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mrmcd posted:A big part of keeping engineering teams healthy is actually human management and not which language is good for writing for loops better faster. Definitely Ruby though.
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Oct 10, 2017 13:32
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e; eff
Good Will Hrunting fucked around with this message at 14:46 on Oct 18, 2017 |
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Oct 10, 2017 15:01
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kick him in the balls
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Oct 10, 2017 15:32
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minato posted:This is an anathema to me. I'm a big fan of TDD, dependency injection, and {unit,integration,functional} tests. I'd love to know how to sell that same mindset to devs, given the reasons they had above for not doing that. Their reasons basically boil down to "I don't think that tests are worth my time". Frankly, I don't have good ideas for getting buy-in from devs on this issue, beyond leading from example. For me, personally, tests save me time in the same CL that I write them in, because they get me to test my code more exhaustively and I always find new bugs that I wouldn't have found without them. So my code quality is up. Sure it takes more time for me to get the CL submitted (I'd guess at least half my dev time, when working on new features, is spent on writing tests and fixing the bugs they reveal), but I take no pride in submitting buggy code. Every time there's an outage, that costs so many dev-hours of time to diagnose, roll back, fix, and roll forward (plus of course the cost of having an outage in the first place!). Part of the remediation for the outage needs to be writing a test that will prevent that same issue from happening again. Refusing to write and maintain that test is a tacit admission that the dev doesn't care about making the same mistake twice. If your devs know they're lovely and don't care, then there's not much you can do about that.
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Oct 10, 2017 15:45
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Pie Colony posted:I've never worked with separate testing and quality teams but in every company I've been at (which admittedly is only a handful), QA has been a bottleneck. I was very hesitant about continuous deployment but with a decent base of tests (unit/component/integration/end to end) it actually works very well. QA is a bottleneck because they often get all the blame if a bug makes it into production. If there is a go live without bugs, the developers are praised. It is a job with all the risk and little pay. Also, testers are some of the most toxic people to be around and those who have options run away fast. Yes, I have been in QA for 14 years and counting. Why do you ask?
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Oct 10, 2017 19:02
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Pollyanna posted:kick him in the balls e: eff Good Will Hrunting fucked around with this message at 14:46 on Oct 18, 2017 |
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Oct 10, 2017 19:06
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:This is your problem, yeah. You don't have buy-in from the devs; they see no reason to not write lovely code, and ops is getting stuck with the consequences. You can fix this to an poo poo, I think I love you and want to marry you. minato posted:I personally agree with this, but others didn't. They complained that such tests: You two should get married, because I cannot chose a favorite. Permission to use these quotes in my workplace? I can in return ramble a bunch about how I was hired as a developer in test to fix the (functional but automated) testing in this project, but your eyes might bleed.
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Oct 10, 2017 19:09
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minato posted:Agreed. These people most likely need training on how to actually write good and useful tests and why.
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Oct 10, 2017 20:01
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Keetron posted:Permission to use these quotes in my workplace? Sure, go ahead.
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Oct 10, 2017 20:04
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Let me guess, these devs quickly moved on in search of another "greenfield" project and never had to maintain their code long-term?
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Oct 10, 2017 20:05
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Keetron posted:Permission to use these quotes in my workplace? Jaded Burnout posted:Let me guess, these devs quickly moved on in search of another "greenfield" project and never had to maintain their code long-term?
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Oct 10, 2017 22:21
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What's the best way to assess the health and lifespan of a startup? I've interviewed with one recently that seems to be doing well - and has been around a number of years - but I've realized I don't know how long the startup will continue to last. I was asked by my parents how they made their money, and I realized I don't really know, and only had a vague idea that they weren't really "owned" by anybody. I'm kind of startup stupid, actually  Is this even something worth worrying about? I personally feel that it'd be better to focus more on what you can do, how you can grow, and the product you're working with, especially since my current "safe choice" megacorp position where the idea was to stick around for 3+ years ended up getting run into the ground over the period of less than two. Counting on a very, very long term job seems like a bad idea when you're working in the tech field these days. I think I'm making a mountain out of a molehill here.
