OT - Programmer war stories

["Christopher Duncan" <address@hidden>]

Hi, folks.

I'm trying to reach as many seasoned programmers
as I can, hope you don't mind the off topic post.
As part of the research I'm doing for a follow up
to my recent book, "The Career Programmer:
Guerilla Tactics for an Imperfect World" (Apress),
I'm compiling a book of war stories from those of
you who have been out there dealing with all the
insanity that Corporate America has to offer.

In The Career Programmer, I talked about
overcoming the real world obstacles we run into
trying to get decent software out the door
(arbitrary deadlines, clueless management,
Marketing, fuzzy requirements, never any time for
testing, corporate politics - all that stuff they
never taught us in school). I've had tremendous
feedback to the book, and one of the things that
struck me was that as I told stories about the
ridiculous situations I've had to cope with in
my own career, everyone asked if I was looking
over their cubicle walls because they were
dealing with the same things in their shop. So,
if figured it would be fun to do a follow up
book relating the war stories that some of you
have been through. None of my books are tied to
a particular programming language, operating
system or platform, so it doesn't matter what
kind of coding you do. We all deal with the
same sort of craziness.

I'll paraphrase the stories, and of course I
won't use any real names (personal or company) -
we get enough grief from management as it is, no
point inviting any more. I'll be happy to include
your name in the Acknowledgements, but of course
will omit it if you prefer your story to be
anonymous. This book will be in the same, er,
conversational style (that's what my publishers
told me was the politically correct phrase for
being a wise guy) as The Career Programmer was.
I try not to take myself too seriously in this
business - keeps my antacid bills down. But then,
if you've read the last book you probably figured
that out about the time you encountered the
night watchman's attack Chihuahua...

Anyway, if you've got a good war story about
programming in Corporate America, I'd love to
hear it. I may change the format of how I gather
& organize the stories on my web site, so just go
to www.ShowProgramming.com/TheCareerProgrammer.asp
and look for the link on War Stories. That gives
me the flexibility to reorganize the database &
data input page whenever I want without leaving dead
links. And of course, you know I'll have to rewrite
the UI at least a couple of times. There's always
one more tweak.

Oh, by the way, since I get emails from programmers
all over the world, I get teased a little here &
there about my use of "Corporate America", since
programming is obviously an international community.
And from what I've heard, the business world is equally
insane in every country. However, America is the only
one I have experience with. And besides, it was easier
to write than Corporate <Insert Your Country Here>.
Hey, I got lazy, what can I say?

Anyway, if you've got a good story about how crazy this
business can get and wouldn't mind me sharing it with
others, please drop by and add it to the database.
Make sure you leave me an email address that will still
be good when the book comes out (these things tend to
take months to get out the door - sound familiar?).

And thanks very much for taking the time, I truly
appreciate it.

Happy Coding!

Christopher Duncan