It's honestly hard to explain software development. (Criticism)

by MacAddictXIV , Seattle WA, Monday, August 06, 2018, 06:50 (2102 days ago)

As a software engineer I honestly try to hold my tongue when people unknowingly say things could be done easily done or question why Bungie hasn't fixed this or that. Every time I am just thinking in my head, from what information I know, how easy or hard it might be. And I'm only thinking about the standpoint of my job, which is just a developer, not a tester. Well, technically I do both but my job title is developer :D

I want to try and explain the complexities of software engineering, but it's honestly REALLY hard to tell people how complex some problems are for very little fixes or how easy some fixes have been for what seemed like very complex problems. You honestly never know.

And this is just further complicated by what type of product you have. I personally work on a product that is "Software as a Service" which means that it's a live product that is always running and there to support other companies. I support the foundation of the software, so if anything goes wrong it affects x% of people. And my managers have to constantly figure out what is the best use of my time. I have to fix things, but I also have to develop a product that keeps our company from going under.

Most people who are on a customer side of a product fail to realize this for SAS products and yes online games are basically SAS products. Customers care about their software working, yes that is very important. But a company has to make money. So they have all the developers spending probably at the very least 80% of their time developing and not fixing stuff.

Anyway, I'm mostly just vocalizing in the best way I can on how hard it is for people to understand software in general. It's not easy. Let me say that again. It's not easy. There is a reason that the most complex software today is done by hundreds of developers.

P.S. I went ahead and just put this in criticism because I figure there is going to be a lot of stuff brought up or no one will reply :)