Brion Vibber to leave WMF, ... yeah, it's official. Options

[Alison]

It looks like Brion is moving on to another company, soon. He's announced it on his blog amongst other places. While I wish him well - he's one of the good guys (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/smile.gif) - I have to wonder what this is going to do for Flagged Revisions and some of the other important software updates. Knowing geeks as I do, he'll probably still work voluntarily on the sidelines - I know I would.

Anyways - I guess Jimmy's going to be hiring programmers and CTOs again soon (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/fear.gif)

[Kelly Martin]

It looks like Brion is moving on to another company, soon. He's announced it on his blog amongst other places. While I wish him well - he's one of the good guys (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/smile.gif) - I have to wonder what this is going to do for Flagged Revisions and some of the other important software updates. Knowing geeks as I do, he'll probably still work voluntarily on the sidelines - I know I would.

It will, no doubt, be used as yet another excuse to delay flagged revisions. There seems to be no end of reasons for not implementing them.

[Malleus]

I doubt that Brion's departure will make much difference, or that it was triggered by the ongoing flagged revisions fiasco.

[MBisanz]

I doubt that Brion's departure will make much difference, or that it was triggered by the ongoing flagged revisions fiasco.

I agree that I doubt it was triggered by flagged revs, but I would disagree that it will not make a difference, Brion has been with MediaWiki since it was created and is probably one of the only individuals out there with a full idea of what is actually in the software (undocumented extension, TS apps, external apps, etc) as well as what direction the software should be developed in (what things to include in core, how to make it more stable, more usable, things not to do with it, etc). I do have confidence is our other paid devs, but I will not undervalue Brion's immense role in the project.

[dogbiscuit]

(undocumented extension, TS apps, external apps, etc)

Usually, if the software is dependent on some individual then it can be a good thing to get them to move on and knock it into shape.

However, what may be sound for a professional software company may not be the right approach from a bodge and dodge shop (and somehow, I can't imagine that Jimbo set up anything else). A bit less time on the trampolines, and bit more time documenting the bits that are too quirky for anyone's sanity.

[Malleus]

(undocumented extension, TS apps, external apps, etc)

Usually, if the software is dependent on some individual then it can be a good thing to get them to move on and knock it into shape.

Exactly. Writing PhP "programs" doesn't seem that difficult to me, but the irony is that software shops generally can't afford outstandingly talented programmers (no idea whether Brion is in that category or not), because their work needs to be understood by those who are left behind when the prima donna moves on.

This post has been edited by Malleus:

[anthony]

Writing PhP "programs" doesn't seem that difficult to me, but the irony is that software shops generally can't afford outstandingly talented programmers (no idea whether Brion is in that category or not), because their work needs to be understood by those who are left behind when the prima donna moves on.

Without outstandingly talented programmers, how is anything going to get done?

You just need to hire outstandingly talented managers as well, to make sure, among other things, that documentation gets written for the outstandingly talented programmers who take over to use to get up to speed.

[dogbiscuit]

Writing PhP "programs" doesn't seem that difficult to me, but the irony is that software shops generally can't afford outstandingly talented programmers (no idea whether Brion is in that category or not), because their work needs to be understood by those who are left behind when the prima donna moves on.

Without outstandingly talented programmers, how is anything going to get done?

You just need to hire outstandingly talented managers as well, to make sure, among other things, that documentation gets written for the outstandingly talented programmers who take over to use to get up to speed.

You need outstandingly talented people to have the great ideas - but generally it is best not to let them implement any more than you have to. Most companies I've worked at have had a prima donna expert, and most have been better off when they have caged them. Most bright ideas end up having massive hidden maintenance costs.

[anthony]

Without outstandingly talented programmers, how is anything going to get done?

You just need to hire outstandingly talented managers as well, to make sure, among other things, that documentation gets written for the outstandingly talented programmers who take over to use to get up to speed.

You need outstandingly talented people to have the great ideas - but generally it is best not to let them implement any more than you have to. Most companies I've worked at have had a prima donna expert, and most have been better off when they have caged them. Most bright ideas end up having massive hidden maintenance costs.

That's an interesting position. Having always been on the "outstandingly talented" side of that equation, I really can't understand it. Nine times out of ten my great ideas don't get implemented if I'm not heavily involved with the implementation myself.

