No Initiative. :(
-
I work now at a huge company. It's one of the biggest private companies in the nation. I fully expected a rather large and ponderous bunch of managers who rarely went out on a limb. The truth is quite the opposite. They embrace change when there is a strong likely of benefit from it. I talked them into a year+ long development project in a radically new direction and they eagerly jumped on it. They're sending me to a conference next month about it. The curious thing is the company is very antiquated about some things on a philosophical basis. For example, all purchase orders must be submitted in paper. None of this new-fangled electronic stuff for POs. So a guy made a spreadsheet and submitting a PO now (for us) is e-mailing the spreadsheet to the appropriate person and printing it out for the piece of paper. The PO then has to be hand-entered into "the system" which is an old AS400 program with a console interface. They refuse to have a windows interface for it. That part isn't exactly philosophical - it's the result of an obstructionist curmudgeon who is the VP of IT. Neither of my bosses can stand him. Incidentally, that's how short the chain of command is - I have a direct boss, there is a division manager, and he answers to one of the company owners.
"They have a consciousness, they have a life, they have a soul! Damn you! Let the rabbits wear glasses! Save our brothers! Can I get an amen?"
On the other hand, I had to reverse a pile of Purchase Orders that were generated by the automated Purchasing System because the noobish Finance "Manager" was doing some "what if I do this... ". And this system could purchase "fast".
"(I) am amazed to see myself here rather than there ... now rather than then". ― Blaise Pascal
-
I've been trying for three months to get my new co-workers excited about doing new development in the form of a rewrite of our web app suite (currently ASP.Net with jquery) to ASP.NET MVC5. All I've gotten in return is the equivalent of, "Great! But it will be a lot of work, so lets not". Yesterday, I mentioned to the PM that I was working on a rewrite at home because we don't have the time/desire to do it at work, and you'd think I was trying to hack the freakin Pentagon. I'm so tired of government contract work... There is no motivation to excel, and initiative is stomped out before it gains a foothold in peiople's minds.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013Sorry, they are right. A rewrite to MVC5 is a complete waste of time. The .NET Framework will be supported - and even receive some development - over the next 5-10 years, but the message is clear: It is at the end of the road. The requirement for backwards compatibility turned it into a beast where changes are too costly (basically the exact same problem making you want to rewrite your app). All new development from Microsoft is focusing on .NET Core. While not as clean as I would hoped (ArrayList ported… really Microsoft?), there is a lot to like - so while it will be a somewhat painful migration for some of our legacy code, I can't say I would not have made the same move if it was me in control of the .NET landscape.
-
I'm not changing things in the actual code base. I'm simply trying to come up with a MVC version of the apps. Nothign special or more ground-breaking than reloacting some of the elements to clean up the 90's era design.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013 -
Sorry, they are right. A rewrite to MVC5 is a complete waste of time. The .NET Framework will be supported - and even receive some development - over the next 5-10 years, but the message is clear: It is at the end of the road. The requirement for backwards compatibility turned it into a beast where changes are too costly (basically the exact same problem making you want to rewrite your app). All new development from Microsoft is focusing on .NET Core. While not as clean as I would hoped (ArrayList ported… really Microsoft?), there is a lot to like - so while it will be a somewhat painful migration for some of our legacy code, I can't say I would not have made the same move if it was me in control of the .NET landscape.
Core presents some additional iis concerns for us, and today, I consider it just half-baked. Besides that, we can't use anything newer than VS2015 until VS2017 is put on the approved software list. I started this journey with core, and had to back away.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013 -
Been there, done that. I worked for government contractors for 10 years and got tired of finally getting to develop something unique and fun just to have it shelved in the end due to politics. Finally, I landed a really good job with a commercial company. The development isn't cutting edge, but at least it will get used.
"When you are dead, you won't even know that you are dead. It's a pain only felt by others; same thing when you are stupid." Ignorant - An individual without knowledge, but is willing to learn. Stupid - An individual without knowledge and is incapable of learning. Idiot - An individual without knowledge and allows social media to do the thinking for them.
