CCP Prism X
C C P
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Posted - 2008.01.15 17:46:00 -
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Edited by: CCP Prism X on 15/01/2008 17:47:22
Firstly, thanks for the kind words. This is pretty much a text-book example of constructive criticism.. mainly because it's not impolite. In return I'll do my best to shed some light on things, but please keep in mind that I an a database developer. I don't make the decisions of resource allocations nor do I have much say in our policies. That is not to say I'm kept in a box and shut of from everything, but I still have to act within the limitations of my position.
Disclaimer aside, as other's have pointed out we have different departments for different tasks, no big surprise there. I'm not going to waste words on that fact as it's obvious.
I'm not going to maintain that there is nothing wrong with the game. I'm a perfectionist and it's my nature to refuse that anything is perfect, there's always room for improvements. But I'm also a realist (which doesn't go well with being a perfectionist because, like I said, I understand that nothing can ever be perfect) and as one I need to tell you that we'll never stop all development. That would put an entire departmant out of business for those 6 months. As far as I can see, it's just not happening. Sorry.
However, I can shine some light in your life. I don't know if this has been mentioned before but there's an entire department in CCP which has nothing to do with EVE itself and everything to do with our architecture. I know it's the same argument as the different departments one, but I reckon you didn't know we had a split EVE group and CORE group. Now I'm not a part of the CORE group so I can't speak for them but I'm looking forward to see their work roll out... in a 100+, or so, man years. 
As to new EVE only features they're constantly being optimized. We're just careful about them and test them extensively.. they're liable to screw with established features if we don't. Now everyone starts screaming Jump Bridges and what-have-you. Granted some things have slipped through QA. But you'll notice I said nobody is perfect but they're sure trying to get there. If you'd realise how much the QA department here has grown and been reorganized you wouldn't be too surprised to see those growing pains in action. They're all great people, very dedicated to what they do and willing to learn from their mistakes and achievements. I'm serious on this growing pains... it's nothing like the QA I got used to when I started.
This probably doesn't answer much. But I just thought the post was so well written and to the point that it deserved some attention.. even thought it's a league off my chosen field.
As to the people here that maintain their many years of software experience give them a carte blanche on telling other people off on how they do their job... there are so many things wrong with that, professional cameraderie aside. Here are the bullet points:
* You know nobody writes perfect code the first, second or third time around. Heck, if you're prudent like me you know it to never be perfect. You also know that people who maintain they code perfect are people you'd want to avoid like the plague.
* You know these are forums. Quoting 1337 experience on anonymous forums is akin to the: "I'm not going to post again in this topic!" (Sadly I've found myself in way to many flamefest I've had to excuse myself out of with this, and I know what it makes people think).
* Everyone knows that a farmer with 10000 years of experience with livestock is still not capable of doing everything. Those might be 10000 years of experience with a special breed and his methods might kill off other breeds.
But if the case is that you're the best programmers in the world: Congratulations. Please apply for a job in the MSSQL Server team, there's a lot of stuff I'd want in there which they maintain isn't doable.
Edit: Again, I am sorry for the vague information but I'd just rather not give you false information or extrapolations. I'll see if Explorer has some free time tomorrow and fancies explaining this better or correcting me (which I hope he won't have to do, please accept forward apologies if that is the case)
~ Prism X
EvE Database Developer,
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