But if it works for you, I guess I can't blame you.

As for me, I suppose that's why I moved out of the software industry and became a tax accountant. It was far too frustrating to watch my creations destroyed by idiot code monkeys managed by idiot project managers. I guess I got spoiled in my first job, working on Unix kernel code with a whole team of outstandingly talented individuals, led by an outstandingly talented manager. In hindsight I should have never quit, but how was I to know that the rest of the world wasn't going to run that same way?

This post has been edited by anthony:

[dogbiscuit]

That's an interesting position. Having always been on the "outstandingly talented" side of that equation, I really can't understand it. Nine times out of ten my great ideas don't get implemented if I'm not heavily involved with the implementation myself.

But if it works for you, I guess I can't blame you.

That's because my outstanding talents are in digging companies out of the mess outstandingly talented people have dug themselves into.

It does depend on what sector you are in, but the general drudge of moving data from keyboard to disk, across to another bit of disk and occasionally back to the screen rarely calls for talent, what is needed is blatantly obvious, comprehensible, maintainable code that everyone can agree what it does. That goes for clever SQL too - untangling dozens of subclauses of heavily nested Oracle SQL and having a few temporary tables instead works wonders for proving that the code works in all possible situations ("But that shouldn't be null so it's not my fault!??!").

I'm too scarred from impossible to follow C++ template code to consider clever coding to be a good thing.

[Friday]

That's an interesting position. Having always been on the "outstandingly talented" side of that equation, I really can't understand it. Nine times out of ten my great ideas don't get implemented if I'm not heavily involved with the implementation myself.

But if it works for you, I guess I can't blame you.

That's because my outstanding talents are in digging companies out of the mess outstandingly talented people have dug themselves into.

It does depend on what sector you are in, but the general drudge of moving data from keyboard to disk, across to another bit of disk and occasionally back to the screen rarely calls for talent, what is needed is blatantly obvious, comprehensible, maintainable code that everyone can agree what it does. That goes for clever SQL too - untangling dozens of subclauses of heavily nested Oracle SQL and having a few temporary tables instead works wonders for proving that the code works in all possible situations ("But that shouldn't be null so it's not my fault!??!").

I'm too scarred from impossible to follow C++ template code to consider clever coding to be a good thing.

Yeah, there are a few niches where "clever" code is Good Thing, but for general purpose application development, easy-to-maintain code wins nearly every time.

If you're writing code that other people can't maintain, chances are you're not exceptionally talented, but rather an egotistical control freak.

[Milton Roe]

If you're writing code that other people can't maintain, chances are you're not exceptionally talented, but rather an egotistical control freak.

Or you have poor communications skills, which is far more common. Clear English annotation about "what I'm doing right here" can save anything, but you can't always get the coder to write it in any way that can be understood when he or she is not there. This is really the same technical writing problem as in any technical documentation. The expert who is doing the job is not necessarily the best person to explain it to others, but coding is one place where you need to, right at the same time, or else.

[dogbiscuit]

coding is one place where you need to right at the same time, or else.

(IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/tongue.gif)

MediaWiki has the classic syndrome of copious comments for the obvious - when things are going well and life is but a cut'n'paste - and then when things get tricky, we are left with "Don't change those double quotes back to single quotes because it breaks things" (with a few other "I don't know when this cariable gets set, so I've got to have this bit of code here").

Good coding needs very little comments because you use long, awkward, unambiguous self-explanatory variables and procedure names, and rely on the editor to do the typing for you (Visual Studio is a dream).

I lived through the James Martin Workbench phase, where it became abundantly apparent that if you wanted code, you needed to write code, and all the bluff about turning analysis into code simply meant you had highly paid analysts writing code (or worse, end users*).


*At a Leeds hosptital, IBM were facing Oracle. IBM were selling their good ol' American package, not a great fit but good enough; Oracle were selling a database, plus a load of ticks in the boxes of "can it do this that and the other?" because, as a database it could be programmed to do anything - in this case, the ultimate healthcare "expert system". I pointed out that Oracle were making nurses and doctors programmers, and the lack of wisdom of this, when they had real jobs to do - and they were not trained to recognise the implications of coding up a system.