Software Engineering Anecdotes
The following could be moral tales, but they are not fables. I have myself witnessed the events descrived, and any changes from actual historical events are unintentional.
An Exciting Codename
August 2018
Years ago, at one of my first software jobs, my team and I were tasked with rewriting a math app to utilize a new software framework. That framework had the codename Glass, and we followed that theme and gave the app itself the codename Crystal, or Crystal Math in full.
As it was far from finished, the app couldn't run by itself, so we wrote a tool to run the lines of code that were ready, and named that tool Lines.
The team was quite productive, with everyone crackin' hard and running Lines of Crystal Math all day long. Or at least we did until management found out, and insisted we'd replace the existing codenames with some less addictive names.
A Grinding Question
May 2025
When was working at an US startup, I atteneded a presentation by the vendor administrating the employees' health insurance ("benefits," in American business vernacular).
When the dental insurance coverage was detailed, a colleague stood up and asked if our policy covers the cost of dental guards that used to reduce the damages of teeth grinding.
"It does not. But we haven't seen this requested often," answered the vendor's representative. After some back and forth about the necessity of such coverage, they asked the crowd: "How many of you need one?"
More than half of the software engineers in attandance raised their hands.