705
You are already a real developer. I'm guessing that your boss is belittling you in order to keep your morale down, so that you're less likely to look for another job or ask for a better salary. Five years of experience is more than enough to consider yourself a qualified developer.
Given that your current role is not going well, and you have an emotionally ...
692
it's still wrong
Why? Because some handbook written by an HR busybody says so?
That's a deliberately inflammatory statement and I don't necessarily completely agree with it, but at its core is a very important point: why does it matter if the developer is in the office or not? You say yourself they're a very good worker and don't need to be in the office ...
398
The other answers are decent, but to me they seem like unnecessary escalation.
If you go along with this, then yes, you need to cover yourself legally.
However, have you tried the simple approach?
He says it will negatively affect how the app looks. Ask him to open up his iPhone, and navigate to "Settings" -> "General" -> "About" -> "Legal" and see how ...
394
I was hired for a 2.5 month contract. I was warned by friends and family not to throw myself into the work and not finish too quickly.
I ignored them, and did the job in 3 weeks. My employer had me budgeted for the full 2.5 months (I did not know this when I did the job). When I finished early, I was asked to assist with a process that was taking 10 ...
341
If you have one developer and twenty(!) managers on this project, your developer is more than likely unable to get any actual work done while in-office. He's been putting in hours at work and then going home to code, got sick of it, and decided to just not donate his free time to the company.
I suspect that the real problem here is that other employees are ...
312
Be humble.
I'm a bit confused here. My understanding was that feature X has property Y. Is there something I'm missing here which means this doesn't work in this case?
Much better to start from the assumption that you are the one that is wrong, rather than the other way round. If you're wrong, you'll learn something; if you were in fact right, you've now ...
310
A lot of good advice here but I'll add my 2 cents
Never negotiate the Price, Negotiate the Features
Time is your currency and your budget is low. Here's a sample script (manager goes first):
- I want it now
- OK. What are the features?
- A, B and C.
- In that timeframe I can only do one. Which one is the most important?
- A smart guy like you ...
300
First, if you worked 53 hours, you need to bill for 53. The client is getting the value of 10 extra hours, and you're giving it away for nothing? Don't do that any more.
Second, "budget problems" is a negotiating tactic in this situation. The value of your work hasn't decreased a bit. You can't call your phone company, electric company, or landlord and ...
282
As a developer these are things I hate:
Requesting software/resources taking forever and needing loads of forms etc.
Stupid requirements that are contradictory to other features or tecnically not possible due to existing functionality.
Unreasonable and arbitrary/pulled out of thin air deadlines being set.
Not knowing the priority of my work.
So, if you ...
278
But something I need to do. But what?
Provide your feedback in a "constructive way", and be done about it. Not your place to make decisions.
Mention something along the lines of
"It was good to get a chance to evaluate the product X. As I see it:
- Pros: 1, 2, 3
- Cons: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, ......
As it is evident from the analysis ...
276
I was wondering if this is a safe topic of conversation in a one to
one meeting with my team lead.
This behavior is an acceptable topic, jumping to conclusion as to the cause isn't. I would come at it along the lines of:
Hey boss. I've noticed lately that when I present technical info about the project you always confirm it with Adam or Bob yet when ...
274
FYI, most universities don't teach about things like JSON. They teach things like depth-first tree traversal that you could theoretically apply in creating your own JSON library, but anything more practical than that almost everyone is self-taught or learned on the job.
Try not to get defensive. Explaining practical technologies like JSON is something we ...
264
This of course could place the company under serious fire for invading
users' privacy when we get found out. In fact, as far as my country's
laws go, it not only illegal, it is unconstitutional.
You're being asked to break the law and do things that might land you in prison or otherwise in serious trouble.
This argument fell on my CEO's deaf ears, ...
262
You should send an email to him saying something along the lines of:
I see that you pushed the code from my branch to the master branch. Please keep in mind that revision history is important in these sort of products, so having code cut and pasted into the main branch, as you did, should be avoided; rather, the code should be pushed from the branch it ...
256
I think you're asking the wrong question. I'm going to go ahead and say that challenge was probably designed for you to fail it:
You've been given a really impromptu test, which is kind of weird outside of an interview setting. I've never heard of it happening like that before. If my manager suddenly did that, I'd stare blankly at him and ask what the heck ...
234
Has doing it your way ever helped? Was there even once a time when you used indirection and injection and extra interfaces, and there was a last-minute swerve, and it was all handled smoothly and beautifully with no swearing? Even at a previous job, if you've never been able to get that code committed here?
I'm going to assume there was. Practice telling ...
196
Stop this madness before it starts.
When your boss has an urgent issue that needs addressing "by everyone", call a meeting.
Discuss the issue rationally, work out what needs doing, work out the resources you need to make it happen, and put that plan into action.
Quit panicking, start planning. Get it done right, by the right amount of people.
Feel free ...
196
You launched a formal complaint complete with witnesses and documentation which was investigated for 10 weeks while you were paid for doing nothing, and then your complaints were found to be groundless, even your witnesses did not back you up.
Is this co-worker relationship salvageable?
No. You put multiple people into a difficult position. Things will ...
195
I don't think it is inappropriate, but I would take care how you word this question. Make sure the interviewee understands why you are asking it. I once had a job where basically everything I did outside work was 'forbidden', so this question would make me hesitant if I didn't know why you were asking. There are companies out there that consider every line ...
186
This is obviously against policy, and although what he is doing
doesn't require to do any interaction with anyone in the office it's
still wrong
Change the policy slightly
I think you should change the work from home policy for your team to be at your manager's discretion, meaning at your discretion. This way you can say they are following the rules, ...
182
If your company has a lawyer, or an ethics overseer, talk to them. It is usually considered the duty of any employee to bring to their attention any practice that might be unethical, or make the company vulnerable to lawsuits.
If there is no such person I would write to your boss pointing out that you believe failing to acknowledge copyright may make the ...
181
Based off your information on this question I assume this question is also linked with this question.
The way your manager has sprung this test on you is completely unfair and clearly an attempt to prove that you are not able to work here when realistically the time restraint was likely too short and the notice was non-existent. The way he approached you ...
173
Get everything in writing
The client wants you to do a job that is substantially different than what's in your employment contract.
They want you to do it under unusual and technically-challenging conditions.
These conditions are possibly unethical (for the managers) and carry significant potential risk for you (mostly reputational, possibly legal).
It ...
165
One of the thresholds for stopping with a recruiter is are they honest, can they be trusted?
Ask the recruiter if they understand/know what is wrong with providing code from your current employer (don't even mention about the legal implications). If they are dismissive about your question or do not see anything wrong with it, then I would recommend ...
162
Would you ask a refuse collector if he cleans the local park on his days off for fun? Ever heard the phrase "Bus-drivers Holiday" (it means "Doing what you do for your work on your holiday")?
Side projects outside work are irrelevant. I've been a programmer for over 30 years. I know how to program, and if someone wants me to write a program, they're paying ...
161
Since your boss doesn't care that this is incredibly invasive, warn him that starting on Android Q, to be released later this year, Android will (finally) block apps from recording video and sound while not in the foreground. Therefore, it will be the same situation you have with iOS.
Of course it will take sometime until Android Q has a significant ...
157
This quote from one of your comments troubles me.:
As a software engineer, it becomes second nature to me to
‘do-stuff-that-may-not-have-a-good-reason-on-the-surface’, like
interfacing the unknowns that I mentioned. Having to constantly be on
the edge of explaining myself on deeply technical (and sometimes
heavily opinionated) subjects drains me.
...
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