For my first many years at my current employer, one of the owners who is quite bright had me produce a number of application. Also, the COO. And others. They're so old I'm beginning to forget that they exist - but that's where they sit - unused and gathering dust (if that can be done inside a HDD). Not to say I didn't learn anything. Each was an adventure. The sad reality is that the same people sort of people are to be found everywhere. If some sort of environment could be found to attract them (in particular), it would be a worthwhile investment to set the place up and remove them from the actual work force.
"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein
"If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you are seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010
-
I've been trying for three months to get my new co-workers excited about doing new development in the form of a rewrite of our web app suite (currently ASP.Net with jquery) to ASP.NET MVC5. All I've gotten in return is the equivalent of, "Great! But it will be a lot of work, so lets not". Yesterday, I mentioned to the PM that I was working on a rewrite at home because we don't have the time/desire to do it at work, and you'd think I was trying to hack the freakin Pentagon. I'm so tired of government contract work... There is no motivation to excel, and initiative is stomped out before it gains a foothold in peiople's minds.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013As others have said, it's not just government. This contractor at the place I'm currently working sent out an email a couple of weeks ago how he'd found a "u-tube" video (yes, that's the term which was used) which showed how to "create an MVC application without using linq". Because actually learning any new technologies is hard, and not worth it. Sigh. While I certainly agree that rushing down the path of "use new thing just because" is bad as well, I saw this email and my first thought was, "ok, but why would you?" Trying to drag them kicking and screaming into the early part of this century...
-
I've been trying for three months to get my new co-workers excited about doing new development in the form of a rewrite of our web app suite (currently ASP.Net with jquery) to ASP.NET MVC5. All I've gotten in return is the equivalent of, "Great! But it will be a lot of work, so lets not". Yesterday, I mentioned to the PM that I was working on a rewrite at home because we don't have the time/desire to do it at work, and you'd think I was trying to hack the freakin Pentagon. I'm so tired of government contract work... There is no motivation to excel, and initiative is stomped out before it gains a foothold in peiople's minds.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013John, Newer isn't Better, it's just different. And full of bugs at first. Try starting and running your own company and develop you own product sometimes. That should give you a whole new attitude adjustment. As someone who has been there, I know. Also don't forget the User interface. Every change you make to it, requires re-training on the part of your users. The PM should have explained this to you.
Newer isn't Better, it's just different.
-
As others have said, it's not just government. This contractor at the place I'm currently working sent out an email a couple of weeks ago how he'd found a "u-tube" video (yes, that's the term which was used) which showed how to "create an MVC application without using linq". Because actually learning any new technologies is hard, and not worth it. Sigh. While I certainly agree that rushing down the path of "use new thing just because" is bad as well, I saw this email and my first thought was, "ok, but why would you?" Trying to drag them kicking and screaming into the early part of this century...
