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User feedback
Apr. 27th, 2014 12:23 pmHaving a meaningful feedback from a smart end user is one of the best resources a product development team can utilize when defining a new revision of a product. Recently one of the end users of a product I am working on wrote two posts on an official support forum. The first post was full of very good technical advises on the product, and our team will definitely take it into account for the next release. My colleague had replied with a sincere words of gratitude.
The second post was more metaphorical and contains some points that I would like to argue with. As the support forum is not a right medium for flames, I'll post it here.
"[Decision making about the product] is dominated by Genius Engineering Geeks*, who usually talk to other GEGs at their customers."
Yes very well spotted! Why is it bad?
"don't assign strategic guidance of this project to someone who has a PhD in kernel performance analysis..."
Wow! It was very difficult to guess but job well done! Indeed a lot of work I did in recent ~10 years involved kernel performance analysis for several RTOSes and Linux. The good thing is now there are new ppl in the core team who "can appreciate the beauty of artichokes (see below)
"Hand it to one of your (few, if any?) employees who can barely parse an array, schedule a couple of blinking LEDs and say "Hello World!" on a serial port,"
I disagree. Actually I wish everyone who call themselves "s/w engineer" is able to parse an array, but unfortunately there are still ~10% who could not. Seriously, I am not quite getting how being a mediocre engineer would help in developing a product.
"but is passionate about wasting his childhood on a ZX81 (Timex Sinclair 1000 in the US) or a VIC20."
Very good example. I would not say I was wasting my childhood when I was programming i8080 (actually KR580xx) and then Z80 when I was 8. In fact that was a very good experienced that helped me to become a decent s/w engineer who does not have problems in "parsing arrays and sending hello_world to serial".
"Also, think philosophically. When writing software, be inspired by the beauty of calligraphy, novels and art books. Hardware-wise, relate to charming or yummy natural wonders like roses and artichokes."
Sorry I am not getting that. How/and what you measure? Reminder: if you can't measure, you can't build.
"If in doubt when designing electronic wizardry, let yourself be guided by these three "G"s: be technologically graceful, gentle and generous."
Sorry I am not getting that. How/and what you measure? Reminder: if you can't measure, you can't build. That would be especially funny for a big multicultural team where everyone has own measures of gracefulness, gentleness and generosity.
The second post was more metaphorical and contains some points that I would like to argue with. As the support forum is not a right medium for flames, I'll post it here.
"[Decision making about the product] is dominated by Genius Engineering Geeks*, who usually talk to other GEGs at their customers."
Yes very well spotted! Why is it bad?
"don't assign strategic guidance of this project to someone who has a PhD in kernel performance analysis..."
Wow! It was very difficult to guess but job well done! Indeed a lot of work I did in recent ~10 years involved kernel performance analysis for several RTOSes and Linux. The good thing is now there are new ppl in the core team who "can appreciate the beauty of artichokes (see below)
"Hand it to one of your (few, if any?) employees who can barely parse an array, schedule a couple of blinking LEDs and say "Hello World!" on a serial port,"
I disagree. Actually I wish everyone who call themselves "s/w engineer" is able to parse an array, but unfortunately there are still ~10% who could not. Seriously, I am not quite getting how being a mediocre engineer would help in developing a product.
"but is passionate about wasting his childhood on a ZX81 (Timex Sinclair 1000 in the US) or a VIC20."
Very good example. I would not say I was wasting my childhood when I was programming i8080 (actually KR580xx) and then Z80 when I was 8. In fact that was a very good experienced that helped me to become a decent s/w engineer who does not have problems in "parsing arrays and sending hello_world to serial".
"Also, think philosophically. When writing software, be inspired by the beauty of calligraphy, novels and art books. Hardware-wise, relate to charming or yummy natural wonders like roses and artichokes."
Sorry I am not getting that. How/and what you measure? Reminder: if you can't measure, you can't build.
"If in doubt when designing electronic wizardry, let yourself be guided by these three "G"s: be technologically graceful, gentle and generous."
Sorry I am not getting that. How/and what you measure? Reminder: if you can't measure, you can't build. That would be especially funny for a big multicultural team where everyone has own measures of gracefulness, gentleness and generosity.
