Comments on: A Tale of 2 Developers

By: Effective Development » Link: The Duct Tape Programmer

Effective Development » Link: The Duct Tape Programmer — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 18:00:20 +0000

[...] This is a great Article I found on Joel On Software. In this article Joel writes about the concept of the Duct Tape Programmer. This is the programmer who gets things done and doesn’t feel the need to show off their software architect skills by over-engineering software. The Duct Tape Programmer is similar to the fictional developer I called “Jim” in my post A Tale of 2 Developers. [...]

By: Burnsy

Burnsy — Thu, 21 May 2009 18:47:05 +0000

In terms of who to hire – Jim or Johnny, I’d say it depends on what type of company they’d be working for. A financial company? Probably Johnny. An internet startup? Probably Jim. Myself, I’d like to hire both of them! It would be a good balance. But if I had to choose? I guess I’d lean toward Jim based on your premise that “Johnny doesn’t really have a large scale stable project under his belt.”

By: bill breen

bill breen — Thu, 21 May 2009 16:23:07 +0000

Mike, good point. I think there is a fine line between a generalist who can apply the right tool for the job, and someone who is just a tinkerer. Ideally your tech leads and management are aware of the possible tools for the job, allowing developers to hone their specific skills without being too distracted chasing technologies.

By: bill breen

bill breen — Thu, 21 May 2009 16:19:40 +0000

Kevin, I I know what you mean regarding developers talking to clients. It depends on the skillset of the developer and their comfort level. I find it is mutual also. Many developers do not want to talk and meet with clients. They find it a distraction discussing mundane features and issues while their brain is running through code ideas. Others are just naturally introverted and avoid it at all costs.
But, some teams are so small, this is not an option.

By: Mike L

Mike L — Thu, 21 May 2009 15:22:35 +0000

I think it depends on what you’re trying to do. The other end of the spectrum you have programmers that will use only one tool (java programmers, I’m looking at you) for every job. When all you have is a hammer everything looks like a nail. Twitter made this mistake by building a messaging system with Ruby on Rails. Now they use Scala which is a better fit for what they are trying to accomplish.

By: Kevin B

Kevin B — Thu, 21 May 2009 14:46:14 +0000

Never let your developers talk to clients.