I've been doing this for 40 years. I know it's not just government contracts.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013 -
I've been trying for three months to get my new co-workers excited about doing new development in the form of a rewrite of our web app suite (currently ASP.Net with jquery) to ASP.NET MVC5. All I've gotten in return is the equivalent of, "Great! But it will be a lot of work, so lets not". Yesterday, I mentioned to the PM that I was working on a rewrite at home because we don't have the time/desire to do it at work, and you'd think I was trying to hack the freakin Pentagon. I'm so tired of government contract work... There is no motivation to excel, and initiative is stomped out before it gains a foothold in peiople's minds.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013Alright, listen up (mostly for the people that I don't recall ever interacting with here). I've been a developer for almost 40 years. I already know it's the same everywhere. I already know about "new is not necessarily better" and the danger of introducing bugs (although honestly that should be a non-issue because ALL dev work - maintenance or new dev - is at risk for that aspect). I already know about the hazards of changing the UI regarding idiot users. I'm not anywhere close to being new at this crap. My rant was merely about my current lot in life. It can even be summed up with the phrase, "Same sh*t different day", and everyone here could nod in agreement.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013 -
I've been trying for three months to get my new co-workers excited about doing new development in the form of a rewrite of our web app suite (currently ASP.Net with jquery) to ASP.NET MVC5. All I've gotten in return is the equivalent of, "Great! But it will be a lot of work, so lets not". Yesterday, I mentioned to the PM that I was working on a rewrite at home because we don't have the time/desire to do it at work, and you'd think I was trying to hack the freakin Pentagon. I'm so tired of government contract work... There is no motivation to excel, and initiative is stomped out before it gains a foothold in peiople's minds.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013Reminds of this: [Initiative](https://rlv.zcache.ca/initiative\_motivational\_parody\_poster-r25d7d9769d164d4ab6d848ec9159efb0\_vevj5\_8byvr\_540.jpg)
-
I work now at a huge company. It's one of the biggest private companies in the nation. I fully expected a rather large and ponderous bunch of managers who rarely went out on a limb. The truth is quite the opposite. They embrace change when there is a strong likely of benefit from it. I talked them into a year+ long development project in a radically new direction and they eagerly jumped on it. They're sending me to a conference next month about it. The curious thing is the company is very antiquated about some things on a philosophical basis. For example, all purchase orders must be submitted in paper. None of this new-fangled electronic stuff for POs. So a guy made a spreadsheet and submitting a PO now (for us) is e-mailing the spreadsheet to the appropriate person and printing it out for the piece of paper. The PO then has to be hand-entered into "the system" which is an old AS400 program with a console interface. They refuse to have a windows interface for it. That part isn't exactly philosophical - it's the result of an obstructionist curmudgeon who is the VP of IT. Neither of my bosses can stand him. Incidentally, that's how short the chain of command is - I have a direct boss, there is a division manager, and he answers to one of the company owners.
"They have a consciousness, they have a life, they have a soul! Damn you! Let the rabbits wear glasses! Save our brothers! Can I get an amen?"
My experience has been similar, I worked at a large multinational company that wasn't afraid to pour money into research and try new ideas. I once proposed a research idea that would cost $1,000,000 and the manager that approved it said "Why not, it's got a chance oF working and it's less than 0.1% OF OUR BUDGET, SO LET'S TRY.I also worked for smaller companies that didn't have the resources to pour into much of anything, so they didn't try new things until they were commonplace in the industry.
CQ de W5ALT
Walt Fair, Jr., P. E. Comport Computing Specializing in Technical Engineering Software
-
It works like this (public and private sectors alike): Long ago we spent an absolute fortune on something that was poorly conceived and planned. It went way over budget and never really did the job properly. We had years of back and forth between development and UAT and thousands and thousands of hours were wasted. Now, you're telling us that it could have been done much more simply and effectively without a life-time of associated technical debt. We'd like to believe you (and you may well be right!) but the pilchard who worked on the previous system told us exactly the same things back in the day and now we're never going to trust a developer again. Ever. Sorry about that, now can you just add a little more string and sellotape to get the existing pile of garbage to do one extra little thing, please?
Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect. - Mark Twain
-
Alright, listen up (mostly for the people that I don't recall ever interacting with here). I've been a developer for almost 40 years. I already know it's the same everywhere. I already know about "new is not necessarily better" and the danger of introducing bugs (although honestly that should be a non-issue because ALL dev work - maintenance or new dev - is at risk for that aspect). I already know about the hazards of changing the UI regarding idiot users. I'm not anywhere close to being new at this crap. My rant was merely about my current lot in life. It can even be summed up with the phrase, "Same sh*t different day", and everyone here could nod in agreement.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013John Simmons / outlaw programmer wrote:
My rant was merely about my current lot in life. It can even be summed up with the phrase, "Same sh*t different day", and everyone here could nod in agreement.
"
Nodding in agreement, John!
