The Butterfly Diaries 10 - Coding Conundrums
Things move slow at times, fast at others. I had expected things to slow down after the release. Instead, things began to move at breakneck speed. A lot of new folks arrived out of nowhere. And before I knew it, I found myself with them in a conference room attending a training.
Apparently next week the second phase was to start which required many more people and I was to be one of them. I found myself drowning in a sea of domain and technology knowledge that week. The only driftwood that kept me afloat was the hope of an interesting role.
And with the coming of new folks, I had a chance to make friends of my own. What aided me instead of Mr. Zest’s charm rub-off was the one remaining relic of my Chennai days – my smoking habit – by inducting me into the fellowship of the tobacco fumes.
The following Monday, one of the old timers greeted me as I entered the office. “I have some good news for you,” he said.
I hoped it was the one I was waiting for. “Welcome to the Contracts team. You will be one of our server-side programmers!”
His words were music to my ears. And if this Mr. Easy was going to be my lead, life was certainly looking up.
I started off, filled with enthusiasm to pour all my coding skills into the job at hand. But within the first hour, I realized there was much more to developing enterprise software than mere programming skills. Developing a module of enterprise software was like crafting a single piece of a puzzle to fit perfectly into a jigsaw while over half the remaining pieces were still being crafted in parallel.
And as if that were not challenge enough, the programming language being used was unfamiliar to me. No one outside this project knew it and there were no books on it. For it was something custom developed for this client. And when I tried to learn by doing, I hit a new roadblock - every time I needed to run my program, I had to go through a complex set up process.
So, the only option left for me was to take expert guidance. The one man who was the walking, talking encyclopedia of the technology neither walked nor talked. He just sat in his seat, staring intently at his computer monitor with headphones covering his ears to block off all noise.
His very look was intimidating. But I approached this tough looking man meekly and tried to grab his attention. At first, he did not respond.
Then when I called his name again, without taking his eyes off the screen, he replied, “Yes. I am listening.”
I started telling him about the errors I was seeing when I tried to run my code.
“Debug them,” he said.
I knew that. But what I did not know was how to do that in the system simulator where I was testing the code.
“See the logs!”
But how was I to find the logs?
“I explained last week,” said Mr. Tough.
He might have. But how was I to know then that it mattered, amongst so many other things?
But it was clear that the conversation was over. I had to figure out the rest for myself. And to my own surprise, I eventually did.
I decided from next time on I would approach my team lead Mr. Easy when I needed help. He was such a nice man who spoke so sweetly and took us for tea, coffee, snacks. And so, when I faced challenges with availability of data to test my code, I sought him out at his cubicle.
He welcomed me with his usual smile and listened patiently. He then said, “Yes. That is indeed an interesting problem. Now tell me the solution.”
I was taken aback. If I had the solution, why would I approach him? Seeing my baffled expression he said, “Problems are such a cliché – almost everyone seems to come up with them. The real fun is in the solution.”
What was I to say? I decided to take his advice and figure out the solution on my own. Which too I eventually did.
However, it didn’t change the fact that he was such a nice man. At least he could be an emotional support.
The next few days were hectic. I had to come to office at 7.00 am, work till 9.00 in the evening and then be back again at 7.00 am. I even had to work weekends. I needed to vent to someone and who better than your friendly next-door supervisor.
He listened for a bit and said with a remorseful shake of his head, “Don’t tell me such things, man. It hurts me so! I understand your pain. But what can I do?”
A voice wafted in from across the cubicle walls, “Plan better.” It was Mr. Tough.
I now felt a bond with Mr. Easy as a co-sufferer.
But I had realized one thing – the only person you could rely on in this world, for anything, was yourself.
And finally when I got my program working after weeks of crawling, it took the client-side programmers whose programs I had failed so many times as a tester barely a minute to arrive for their pound of flesh!
Apparently next week the second phase was to start which required many more people and I was to be one of them. I found myself drowning in a sea of domain and technology knowledge that week. The only driftwood that kept me afloat was the hope of an interesting role.
And with the coming of new folks, I had a chance to make friends of my own. What aided me instead of Mr. Zest’s charm rub-off was the one remaining relic of my Chennai days – my smoking habit – by inducting me into the fellowship of the tobacco fumes.
The following Monday, one of the old timers greeted me as I entered the office. “I have some good news for you,” he said.
I hoped it was the one I was waiting for. “Welcome to the Contracts team. You will be one of our server-side programmers!”
His words were music to my ears. And if this Mr. Easy was going to be my lead, life was certainly looking up.
I started off, filled with enthusiasm to pour all my coding skills into the job at hand. But within the first hour, I realized there was much more to developing enterprise software than mere programming skills. Developing a module of enterprise software was like crafting a single piece of a puzzle to fit perfectly into a jigsaw while over half the remaining pieces were still being crafted in parallel.
And as if that were not challenge enough, the programming language being used was unfamiliar to me. No one outside this project knew it and there were no books on it. For it was something custom developed for this client. And when I tried to learn by doing, I hit a new roadblock - every time I needed to run my program, I had to go through a complex set up process.
So, the only option left for me was to take expert guidance. The one man who was the walking, talking encyclopedia of the technology neither walked nor talked. He just sat in his seat, staring intently at his computer monitor with headphones covering his ears to block off all noise.
His very look was intimidating. But I approached this tough looking man meekly and tried to grab his attention. At first, he did not respond.
Then when I called his name again, without taking his eyes off the screen, he replied, “Yes. I am listening.”
I started telling him about the errors I was seeing when I tried to run my code.
“Debug them,” he said.
I knew that. But what I did not know was how to do that in the system simulator where I was testing the code.
“See the logs!”
But how was I to find the logs?
“I explained last week,” said Mr. Tough.
He might have. But how was I to know then that it mattered, amongst so many other things?
But it was clear that the conversation was over. I had to figure out the rest for myself. And to my own surprise, I eventually did.
I decided from next time on I would approach my team lead Mr. Easy when I needed help. He was such a nice man who spoke so sweetly and took us for tea, coffee, snacks. And so, when I faced challenges with availability of data to test my code, I sought him out at his cubicle.
He welcomed me with his usual smile and listened patiently. He then said, “Yes. That is indeed an interesting problem. Now tell me the solution.”
I was taken aback. If I had the solution, why would I approach him? Seeing my baffled expression he said, “Problems are such a cliché – almost everyone seems to come up with them. The real fun is in the solution.”
What was I to say? I decided to take his advice and figure out the solution on my own. Which too I eventually did.
However, it didn’t change the fact that he was such a nice man. At least he could be an emotional support.
The next few days were hectic. I had to come to office at 7.00 am, work till 9.00 in the evening and then be back again at 7.00 am. I even had to work weekends. I needed to vent to someone and who better than your friendly next-door supervisor.
He listened for a bit and said with a remorseful shake of his head, “Don’t tell me such things, man. It hurts me so! I understand your pain. But what can I do?”
A voice wafted in from across the cubicle walls, “Plan better.” It was Mr. Tough.
I now felt a bond with Mr. Easy as a co-sufferer.
But I had realized one thing – the only person you could rely on in this world, for anything, was yourself.
And finally when I got my program working after weeks of crawling, it took the client-side programmers whose programs I had failed so many times as a tester barely a minute to arrive for their pound of flesh!
Comments
Post a Comment