I’m also a software engineer (at least in title). I agree with the social skills but a different thing came to mind. The ability to actually watch and understand what people are trying to do. I’m lucky as all my software is internal to my company. I don’t make what we sell, I make what tests the products we sell. And yes I test the tests and also test the test’s tests 😭.

I’ll give an example. I have an operation where the operator is to scan a number off a paper before testing. That number is for traceability we need to know which test results are for which unit. Previous engineer said since it’s scanned off the unit it will never be incorrect as long on the printed barcode is correct(separately validated) so no need to verify format.

I ran into an issue where units had an extra zero either before or after the number. So if number was 12345 sometimes it would be 012345 or 123450.

I went to watch the process. The operator scanned the unit( I watched them work all day, this was 1 unit out of a whole days work) and when they put the scanner down the scanner’s corner was on the 0 button of the keypad.

We did a 2 phase remiduation. Stage 1. Operator instructed to log in and then place keyboard on shelf away from workplace. Stage 2. Verify the number is in correct format in code. Yes the code update is simple but in our field needs weeks of work to test, validate, and release.

Actually watching the operator closely identified the problem. The code was not the issue, the code passed all requirements and tests. The issue was the tests and requirements did not match the user’s experience but if I stayed in my cube as for weeks I would not of been able to find the bug.

I equate an AI to an intern. It’s useful for some stuff but if I’m going to attach my name to it I’m going to review it and probably change a lot about it.

Yes, as I said it depends on you and your partner. Also the point is basically to say “I understand the struggle you are experiencing, here is some encouragement” without being a machine…

As another user said in a better way…do you want to vent or do you want solutions? If vent recognize their pain and encourage them, if solutions try to help.

If your dog is ever running and you can’t catch them act hurt. Pretend to fall and hurt your knee. Most likely it will come back and check on you and you grab it, unless it’s playing with something else then good luck

Yup some idea. I think I heard it on Reddit but you put it succinctly.

Anyone else reading this keep in mind this changes with partners and situations and maybe by day…without specific examples with lot of details it’s hard to tell. If you don’t know, ask kindly.

I was taught a long time ago a simple idea … Men hear a problem and try to solve it…”i don’t know x" ok let me teach you" or “I can’t get this thing to work” ok let me try if I can.

Women on initial compliant some times just want to know that you know they are struggling. Instead of "let me teach you” you could say “I’m sure you will understand” or “I know it’s difficult but you got this”.

Yes it varies by person some men prefer the latter and some women prefer the former. As with most things it’s up to you to know your partner and what they want…

I had that experience last week. I half blame the language though cause the way it works is you don’t initialize a variable, first time you use it the language automatically makes the variable and default value is 0.

I had a variable countoot that I had a formula calculate. Then a simple if countoot > 0 do this else do that. The program kept doing that. I knew countoot should be 2. I manually did the formula … The answer was two.

I did the same formula in 3 other programs and it worked correctly. I spent between 1.5 to 2 hours a day for like 3 days banging my head on the desk trying to figure out why it would work. Fourth day me and 2 other guys were trying to figure it out when I finally really looked closely. I realized the formula result was stored in ccountoot(notice 2 c) and the if statement was based on countoot(notice 1 c)…yeah I felt so stupid when correcting the typo fixed the problem.

It might be a side effect of my work environment. I make the equipment that tests electronic medical implants. Theoretically if a unit put 1A of charge out instead of 1ma that could kill a person. Now on a practical level that’s not possible with our devices and even if it was we should be able to identify and prevent that unit from reaching the field.

Yes you are right, you want 99.99% uptime you need this stuff. In the field I’m in a single case escaping test can be months of engineering time to investigate, root cause analysis to determine the actual cause, expensive fixes for the short term and even more expensive fixes in long term to upgrade everything so it never happens again.

Boss being unhappy that you missed something is minor. Their boss’s boss’s boss is the real issue. That said we get regularly audited both in-house and external agencies so it’s unlikely. Multiple lines of defense, have a computer check it, have a person check that the computer actually checked it, have a computer verify that the person actually verified it. Have each of those systems regularly audited and verified to be effective.

