Screeds

Yesterday, I wrote a fairly lengthy screed about how my company, MegaGihugic Software Peddlars, spends a great deal of time and energy making sure that auditors are kept happy. I said that the goal was admirable when it was focused on ensuring that our code was as clean and vandal-proof as could be, but when the goal was equally 'keep the code pure' and 'keep the auditors happy', it became less admirable. The more 'auditor' and less 'code' it became, the less admirable it became. Politically defensible, yes. Admirable, no.

I said that the reason that it was less and less admirable was that auditors have a basically jaundiced view of life. Their goal is to find problems, and then to find problem with the fixes for the problems. They usually don't differentiate between big problems and little problems, and they aren't paid to care how long the problems take to fix, or how much energy that would be devoted to productive work is taken up with doing it. To them, doing this is productive work. Its why they get paid.

I deleted the piece because it didn't say anything I haven't said before. But this time, I'm adding something.

I think it is more important to create than to repair problems; more important to repair problems than to look for problems, and more important to look for important problems than to look for any problems, period. That last, just barely.

If things need fixing, fix them. But do it intelligently.