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Oct 11, 2017 01:28
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Pollyanna posted:What's the best way to assess the health and lifespan of a startup? be a VC with decades of experience, lots of inside info, and a large portfolio then pray you're right some of the time EDIT: s/profile/portfolio Doctor w-rw-rw- fucked around with this message at 05:24 on Oct 11, 2017 |
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Oct 11, 2017 04:28
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How come all these HN or whatever salary threads are full of people making like a quarter million or more in a year and yet actual job listings I see all tend to top out at like 120?
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Oct 11, 2017 04:38
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Geography, skillsets, and who they know.
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Oct 11, 2017 04:39
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It kind of sucks the amusement out of looking at job listings when none of them are even offering to match your current salary, you know?
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Oct 11, 2017 04:43
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Is this a salary/tcomp discussion? Feels like a salary/tcomp split.
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Oct 11, 2017 04:46
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ultrafilter posted:Geography, skillsets, and who they know. Put another way, the jobs that pay $250k don't want to be posted on public listings. Can you imagine the poo poo-tacular people that would try to lie and cheat their way into such a position? They wouldn't make it past any remotely competent screening process, but they'd be a tremendous waste of time. Far easier to just send out an email to the company saying "Hey, we're looking for a new TL to head up $team, if you're interested or know someone who is, let us know." That way you get maybe a few dozen submissions/referrals, and the overall quality will be vastly higher.
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Oct 11, 2017 04:48
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If job postings are just listing salary it isn't taking into account equity and bonuses which probably make up a substantial portion of the $250k people post on HN
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Oct 11, 2017 04:50
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Doctor w-rw-rw- posted:be a VC with decades of experience, lots of inside info, and a large profile then pray you're right some of the time Yeah, I don't think I'm going to be able to predict lifespan/health in any intelligent way. I'm just going to focus on the poo poo that matters to me, and if my parents start giving me poo poo for working at a startup then gently caress em.
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Oct 11, 2017 05:23
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"What's your current runway and are there any upcoming funding events?" First one is roughly how long they'll keep paying you. Second is more open, answers like "lol who would fund this shitheap" would be "bad." If they're between B and C, for example, the next funding event might be tied to an internal goal (we can ask for more money after 50k DAU).
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Oct 11, 2017 05:30
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Pollyanna posted:What's the best way to assess the health and lifespan of a startup? I've interviewed with one recently that seems to be doing well - and has been around a number of years - but I've realized I don't know how long the startup will continue to last. I was asked by my parents how they made their money, and I realized I don't really know, and only had a vague idea that they weren't really "owned" by anybody. I'm kind of startup stupid, actually In my mind, I'm thinking - does this company have the capacity to pay my base salary for at least two years? I've worked for 3 startups. One that went through 120m in less than a year due to overgrowth and two very small start ups that started with less than 30 people and significantly less money and grew slow and organically and even struggled at times and laid off 2 or 3 people at one point. I'd ask what the growth plan is. One of our competitors had 50m in funding and hired ~150 developers and have just been burning through all of their cash because of it and have had layoffs and restructuring of everything below C-level. My company has been growing slowly, hiring maybe 2-3 people per year and spending it in a more methodical way (interesting note, my now-CFO was lower on the finance chain of the startup that burned through 120m 17 years ago and I think he learned first hand what not to do from his bosses back then). Ask if they are cash flow positive or still relying on VC money? How many rounds of VC money have they taken? If they say something like, "we just closed 50m in funding and we want to bring on a reasonable number of developers, qa, etc. and grow the product" that's probably a good thing. If they say they're plans are to triple the team blindly... maybe that's a red flag.
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Oct 11, 2017 06:17
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RICHUNCLEPENNYBAGS posted:How come all these HN or whatever salary threads are full of people making like a quarter million or more in a year and yet actual job listings I see all tend to top out at like 120? look for the listings that don't list the salary and just say "generous." if you see the salary listed in the job posting it's probably not going to pay well.
