Endless development

[Walter Soyka]

[Jeremy Garchow] “It’s not that, and not what I am taking away from the article or this discussion. I don’t think that all boxed software was polished as the article states, but, as a user, you certainly knew what version you were on, and more or less what to expect from that version. Now there are no more versions, or versions of software are becoming less and less important. It’s as if every single application is a bit of a platform. Some applications play well with other platforms, some don’t play as well.”

Ah, now I see. Sorry for being dense before. This is a great point. Versions still matter a great deal — but software is not marketed in versions anymore, and that means that people don’t think of them in terms of versions anymore.

We just went through this with a small team of artists using Photoshop CC. Some of us were using linked smart objects — new in Ps CC 14.2 — but even though everyone was on “Photoshop CC” not everyone could read them. Ps 14.0 and 14.1 count as “Photoshop CC,” too.

Version blindness is preventable. Don’t let it happen to you. Watch your splash screens!

Of course, this is a non-issue with true SaaS cloud offerings, where the software is constantly being updated, but because it’s running somewhere out there, everyone is always on the same build.

Walter Soyka
Principal & Designer at Keen Live
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
RenderBreak Blog – What I’m thinking when my workstation’s thinking
Creative Cow Forum Host: Live & Stage Events

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Paul Neumann] “Yes, they can. It’s old methodologies and processes that they’re using that keep them constrained. That and the technology they need to do so is something they don’t use. Virtualized development environments (not machine virtualization but Service Virtualization), automated testing, continuous delivery and continuous validation are all available today.”

Sure. But do you have time for that if you are not a huge developer?

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Walter Soyka] “We just went through this with a small team of artists using Photoshop CC. Some of us were using linked smart objects — new in Ps CC 14.2 — but even though everyone was on “Photoshop CC” not everyone could read them. Ps 14.0 and 14.1 count as “Photoshop CC,” too.”

This is the perfect example. And the next whole number version, say it’s Photoshop 15 (or 14.3 for that matter), could come out tomorrow, and in CC it would look like any other update, but really there are fundamental changes to how the application works. I’m not ragging on Adobe here, this seems to be happening more and more, everywhere.

This means that even if you aren’t ready, you are going to have to update to 14.3 if you want to keep working with your colleagues.

I’m not saying it’s not preventable, but as more and more people get used to getting more and more updates, and those updates contain more and more content and not just bug fixes, this seems to perpetuate the beta state.

I don’t know how I feel about it, but I feel like there’s not much I can do about it. So, I have to hope this new development cycles are for the greater good, and by the greater good, I mean I hope it’s good for me. 🙂

[Paul Neumann]

[Jeremy Garchow] “I’m not saying it’s not preventable, but as more and more people get used to getting more and more updates, and those updates contain more and more content and not just bug fixes, this seems to perpetuate the beta state.”

And that’s the thing there Jeremy. It’s not (nor should it be) perpetual beta anymore. It can and should be a brand new release with features and fixes released with absolute confidence that it will do what it’s supposed to do. If it’s two releases in the month of May and not another til July then that’s 3 releases that quarter. Not 3 beta iterations of what you first got in March. Any CTO will tell you he wants more developers more than anything. Not because he needs more people to fix all things that are wrong, but because he wants more people to make more and better products (through software) so they can be current and a leader in their business.

More and more people ARE getting used to it because more and more people DEMAND it. And they should.

On this very FCPX forum there’s a thread about when is the next update and what we all hope it will contain, while Adobe can tell you when the next update is coming and what’s going to be in it. That doesn’t make the current version of FCPX et al and CC beta versions. But it is pretty illustrative of different development methodologies in action.

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Paul Neumann] “More and more people ARE getting used to it because more and more people DEMAND it. And they should. “

But that brings us to expectations. People are going to expect for things to be fixed in a day. Will companies be able to keep up and deliver without making some mistakes? Since there’s less time to test more features, it will probably be more challenging, especially for smaller development companies.

Also, FCPX sure feels like a constant beta test. There are bug that haven’t been fixed in a few versions, and the application just underwent a complete structure change in just over two years of public existence, along with 3 XML changes, a new and updated plugin architecture, support for the latest Apple hardware including multiple GPU support (something Apple has shunned for quite some time).

Did Apple have real time to test all of this or wait 2.5 years until it was “ready”? If so, why wasn’t FCP 10.1 released in June 2011?

[Jp Pelc]

I’ll second this. (Minus the 10 years part)