Pro Developer - Optimize Your View

I'm beginning to see some glazed eyes in the back of the room. If bad releases aren't caused by poor technical skills, then how can it be the fault of the programmers? Well, in fact, we're going to invoke a little pretzel logic here. Not the straight, matchstick sized ones that are also good for stirring your drink, but those twisty, winding type pretzels that take a lot of turns but always end up right back where they started. We'll start by listing rounding up all the usual suspects, but trust me, in the end it's all going to come home once more to rest right in our own laptop filled little laps. Pretzels are like that.

In fact, many of the veterans here have already made a list of the parties responsible for screwing up a perfectly good project, and have even made suggestions regarding exactly which wall they should be placed against when the revolution comes. Some of the more seasoned among you may have even suggested that the lawyers must wait their turn, or use another wall.

Who are these villains, these people powerful enough to override the capabilities of even the most brilliant coder? Marketing and management are certainly the first to come to mind, often known as Weasels and Suits when programmers are hanging out by the cappuccino machine late at night. When turned loose on an unsuspecting software development team, the results inevitably include vague and shifting requirements, arbitrary deadlines declared with no concept of the technical realities, scope creep, crisis driven management, complete lack of a professional testing department and in the end, software that was released long before it should have been.