Bugs
Tough day. Had to fix a lot of bugs under pressure. Deadline is this Friday. I'm sure I'll make it, I'm not worried.
For this one security-related bug I had to do maintenance in 50+ source files across the product. What's annoying is that I don't think the bug fix is even necessary. But management wants the fix to satisfy some sort of checklist.
What's more depressing is seeing how bad a lot of the existing code is. A lot of the code looks sloppy, as if it was thrown in in sort of a mad rush to make the deadline. A lot of my old code looks good though and I admired my own handiwork. Or probably I'm biased.
I asked Dan, our PM, to set aside some time in the next release so that I can do a code scrub to fix some of the scruffy parts of the codebase. He said something like "We'll see if we have time" and I can see in his eyes he would rather I spend more time with new features or accomplishing some manager's checklist.
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Q: What's the difference between a goal and a dream?
A: A goal has a deadline.