Please do not implement code you can not support

Dear Daybreak,

Other gaming companies have no problems saying they are delaying new content because of the pandemic. It's hard to develop in isolation. We just want a world other then our homes right now. Don't push yourselves. Get it working and wait to add new stuff please!

Who is isolated? Do employees of their company not have internet or phones? I do code every day from my house, because I know my job and I know how to do it. Stop making excuses.

That's YOU. You are accustomed to working from home every day.

There is a difference between working from home and working at the office though. As a software engineer, if you're in an agile or even kanban the day to day ceremonies feel a lot different. Especially retros because you're not physically in the room and they are designed to be intimate. This is especially so if your company does not have a WFH policy in place. Fortunately my company allowed some work from home days to test the waters over the years and we're all working efficiently, but I can see where this could throw disorganized development teams into disarray.

We don't know the working environment at Darkpaw, so please don't assume they have it easy. I hope they do, but again you just never know the situation.

Yep server mergers and new TLP server should be on hold until they are all back from isolation.

I think it's safe to assume DPG is a waterfall shop.

Why are you making the assumption "it's hard to develop in isolation"? Who's isolated? Everyone can video chat if they need to see someone's face for whatever reason or just use skype, webex, cell phone audio to keep connected. Plus they can just share their screens and its like they are back in the office.

When you factor in the time saved each day from not having to commute, not having to get dressed up for an office environment, being able to eat food directly out of your kitchen instead of taking lunch time to go eat out, and the ensuing productivity gains from the lower stress levels by being in a comfortable surroundings (and not being stressed out via the traffic), I would bet there is more chance that the devs are more productive now than before the stay at home orders.

LOL at people who think agile/kanban ceremonies are important.

IBM and most other tech giants disagrees with you.

Humans do not collaborate as well remotely as they do in person, has been plenty of research on this.

All of which you assume companies that didn’t have telework, already had in place all the infrastructure to successfully implement telework.

This guy codes.

Really? So we will see new servers in 5-6 months?
Mangler and other servers are lag/crash only because there is no new servers yet, just open 1-2 new servers and Mangler will be ok and all you ppl will be happy. Noone force you to join new servers, even if them will lag/crash too, so just play on your server you currently is.

It is hard to do IT infrastructure work from remote, unless you have a robot or something. There is more to running this operation than coding.

Yeah it is hard to replace physical infrastructure or something. But unless you are running some super secure network no one physically goes to a server to make a change even when they are working from the office.

I work for one of those tech giants for over 2 decades now and work remotely - many of us do. Your statements are false.

What code do you think they implemented that they can't support?

It’s false that IBM required workers to come back home in 2017. Good to know, let me call my Uncle and some friends to let them know they didn’t actually have to move back or lose their job. Glad to know google hasn’t been spending billions on office space for their workers! And great to learn if you don’t have infrastructure in place for people to work remotely you can just magically have them do it.

Good for you at working at company that has supported it. Nothing I said was false.

I wouldn't make that assumption. Sure, their code base is ancient by software development standards but that doesn't mean their processes are. Waterfall doesn't make coding/testing worse, it just makes predictability and planning worse. Granted, they have a QA issue but I don't think that has to do with the software development methodology they use.

Just curious, what is your level of experience with software development methodologies?

Perhaps you should - my friends and former coworkers at IBM have had no issues.

What you're failing to realize is that in a global company, you are almost always working with people remotely, whether you drove into an office to do it or not. I work with people all across the country and world - from the east coast to the west coast, in Europe, Asia, etc - everyday. In large companies, it is the norm and no different if done from a work place office or your home (and in fact, impossible to do from work due to timing, or do you think midnight conference calls happen in the office?).

Ugh.

Waterfall isn't bad per say, it's just an older (and ultimately slower) practice by nature.

I have a few Scrum Masters at my company that would like a word with you.

Yep, been there many times. Remote or from home work is becoming the norm in many large tech companies. Microsoft allows (prior to virus) many of their workers only come into work once or twice a week during non peek traffic hours in the Seattle area because you can spend up to 3 hours in your car a day just trying to get through the traffic. Get much more production out of someone logged in and working at home.