Happy Belated Anniversary To Me

Yesterday was the first day of my second year at, ahh, Cerebral Locomotion. In the one entire year that I’ve been there, exactly ONE new software module has been released (out of four planned). This module was released at the end of January and consisted of seven sub-programs. Each sub-program was an ActiveX DLL written in Visual Basic 6, consisting of no more than several thousand lines of unique code each. (Which is to say, this was not rocket science.) Significant changes were made to the launcher application as well, though again-it was not rocket science.

Why has only one out of the four planned modules been released you ask? Each program consists of 45 "levels" of game play, and each one of these levels has to be tediously constructed and approved by the boss. Building each level is done through the construction of a "config" file, which is a very long text file (often longer than the source code for the program logic!) consisting of an enormous number of key/value pairs. The boss is quite picky about the formatting of these config files, and he insists on duplicating comments and variables to the point of absurdity. The reason for this is that he likes to edit them himself from time to time, so they need to be clear enough to be understood by a casual user. Unfortunately, due to the enormous complexity and redundancy of the config files, it takes the boss quite a while to pour over them and modify or approve them. (Typically months.)

Another large complication is the complete lack of forethought and planning in the design goals for the programs. Essentially, I am made to construct the programs by trial-and-error. That is, I build a version based on my best guess of the boss's goals, and the boss then tells me if it is close to what he wants or not.

How would one fix this? 1) Spend the time to design and layout the software beforehand! 2) Stop hand editing the silly config files and create point-and-click "level builder" programs. 3) Observe the enormous increase in productivity. Sounds simple doesn't it? Too bad Cerebral Locomotion is not interested in creating solutions to obvious problems.

I would be willing to bet that Cerebral Locomotion has spent more for my salary for one year than they have made by selling the one new module that was released.