Sure. There are always going to be eleventh hour changes. But generally speaking, a reasonable requirements miss isn't going to cause a database architecture to go from being the best choice to making the project impossible. That's a huge miss that is partially the developer's fault.
Maybe I'm wrong, but this sounds like a clear case of cowboy development to me. Maybe it wasn't, but this is what cowboy development gets you in any case. If he keeps doing the same things he's going to keep getting the same results.
They care about deadlines and money. You tell them that both will be sacrificed for some unneccessary feature creep, and you'll start seeing some managerial decision making instead of simple managerial delegation.
You should be asking, "Should I make architectural decisions before or after I collect all the requirements." But you know the answer to that one.
A more experienced engineer would have dug for requirements early, planned for some creep, and would have warned the manager that the risk of starting before the thing is properly speced is that all work might have to be thrown away.
Huh? My first Mac keyboard (not quite three years old) has page up and page down keys. Never noticed my MacBook doesn't have them because the two-finger-scroll is so easy. They're normally buried in "Fn" hell on PC notebooks anyway.
I think this is a case where conflict of interest is practically unavoidable. This is only one step away from saying that no one in the Department of Agriculture should eat, or no one in the FDA should take medicine.
I don't know anything about the man in question, and, clearly, Diebold is a catastrophe for US democracy. But I don't think there's any effective way from removing partisans from the process at every level. Better to have openly political people running the system than covertly political people.
Openness is the solution, not the unverifiable appearance of neutrality.
if the common perception of the 1%-ers is to be belived
I'm reading that with a tone of skepticism. If that's not what you intended then this is only intended for those who misinterpret you the same way I did.
The name itself is a claim to be the thing that they are commonly perceived to be. The one-percent of "outlaws" that gives the other 99% of MC members a bad name.
This perception isn't unfair.
They deserve their rights, and I don't know enough about this decision to comment on it, but these are bad people who aren't victims of bad press. I mean, these are people who are committed to being bad. They don't wake up the next day with regrets; they wake up in the morning (or whatever) with intent to do wrong. Or, at least, that's what they'd have us believe.
Now, when you lump the other 99% in with the one percenters that is an unfair perception.
Testing a new machine is a significant expense. Adding a couple of machines that need to be tested every time there is a point release or a security patch is non-trivial. I mean, you're just wrong in your estimation.
That said, this is all so that they can support another company that, best case for Apple, won't cannibalize their hardware market.
Seriously, if this was your pitch to Apple, do you really think they wouldn't have laughed you out of the room by this point?
I don't get your point about "withdraw their operating system from the open market and sell only to their customers and to Pystar". What does that even mean? Don't they sell only to their customers by definition? Do you mean only to their hardware customers? What does that buy them? Selling to the odd hackintosh user doesn't hurt them any. It would be asinine for them to insist that people prove they own a Mac (or Pystar) to buy OS X. Is that what you're proposing?
I think that both parties will benefit by a quiet deal that allows Psystar to sell their boxes; paying Apple a nice "per copy" price for OS-X.
You and I have very different understandings of Apple's business model. I'm certainly not an expert, but I don't see how this would benefit Apple.
Apple has a strong reputation for their products "just working". They would have to either trust Psystar to do all of the necessary testing to ensure that they don't damage this reputation, or they'd have to trust the public to "know the difference".
Or they'd have to do the testing themselves. This would be a significant expense, and would probably not be offset by any licensing revenue. (Bear in mind that OS X retails for $130.)
Furthermore, there is a strong probability that this would cut into Apple's hardware sales (and accompanying AppleCare and accessories). This almost certainly wouldn't be offset by this proposed licensing revenue.
Such a deal would certainly benefit Psystar, and would arguably benefit consumers of OS X, but I completely fail to see how this would benefit Apple. Even if we assume that increased OS X sales would several times the lost hardware sales, which I'm not sure we can.
You have convinced me that marketing is non-trivial. You have failed to convince me that a guy who should be spending is time making the software not suck should be allowing himself to be "nearly sent" "over the edge" by the machinations of the marketing department.