It’s expensive but it is what is needed to be in this field.

Ok,this maybe too nerdy of a topic for here but that’s why I love unit tests.

Basically I write a piece of code that gets this input and generated that output. I also make a test to verify that I get a certain output given a certain input.

Now if I spend all day futzing within that code , changing variable names, refactor and extract a large function to 10 small ones, decide to re-write all the SQL queries to linq arguments…I can fuck up and tests may fail. I fix the failing code to still pass the test. I know I delivered code that met the requirements, hopefully improved it, but I know I didn’t fuck it up enough to not do what it’s expected to do.

Plus source control…I mess around with code, my tests all pass…I commit it…I mess around more, can’t get the tests to pass, oh well quitting time roll back to previous working commit. Boss may be mad I didn’t improve it but at least I didn’t break it. Zero gain day is better than negative gain…

I did this back in probably 2008 with Linux mint.

The difference is in exact wording Agile: the software shall properly authticate a user within our active directory.

Documention : user authentication will be provided by functions ”valisate username” as described in section 14,7 subsection 4, ”validate password” as described in section 16.2 and validate the correct pasword as described in section 23.4.Proper authication to the correct use group shall comply with the requirements in document 654689 section 64.7 subsection 17

Yes there is a difference and one is better…

I know that for FDA or BSI we can’t offer anything at all. We can’t even let them use our building water to drink, they must bring there own water.

One time we worked with the FDA to help expose some new auditors to a real audit(we were not really being audited but told to treat it like a real audit). One of the new auditors didn’t bring anything to drink, assuming there would be water provided. Nope, the senior auditor made them sit there all morning being thirsty and when we broke for lunch the new auditor went across the street to CVS and bought a bottle of water. I felt kind of bad for them. But every other day they arrived with a big bottle of water :-D

Well when things got hot…

I prefer mildly slutty olive oil…

Depends on where you live… Northeast us most likely a black bear, as long as its not a mother protecting its cubs make some noise and it will leave you alone. If your in the artic, how the hell are you in woods but ignoring that’s and it’s likely a polar bear and you are dead.

I am NT but here is my take…

1. Typically any holiday is spent with your partner (if possible, exceptions can be made in advance… “I’m sorry I can’t spend fourth of July with you, I need to work on that day” for example)

2. Discuss limits, periodically confirm limits haven’t changed. Maybe hanging out at a beach with a different potential partner is a limit. Maybe having dinner alone with a different potential partner is a limit. Maybe kissing is a limit. Maybe sex is a limit. Maybe the gender matters, if your partner is same gender as the other person may increase the limit(if your partner is a girl, she may not be ok with your kissing a girl but if fine with you kissing a guy for example). All these vary by partner.

3. Communicate… Why is she upset? Was it timing? Would what you did be ok next weekend for example? Was it the activity? If you saw a movie with your friend would that be ok?

4. I don’t mean to be offensive about this one. Why did you leave your partner to spend time with another person? Did you not like spending time with your girlfriend? Did you prefer to be around your friend? Did you just need a break of the party but it’s awkward to return to the party afterwards? Do you just not like that type of party and that’s why you left?

All of these will influence your relationship. The biggest is going to be 3… Communicate communicate communicate. Discuss these questions with your partner and you should have a better idea of what is acceptable and what isnt going forward.

My kid is severely autistic (like mostly non-verbal sever) and had this stuffed magenta (from blues clue) that he took everywhere(except school). He was in the children’s hospital and they lost it over night.

Luckily we got him a new one (basically the same except ears and tail not ripped off and now had glasses?) and he seems to be be ok with the change, but it’s hard to tell. Those few days waiting for it to arrive were hell though.

Wouldn’t it be Sehor Hitler… No relation?

The theory about Hitler was he was alive in Brazil.

I don’t mean this to be offensive but holy shit is that advanced for third grade. I would would expect that to be like high school work. I think in my third grade we were doing stuff like “who discovered America?” and how to read a analog clock.

If you could analyze Shel Silverstein, or even knew who that was, in third grade you would of been light years ahead of me in third grade or most of my classmates.