Explain to me like I’m 5…is software really that hard?

[CharonPDX]

Yes software is hard.

The software I support just made a major update today - that completely broke the ability to "select a page number in the output". Part of a major overhaul of that product feature to improve usability, and the engineering team just completely neglected to consider that customers with large lists of data may want a method to go through those lists other than "next page, next page, next page, next page".

That isn't something AI can fix. That was a design oversight. Telling AI "make this part of the product easier" wouldn't have caught this.

The previous version at least had the ability to manually type a page number in the URL. That was removed in the new version because they made the page rendering of the table "live", so the URL doesn't impact it.

Sure, they made search and filtering better, but not every user knows what they're searching for, they may just want to page through 500 pages of data over time. And if they leave and come back, they want to pick up where they left off. They can't do that now.

Edit: Oh god… The engineer primarily responsible just let me know that there is still the "modify the URL" - it's just that we base64 encode the parameters now, instead of having them plain.

Where previously the url would end in "?search=test&size=100&page=5" for example, now the URL ends in "eyJxIjoidGVzdCIsInBzIjoxMDAicCI6NTB9".

So to change pages, the customer has to copy the base64, decode it, modify the page number, re-encode it, then paste it. Yes, much more usable…..

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[justinkitswa]

I can't imagine the sheer volume of code needed to fully operate a vehicle as complicated as an EV, especially the way Rivian does it where everything is in-sourced.

Companies like Ford, GM, Toyota all out-source some portion of code development to the likes of Bosch, Continental, etc. So while the infotainment on a Ford is likely some abomination they created from scratch, the code running on the ECU likely came from a supplier like Continental.

Rivian, as far as I know, writes everything for everything in-house. So the responsibility of making sure the battery pack doesn't overheat and meltdown falls somewhere along the list of priorities as the Halloween light show last October.

I've learned over time to cut a lot more slack to the overall operating environment on these things. As long as the important stuff works, I can live with the rest.

 

[CharonPDX]

You want to know how hard it is to code….

Simple test, write the steps to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Give it to someone else to execute. They need to follow the steps exactly, no interpretation of what you meant, can’t do anything you did not write.

It can be funny to watch and will give some great insight into the required detail needed for such a simple process.

That was an assignment in my college technical writing class. To *FULLY* document how to make a sandwich. If the professor did not successfully have an edible sandwich at the end of following your instructions, you got an F. (It could be any kind of sandwich *OTHER* than PB&J)

The only A my term (not me, I got a B - "unclear on correct application method of mayonnaise") on that assignment had instructions ~50 pages long. With proper "technical drawings", not photographs.

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