What's more, you have only strengthened my belief that his efforts are no more appropriate than having some popped-collar douchebag from the marketing department asking why he's writing that function, given that there's a suitable one in the standard library. Even if he's right, he's not doing his job.
I'm going to assume you're an Engineer. (Since you're a Slashdotter and refer to "the Product Managers".)
I think it's swell that you're all involved with your project and everything. That said, do you like it when management and/or marketing types get all in your shit about how you do your job?
Honestly, those cheese-eating motherfuckers probably really do have a better idea than you do about how to sell this stuff. Let them. You'll all feel better if you do!
I really like having a general purpose computer hooked up to my TV.
You know you can't add codecs to an AppleTV without voiding the warranty, right? And it doesn't have the horsepower to decode anything good in software anyway. Blech.
That's pretty good. But still no Blu-ray . . . which you might recall was my original request.
Looks like the codec support is pretty good, but I like having a full-blown computer hooked up to my TV. Web, email, handbrake, bittorrent, easy codec updates.
I'm happy to pay three times as much (and burn three times the juice) for all the features I want. Actually, at the end of the day it saves power, since I'd have to run some other computing platform in addition to "Popcorn Hour".
Why on Earth isn't this bill co-sponsored by a Republican? Have they stopped even paying lip-service to freedom?
Ten years ago the Republican party had two things going for it, fiscal conservatism and a strong stance on freedom. What happened? (It would be easy to say, "George Bush", but I refuse to believe that he could have done it single handedly.)
Slashdot Mirror
Sure. There are always going to be eleventh hour changes. But generally speaking, a reasonable requirements miss isn't going to cause a database architecture to go from being the best choice to making the project impossible. That's a huge miss that is partially the developer's fault.
Maybe I'm wrong, but this sounds like a clear case of cowboy development to me. Maybe it wasn't, but this is what cowboy development gets you in any case. If he keeps doing the same things he's going to keep getting the same results.
-Peter
Well said.
-Peter
You should be asking, "Should I make architectural decisions before or after I collect all the requirements." But you know the answer to that one.
A more experienced engineer would have dug for requirements early, planned for some creep, and would have warned the manager that the risk of starting before the thing is properly speced is that all work might have to be thrown away.
You'll know next time.
-Peter
You're right! Now I'm going to forget that and just scroll with two-fingers. ;-)
-Peter
Huh? My first Mac keyboard (not quite three years old) has page up and page down keys. Never noticed my MacBook doesn't have them because the two-finger-scroll is so easy. They're normally buried in "Fn" hell on PC notebooks anyway.
As for colors, what color do you want?
-Peter
Excellent book.
Regarding number eight: Do you like my fangs? They're haunted.
-Peter
All the pictures of my keys online have been photoshoped. The keys you could make from them set the tumbler combination that looses the killer bees!
-Peter
I think this is a case where conflict of interest is practically unavoidable. This is only one step away from saying that no one in the Department of Agriculture should eat, or no one in the FDA should take medicine.
I don't know anything about the man in question, and, clearly, Diebold is a catastrophe for US democracy. But I don't think there's any effective way from removing partisans from the process at every level. Better to have openly political people running the system than covertly political people.
Openness is the solution, not the unverifiable appearance of neutrality.
-Peter
The sun is never directly over head on most days in most places.
-Peter
I'm reading that with a tone of skepticism. If that's not what you intended then this is only intended for those who misinterpret you the same way I did.
The name itself is a claim to be the thing that they are commonly perceived to be. The one-percent of "outlaws" that gives the other 99% of MC members a bad name.
This perception isn't unfair.
They deserve their rights, and I don't know enough about this decision to comment on it, but these are bad people who aren't victims of bad press. I mean, these are people who are committed to being bad. They don't wake up the next day with regrets; they wake up in the morning (or whatever) with intent to do wrong. Or, at least, that's what they'd have us believe.
Now, when you lump the other 99% in with the one percenters that is an unfair perception.
-Peter
Sure, but if they are committing fraud over the phone it is wire fraud, without regard to caller ID spoofing.
-Peter
I think you have to actually defraud someone out of money for it to be wire fraud. Otherwise, I think it's just "wire lying".
If they spoofed her caller ID and then called and got Social Security to send them her checks, that would be wire fraud.
