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2. How to Stop Sucking and Be
Awesome Instead
Jeff Atwood
Coding Horror, Stack Exchange, Stack Overflow

4. Q:
What does it mean when
something “Sucks”?

5. • This doesn't do what I need
• I can't figure out how to do what I need
• This is unnecessarily frustrating and
complex
• This breaks all the time
• It's so ugly I want to vomit
• It doesn't map to my understanding of the
universe
• I'm thinking about the tool, instead of my
work

6. And folks, let's be honest. Sturgeon
was an optimist. Way more than
90% of code is crap.
Al Viro

8. Q:
Why do we suck?

9. A:
Because we’re software,
too.

10. “The main reason we tend
to focus on the technical
rather than the human side
of the work is not because
it's more crucial, but
because it's easier to
do.”

11. The common thread in all
my failed projects is…

12. The First Rule of Programming:
It’s Always Your Fault.
codinghorror

13. 1. Embrace the Suck

15. We make shitty software… with
bugs!
Dave Winer
1995

16. “Software is a process, it's never finished, it's
always evolving. That's its nature. We know
our software sucks. But it's shipping! Next
time we'll do better, but even then it will be
shitty. The only software that's perfect is one
you're dreaming about. Real software
crashes, loses data, is hard to learn and hard
to use. But it's a process. We'll make it less
shitty. Just watch!”

17. Version 1 Sucks, But Ship It Anyway
codinghorror

18. 3 months in development
vs.
3 months of user feedback

19. • better side visibility
• hydraulic flight
controls
• climbs faster
• turns faster
• better distance
visibility

20. Boyd’s Law of Iteration:
speed of iteration always beats quality of
iteration
Where you are today doesn’t matter so
much, compared to where you’re going
tomorrow.

21. My goal is to suck less every year.
codinghorror

22. 2. Do It In Public

23. One of my favorite business model
suggestions for [web] entrepreneurs is to find
an old UNIX command that hasn't yet been
implemented on the web, and fix that.
Marc Hedlund

24. talk, finger ICQ
LISTSERV DejaNews
ls Yahoo! directory
find, grep Google
rn Bloglines
pine Google Mail
mount Amazon S3
bash Yahoo! Pipes
wall Twitter

25. Blogger = public email messages (1999)
Instead of "Dear Bob, Check out this movie."
it's "Dear People I May or May Not Know
Who Are Interested in Film Noir, check out
this movie. If you like it, maybe we can be
friends."

26. Flickr = public photo sharing (2004)
"When we started the company, there were
dozens of other photosharing companies
such as Shutterfly, but on those sites there
was no such thing as a public photograph -- it
didn't even exist as a concept."

27. YouTube = public home videos (2005)
Bob Saget was on
to something.
Viewed 456 million
times… so far.

28. Twitter = public instant messaging (2006)
I don't think it's any coincidence that one of
the people responsible for Blogger is also
responsible for Twitter.

29. GitHub = public source control (2008)
“SourceForge is about projects. GitHub is
about people... A world of programmers
forking, hacking and experimenting. There is
merging, but only if people agree to do so, by
other channels... GitHub gives me my own
place to play. It lets me share my code the
way I share photos on Flickr.”

30. “Moreover, I’m sharing my code, for what it’s
worth to me to share my code... I am sharing
my code. I am not launching an open source
project. I am not beginning a search for like
minded developers to avoid duplication of
efforts. I am not showing up at someone
else’s door hat in hand, asking for commit
access. I am not looking to do battle with
Brook’s Law at the outset of my brainstorm.”

32. Stack Overflow = public learning (2008)
• Fun-size units of Q&A “work”
• Document how much we suck, so that
others might learn from it!
• Leave breadcrumb trails of our
awesomeness

33. Maximize the value of your keystrokes
If nobody
knows you did
{x}, did you get
all the benefits
of doing {x}?

34. The onus of “interestingness”
the freedom to totally suck in private
vs.
attempting to be awesome in public

35. If you you don't have any marketable skills, learn
some. It's the future. We have Khan Academy and
Wikipedia and Codecademy and almost the entire
world's collective knowledge at your fingertips.
Use it.
Carl Lange

37. In the information age, the barriers
just aren't there. The barriers are self
imposed.
John Carmack

38. “If you want to set off and go develop some
grand new thing, you don't need millions of
dollars of capitalization. You need enough
pizza and Diet Coke to stick in your
refrigerator, a cheap PC to work on, and the
dedication to go through with it. We slept
on floors. We waded across rivers.”

39. 3. Pick Stuff That Matters

40. So what?
everyone

41. The world just isn’t that into you. Unless what
you're sharing …
• solves their problem
• provides useful information
• entertains them
• makes them feel like they rule
… why would they care?

42. Every time you share something – ask
yourself “so what?”
If you can't answer convincingly, reformulate
and try again.

43. If your thing in public isn’t awesome enough
(or sucks) that’s OK.
People won’t go out of their way to mock you.
They’ll just ignore it.
(people do remember successes, though)

44. This is The
Internet.
Let your freak flag
fly.
Find your
audience.

45. Nobody should be
more excited
about your
mission than you.

46. How do I know if this matters?
What cool thing did you do for someone else
today?
(psst… Stack Overflow isn’t really a site
about programming, it’s where we trick peers
into reading, writing, experimenting, and
learning with each other.)

47. “It's better to be safe than sorry” is
such crap. You know what's better
than being safe? Being AWESOME.
codinghorror

48. 1. Embrace the Suck
2. Do It In Public
3. Pick Stuff That Matters
#atlassiansummit

49. Thank you!