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Oct 11, 2017 11:21
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Pollyanna posted:Yeah, I don't think I'm going to be able to predict lifespan/health in any intelligent way. I'm just going to focus on the poo poo that matters to me, and if my parents start giving me poo poo for working at a startup then gently caress em. You're an adult, this shouldn't matter.
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Oct 11, 2017 12:32
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Jose Valasquez posted:If job postings are just listing salary it isn't taking into account equity and bonuses which probably make up a substantial portion of the $250k people post on HN Yeah it's probably this. I had a couple years where my base was only like $150k but because of hitting the gold mine on options and stock appreciation my reported IRS income was just shy of $300k. Most established companies will try to target 20-30% of your base in RSUs at time of grant, so that already gets you close to $200k, then with bonus ~15% and good price momentum you're within striking distance of $250k. You pretty much gotta be in SF or NYC though, and these are senior / highly experienced salary bands, not "first job after by CS bachelors".
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Oct 11, 2017 13:26
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mrmcd posted:my base was only like $150k I think my career plateaued at $80k 
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Oct 11, 2017 13:31
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rt4 posted:I think my career plateaued at $80k Move to NYC or SF/SV, do anything that looks vaguely "back end" (since front end / UI also has a rep for being bad pay). Also don't work for startups because 9 out of 10 times their equity is garbage.
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Oct 11, 2017 13:36
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Also, don't underestimate the selection bias in those threads. The guy making $60k a year isn't going to brag about it on HN
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Oct 11, 2017 13:39
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I’ve been involved with 4 start-ups and all of them exited just fine and I made some money. All of that pales in comparison to RSUs from a big company though. Most exits for employees at start-ups even when they do well are piddly scraps unless you’re within the first 10 employees. Barring home run exits like Dropbox, Facebook, etc start-ups are worse for you financially.
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Oct 11, 2017 13:44
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necrobobsledder posted:I’ve been involved with 4 start-ups and all of them exited just fine and I made some money. Yeah if you like the startup and what it's doing, and the base let's you live how you want to live, then it's fine. If you're concerned about maximizing earnings for your career though, don't believe the hype about people becoming millionaires, etc. There's also the anchoring effect, where your next job usually pays (1+X)*$current_pay. Spend too long in low paying industries or cash poor companies and it hurts you over 10+ years.
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Oct 11, 2017 13:56
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I find that even though the pay may be worse, most startups at least move faster on things. The year I spent at a financial company (or 10 months actually), they were impressed that I was able to set my environment up and trigger a dummy build in 4 days (which, lol, support desk is the only reason it wasn't done in an hour). I can't wear business casual ever again, which rules out probably about 40% of NYC due to financial jobs.
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Oct 11, 2017 15:43
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Good Will Hrunting posted:I find that even though the pay may be worse, most startups at least move faster on things. The year I spent at a financial company (or 10 months actually), they were impressed that I was able to set my environment up and trigger a dummy build in 4 days (which, lol, support desk is the only reason it wasn't done in an hour). This is 100% the reason I don't think I could ever work in enterprise software dev. At my last contracting position, to get keycard approval to get into the building took almost a week. Getting on the project's JIRA, same. Getting a company email address, same. Getting invited to project planning meetings with my project manager, same. I think it was probably two months before I was contributing any kind of value whatsoever. Compared with my first startup job where the CTO handed me a laptop and stuck me in the project manager's office until I had all that stuff, and then took me to lunch. Had my first code contribution that afternoon (fixing a minor typo on the project README, sure, but still). I just can't with bureaucracy.
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Oct 11, 2017 15:48
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I've worked for Amazon and Google and neither had issues like that. It took them both a little bit to get my workstation hooked up, but I had a working laptop (sufficient to do "real work" with in Google's case) in the meantime and plenty of documentation to review / training videos to watch while I waited.