-Peter
Dude, what the fuck are you talking about? There are zero controls on purchasing OS X. Look.
They didn't sell Intel Tiger at retail because every compatible machine came with it. What possible reason would they have for selling it at retail?
-Peter
Testing a new machine is a significant expense. Adding a couple of machines that need to be tested every time there is a point release or a security patch is non-trivial. I mean, you're just wrong in your estimation.
That said, this is all so that they can support another company that, best case for Apple, won't cannibalize their hardware market.
Seriously, if this was your pitch to Apple, do you really think they wouldn't have laughed you out of the room by this point?
I don't get your point about "withdraw their operating system from the open market and sell only to their customers and to Pystar". What does that even mean? Don't they sell only to their customers by definition? Do you mean only to their hardware customers? What does that buy them? Selling to the odd hackintosh user doesn't hurt them any. It would be asinine for them to insist that people prove they own a Mac (or Pystar) to buy OS X. Is that what you're proposing?
-Peter
You and I have very different understandings of Apple's business model. I'm certainly not an expert, but I don't see how this would benefit Apple.
Apple has a strong reputation for their products "just working". They would have to either trust Psystar to do all of the necessary testing to ensure that they don't damage this reputation, or they'd have to trust the public to "know the difference".
Or they'd have to do the testing themselves. This would be a significant expense, and would probably not be offset by any licensing revenue. (Bear in mind that OS X retails for $130.)
Furthermore, there is a strong probability that this would cut into Apple's hardware sales (and accompanying AppleCare and accessories). This almost certainly wouldn't be offset by this proposed licensing revenue.
Such a deal would certainly benefit Psystar, and would arguably benefit consumers of OS X, but I completely fail to see how this would benefit Apple. Even if we assume that increased OS X sales would several times the lost hardware sales, which I'm not sure we can.
-Peter
Bill W.? He has more friends than Tom!
-Peter
PS: As always, remember that there is no "I don't get it." moderation option.
Back in February
-Peter
Aight, I put on my robe and wizard hat.
-Peter
You have convinced me that marketing is non-trivial. You have failed to convince me that a guy who should be spending is time making the software not suck should be allowing himself to be "nearly sent" "over the edge" by the machinations of the marketing department.
What's more, you have only strengthened my belief that his efforts are no more appropriate than having some popped-collar douchebag from the marketing department asking why he's writing that function, given that there's a suitable one in the standard library. Even if he's right, he's not doing his job.
-Peter
I'm going to assume you're an Engineer. (Since you're a Slashdotter and refer to "the Product Managers".)
I think it's swell that you're all involved with your project and everything. That said, do you like it when management and/or marketing types get all in your shit about how you do your job?
Honestly, those cheese-eating motherfuckers probably really do have a better idea than you do about how to sell this stuff. Let them. You'll all feel better if you do!
-Peter
Actually, it means you aren't using enough lube.
-Peter
I really like having a general purpose computer hooked up to my TV.
You know you can't add codecs to an AppleTV without voiding the warranty, right? And it doesn't have the horsepower to decode anything good in software anyway. Blech.
Seems way more important than the color to me. But if you're really hung up on it, buy a skin: http://www.skinit.com/devices/miscellaneous/apple_miscellaneous (You can do "custom" and select all black.)
-Peter
That's pretty good. But still no Blu-ray . . . which you might recall was my original request.
Looks like the codec support is pretty good, but I like having a full-blown computer hooked up to my TV. Web, email, handbrake, bittorrent, easy codec updates.
I'm happy to pay three times as much (and burn three times the juice) for all the features I want. Actually, at the end of the day it saves power, since I'd have to run some other computing platform in addition to "Popcorn Hour".
-Peter
All I want for Christmas is a Mini with a Blu-ray drive. An integrated screen is a detriment to an HTPC.
-Peter
Why on Earth isn't this bill co-sponsored by a Republican? Have they stopped even paying lip-service to freedom?
Ten years ago the Republican party had two things going for it, fiscal conservatism and a strong stance on freedom. What happened? (It would be easy to say, "George Bush", but I refuse to believe that he could have done it single handedly.)
-Peter