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Subject:RE: Engineering specs: The way it spozed to be? From:"Joe Malin" <jmalin -at- tuvox -dot- com> To:"Dan Goldstein" <DGoldstein -at- riverainmedical -dot- com>, <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com> Date:Fri, 22 Sep 2006 10:22:37 -0700
My experience is that in modern, state-of-the-art software departments,
engineers do not make changes "whenever they feel like changing it". No
department has the time to allow random work. Ad hoc changes can cause
bugs, and they throw off the QA department. The product managers and
usability teams need to vet UI changes. The bottom line is that most
engineers are too busy implementing past-due features and fixing
long-standing bugs.
>From the outside, you may think you see random changes going on. This is
a communications problem. The engineering team, or bug council, or
senior management may have decided to make the change but didn't tell
absolutely everyone. Nobody is perfect. The solution is to work with
engineers to find a way to make these changes more visible.
Depending on constant updates to internal design/planning/implementation
documents is illusory; people are just not going to have the time. I am
convinced that you can find some other way to do it, even if it's
notifications from code check-ins.
Hardware, of course, is different. For a variety of reasons, hardware
companies have a very strict, defined, and enforced process for making
design changes.
Joe
Joe Malin
Technical Writer
(408)625-1623
jmalin -at- tuvox -dot- com
www.tuvox.com
The views expressed in this document are those of the sender, and do not
necessarily reflect those of TuVox, Inc.
-----Original Message-----
From: techwr-l-bounces+jmalin=tuvox -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
[mailto:techwr-l-bounces+jmalin=tuvox -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com] On Behalf
Of Dan Goldstein
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2006 1:51 PM
To: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
Subject: RE: Engineering specs: The way it spozed to be?
> -----Original Message-----
> From: stevefjong
> Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2006 4:44 PM
> To: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
> Subject: RE: Engineering specs: The way it spozed to be?
>
> To clarify our situation, I think my VP is asking when it's
> OK for an engineer to make a change without writing down in
> an internal document what's been done. (I get the sense that
> engineers change whatever they feel like changing whenever
> they feel like changing it, but I could be wrong.)
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