Joel holds forth on the software approach of the day.
Almost any argument about managing the software development process inevitably deteriorates into anecdote-ping-pong. “We did wawa and everyone quit.”
“Oh yeah? Then how do you explain Company X? They wawa regularly and their stock is up 20%!”
This is an interesting post in a variety of ways. It points out how little is really known about some aspects of s/w engineering even until today. I laughed out loud when I saw the quote, " They wawa regularily and their stock is up 20%!" I remember one over zealous management type at my office who said "... the stock price is a reflection of your hard work." Whatta moron. This was in 1999, well before the bubble burst. Even then I knew that it wouldn't last forever, and our stock price was a reflection of a fundemental imbalance where there were more buyers than sellers temporarily. While we were working hard in 1999, we worked harder the following two years when the stock declined drastically.
Reminds me of what a wise software engineer said to me. "You can be sure that someone is lying if they know exactly what day software will ship and exactly how much it costs."