CQ de W5ALT
Walt Fair, Jr., P. E. Comport Computing Specializing in Technical Engineering Software
-
What I find ironic is that while everybody agrees that a redsesign/rewrite would be a good thing, they don't want to commit to it, and eventually, the software becomes so outdated and im[possible to maintain that it goes "EOL", and everybody blames the programmers for not "taking the initiative to do a rewrite (that management refused to allow in the first place.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013 -
I've been trying for three months to get my new co-workers excited about doing new development in the form of a rewrite of our web app suite (currently ASP.Net with jquery) to ASP.NET MVC5. All I've gotten in return is the equivalent of, "Great! But it will be a lot of work, so lets not". Yesterday, I mentioned to the PM that I was working on a rewrite at home because we don't have the time/desire to do it at work, and you'd think I was trying to hack the freakin Pentagon. I'm so tired of government contract work... There is no motivation to excel, and initiative is stomped out before it gains a foothold in peiople's minds.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013I did a few goverment jobs - they all failed. None of my other projects ever failed. In Goverment projects, nobody cares if it is ever finished. And - in my experience - almost all externals are sitting there to make as much hours as possible so even they do not want the project to succeed. So I don't do any goverment project anymore; it's just a waste of time.
-
I've been trying for three months to get my new co-workers excited about doing new development in the form of a rewrite of our web app suite (currently ASP.Net with jquery) to ASP.NET MVC5. All I've gotten in return is the equivalent of, "Great! But it will be a lot of work, so lets not". Yesterday, I mentioned to the PM that I was working on a rewrite at home because we don't have the time/desire to do it at work, and you'd think I was trying to hack the freakin Pentagon. I'm so tired of government contract work... There is no motivation to excel, and initiative is stomped out before it gains a foothold in peiople's minds.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013for my opinion (its worth what you paid to get it $0.00) Sounds like you are one of two extremes, the newbie that is uber excited to be part of the group which also can includes the guy with a new toy! Again super excited to bring that (new toy, language, design paradigm) to the group or you could be the other extreme. A craftsman, one who probably started this field on their own well before setting foot on a campus but it was never a job and always the pursuit of perfection, making something the absolute best it can be with the best choice of languages and tools and/or architecture. If you are the newbie or simply have a new toy - there is hope for you. If you are the craftsman, the ultimate configurer than I am truly sorry and I know your pain. I have been a hired gun for almost 40 years myself in this industry. There has been both good jobs and bad jobs and many nights programming for work until 2 AM at home, and showing up at work by 8 AM to start my day allover - suffering for my art because I know it can be done better, faster, with tighter security and with better stability (typically starting with architecture at square one). However, if that is NOT you then simply keep your head down, your ears open, volunteer for team lead on projects you know you can handle and brass will eventually trust you with bigger projects - OH!!! Watch your back, get to know who your friends are and WHO THEY ARE NOT. Don't let the amount of back stabbing make you a casualty, people will do some serious politicking if they feel their work/job/career is in jeopardy from the new guy, especially if the new guy is as good as he claims.
-
I've been trying for three months to get my new co-workers excited about doing new development in the form of a rewrite of our web app suite (currently ASP.Net with jquery) to ASP.NET MVC5. All I've gotten in return is the equivalent of, "Great! But it will be a lot of work, so lets not". Yesterday, I mentioned to the PM that I was working on a rewrite at home because we don't have the time/desire to do it at work, and you'd think I was trying to hack the freakin Pentagon. I'm so tired of government contract work... There is no motivation to excel, and initiative is stomped out before it gains a foothold in peiople's minds.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013I know the feeling. I work for a small software firm and our primary product is so mired in old code (much of it Borland OWL which pretty much only one person in the company touches these days), that any attempt to improve the product is met with the same "that will be a ton of work that we can't do because we need to concentrate on new features". I almost always end up implementing new methodologies in my off-time or in projects that are entirely within my control, and slowly begin interfacing the legacy code to use them in "baby steps" ("what about Bob?"). We have countless requests for specific improvements that have literally all been handled in a "proof of concept" I wrote a few years ago, but until I can mirror all of our internal and external legacy API calls, there is no way to drop in this new system. That proof of concept was proven to be faster, more memory efficient, more fault tolerant and more resilient to abnormally high concurrent transaction counts than our old legacy system, while also opening up the door for a clustered parallel processing solution. 4 years later, that "proof of concept" still has not been implemented in our product because of the fear of beginning a new branch that could get out of date with current fixes while in development. (Though, I have it running as an alternate service provider for several of my projects on one of my test servers.) I feel your pain!
