How dare I polish and remove kludges from previous releases. 😆
Also, none of those kludges would have even been necessary if the project scope was properly defined from the start and the project manager didn’t let the users keep trickling in new requirements without also extending the deadline.
So yeah, how dare I go back and implement something the way it should have been done the first time?
Hrm, I would argue that if your update gets in the way of productivity on the user side, then it’s actually worse, not better.
Sure, in a vacuum it might be superior, but that is now what is happening.
We used to rail against our users always wanting an Excel like view for everything, but when you observe them working to understand their work flow it makes sense. They use excel the other 75%of the day, we’re the one breaking their mental flow and ruining their productivity.
Just because someone got used to walking around on their knuckles doesn’t mean walking upright isn’t easier and better overall. Sure, it will be difficult, it will be uncomfortable, and they’ll have to get used to it before they see any improvement, but once they get past those hurdles even they will be amazed at how fast walking upright can be. And in the meantime, no one else who already has a tendency to walk upright will have to go through the pain and inefficiency of walking on their knuckles.
These people don’t get to pick whether they use Excel, either. They have to, they just want to get their job done and go home, too.
They don’t get paid to walk upright, basically. So why do it just so someone else can buy another yacht?
You seem very defensive of the workers. That’s cool, I’m one of them.
Good workers will do better with the right tool. Bad workers, those who are resistant to change and are unwilling to learn, will never do better. So why cater to the bad workers? Now catering to the bad workers makes sense if the job is so basic that virtually no training is required, and bad workers need to eat, too. But saying we should all crawl because they don’t want to run is absurd.
Software developers are uniquely arrogant in their belief that they have a right to choose when the workers of entire industries or sometimes everyone in the world needs to re-train on the tools they use to do their jobs.
I’m a woodworker. Imagine if I walked into the shop one day to find my table saw replaced with one of those mutant sliding table European things because the manufacturer pushed an update. “We’ve replaced your tool with one that conforms to recently adopted industry norms, buzzwords and trendy design patterns we in the table saw industry have been peer pressuring each other into adopting. You may proceed to suckle upon our genitals in gratitude and worship.”
Meanwhile I’m losing money because the tool I rely on to run my business no longer functions how I was trained to use it. I have to tell my customers that their orders aren’t getting filled because I was visited by the saw fairy and instead of building their furniture for them I have to read manuals, learn how to safely use this thing, find where all the controls went, and then remake all the jigs and tooling I relied on for production and hopefully I can get back to doing actual work before they change it again according to their needs and not mine, on their schedule and not mine.
That’s what it’s like using software in the age of nightly updates or worse cloud-based solutions. You never know when your tools will change out from under you mid-project.