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Oct 11, 2017 15:54
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JawnV6 posted:"What's your current runway and are there any upcoming funding events?" If I remember correctly, they don't currently receive funding. They said that they're operating independently and don't have any owners. That said, it'd be good to get it in writing so I don't completely forget again. geeves posted:In my mind, I'm thinking - does this company have the capacity to pay my base salary for at least two years? I do not recall exactly if they're cash positive, but I do know the CEO said something amenable to that - poo poo, I should have written this all down when I asked And I need to ask about this more for startups. They're still relatively small.Doh004 posted:You're an adult, this shouldn't matter. Oh it only mattered for like five minutes before I started getting introspective. They can think whatever they want, but when the seed of doubt is planted, you get all my lovely posts. necrobobsledder posted:I’ve been involved with 4 start-ups and all of them exited just fine and I made some money. Stuff like this is why I only count direct compensation, i.e. salary, as worthwhile. The rest is vague and contingent on stuff going perfectly, whereas with salary I know for drat sure what I'll be getting.
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Oct 11, 2017 15:57
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Pollyanna posted:Stuff like this is why I only count direct compensation, i.e. salary, as worthwhile. The rest is vague and contingent on stuff going perfectly, whereas with salary I know for drat sure what I'll be getting. Your account got hacked, you are never this sensible in your considerations.
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Oct 11, 2017 16:15
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:I've worked for Amazon and Google and neither had issues like that. It took them both a little bit to get my workstation hooked up, but I had a working laptop (sufficient to do "real work" with in Google's case) in the meantime and plenty of documentation to review / training videos to watch while I waited. I might give Google a shot again. I've heard mixed stuff from the three engineers I know there though. A lot of them just keep getting switched around too much to settle and have gotten quite frustrated. Also I interviewed a guy from the NYC office who left because "there were no women on his team" (I poo poo you not) and he had scathing stuff to say (probably got fired obviously). Amazon is opening a huge office in NYC so if there are engineering teams there I'll probably just embrace the evil and interview there as well. Lord knows I get emailed by one of their recruiters once a week. As far as other big companies go, Facebook engineering team seems great but gently caress Facebook. Microsoft is too far away for me to relocate to. On the flip-side of that, I've grown to like the take-home assignment interview style and would rather do that than gamble on getting another white-boarding question I would have easily been able to solve had the interviewer spoken English. Communication problems in the workplace is obviously a part of working but in an interview it feels unfair to the interviewee.
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Oct 11, 2017 16:22
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The process layers in the enterprise are a pain, but there is another side too. Generally, I can receive whatever I need for projects/prototypes. Need 10 VMs to play with? Have them the next day. Full access to an enterprise Azure subscription with no spending limit. No issue with dropping $XX,000 on yearly license fees for development software. Having a low-level issue with Windows? Just call up the assigned Microsoft rep and have him take a look at it. Software vendors taking you out to steak dinners. Etc. I love the me against the world feeling of early-stage startups too, but there's a certain comfort in a decent-sized company that has enough money to instantly-approve any technology requests that are less than $10K and make payroll on time.
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Oct 11, 2017 16:33
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Good Will Hrunting posted:I might give Google a shot again. I've heard mixed stuff from the three engineers I know there though. A lot of them just keep getting switched around too much to settle and have gotten quite frustrated. Also I interviewed a guy from the NYC office who left because "there were no women on his team" (I poo poo you not) and he had scathing stuff to say (probably got fired obviously). I'm curious as to what he said that have you that impression.
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Oct 11, 2017 16:36
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mrmcd posted:I'm curious as to what he said that have you that impression. The other two engineers I know in the NYC Google office make it seem like it's almost impossible to get "fired" and realistically why would you ever voluntarily leave Google besides starting your own company or something? I just assumed his claims of toxicity and disarray were a product of being canned. Not that we held it against him, he was bounced because his assignment submission sucked.
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Oct 11, 2017 16:46
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Keetron posted:Your account got hacked, you are never this sensible in your considerations. Broken clock etc.
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Oct 11, 2017 17:36
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