-
I've been trying for three months to get my new co-workers excited about doing new development in the form of a rewrite of our web app suite (currently ASP.Net with jquery) to ASP.NET MVC5. All I've gotten in return is the equivalent of, "Great! But it will be a lot of work, so lets not". Yesterday, I mentioned to the PM that I was working on a rewrite at home because we don't have the time/desire to do it at work, and you'd think I was trying to hack the freakin Pentagon. I'm so tired of government contract work... There is no motivation to excel, and initiative is stomped out before it gains a foothold in peiople's minds.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013An analogy just occurred to me. Re-writing software in a different framework or language might be like switching a petrol engine car to electric. For most users (bosses included), when they sit in the new car, and don't see or feel anything different, they might wonder why all the fuss and cost. But it's more efficient. The engine kicks in 0.2 seconds vs 2 seconds. Running cost will be lower. Fixing things will be simpler because fewer moving parts. It will be easier to re-use the engine across other cars, reducing the development time of those (repeat time might be reduced but initial development expense might mean return takes a few years - long term planning for the win) Boss: "And it will look and feel the same"? You: "Yes, with those additional things you want!" Boss: "But you could add those additional things to the existing version?" You: :( You: "I will go back to my dungeon and add the feature to allow a user to define how big they want the buttons to be."
-
I've been trying for three months to get my new co-workers excited about doing new development in the form of a rewrite of our web app suite (currently ASP.Net with jquery) to ASP.NET MVC5. All I've gotten in return is the equivalent of, "Great! But it will be a lot of work, so lets not". Yesterday, I mentioned to the PM that I was working on a rewrite at home because we don't have the time/desire to do it at work, and you'd think I was trying to hack the freakin Pentagon. I'm so tired of government contract work... There is no motivation to excel, and initiative is stomped out before it gains a foothold in peiople's minds.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013John Simmons / outlaw programmer wrote:
'm so tired of government contract work... There is no motivation to excel, and initiative is stomped out before it gains a foothold in peiople's minds.
I worked as an expert witness for the government on the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. It was a nice experience and I enjoyed it!
CQ de W5ALT
Walt Fair, Jr., P. E. Comport Computing Specializing in Technical Engineering Software
-
I've been trying for three months to get my new co-workers excited about doing new development in the form of a rewrite of our web app suite (currently ASP.Net with jquery) to ASP.NET MVC5. All I've gotten in return is the equivalent of, "Great! But it will be a lot of work, so lets not". Yesterday, I mentioned to the PM that I was working on a rewrite at home because we don't have the time/desire to do it at work, and you'd think I was trying to hack the freakin Pentagon. I'm so tired of government contract work... There is no motivation to excel, and initiative is stomped out before it gains a foothold in peiople's minds.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013John Simmons / outlaw programmer wrote:
I'm so tired of government contract work...we don't have the time/desire to do it at work, and you'd think I was trying to hack the freakin Pentagon.
It was my understanding that government contracts were based on dollars for features. Thus if it isn't in the contract then it should not be done in the first place. To be fair however that is how all contracts work. The developer doesn't get paid to work on what they want - they are paid to work on what the customer wants. One is of course free to convince the customer that they should want something else. And produce another contract. However that role is seldom one that a developer will be doing. Somewhat reasonable of course given that normal businesses end up in the situation where they find that a developer has spent the last month working on something that they are sure is better (although often being able to quantify that is non-existent) rather than what they were supposed to be and said they were working on. Not to mention that they fail to consider the actual cost to the business such as impacts like the cost to re-test the entire stack or even actual impacts to customer processes.
