a consulting team in to assess requirements, code the software, and charge a nice fee. This process will appeal to managers who do not want to have the overhead of keeping developers on staff. Oh, and Microsoft will retain all rights to the product, of course; if it is commercially valuable they will sell it elsewhere. It's the old mainframe business model from the sixties once again - remember that's the environment Gates grew up with.
As for home software - what is left of it - forget it. There's very little remaining that isn't Microsoft or doesn't have Microsoft competition. For example, my former employer had a nice little niche market with $20 million/year in revenue. So, of course, Microsoft decided to move in. Guess who's still in business.
I also expect Microsoft to move into PC hardware very soon. Sometime next year they will buy some well-known but cash-starved PC distributor (Gateway?), or retool the game-machine plants in Mexico to produce PC boxes. Given the current administration's attitude toward antitrust, they will get away with it - especially if Microsoft can justify their moves as aiding the national war effort by increasing business efficiency.
Actually the interview process was (and is):
"I see you have a felony drug conviction. You're in the wrong room - the interviews for management are next door."
Yeah, and they are the ones keeping their jobs in this economy while all the developers are being laid off.
Possibly the original poster meant "unemployment in the IT industry is at a 30 year high". It certainly seems that way ...
Basically, if you don't enjoy your work any more because of this, let your boss know you will be looking for work if the situation doesn't improve.
And his response will be to call security and have you escorted off the premises. Hope you like flipping burgers.
Another in agreement here. You are screwed. If you leave there will be several hundred applicants for your job, and your boss knows that. That is, if they bother to hire a replacement at all. If you have other skills you might want to consider getting out of programming until the economy recovers (and no one realistically expects it to do so for at least three years).
Your idea has enormous potential and can make you billions if you have the proper management team behind you. Fortunately, Stephan Paternot and Todd Krizelman are available for work. Call them today!
Speed of light down. Fine structure constant up. Details on the financial and physics news at 11...