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Comment by ereyes01 | Hacker News Reader

I've never worked at Microsoft, and I know little about their work environment for developers. Can others here elaborate on why Joel Spolsky has such high praise for them beyond the 12/12 Joel Test score? What lessons can other teams take from Microsoft's mastery of developer work environments?

EDIT: I would add that I strongly agree with the need for quiet and concentration as a developer. The worst place I ever worked at had a constant barrage of meetings throughout the workday and a very noisy distraction-heavy open floor plan.

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I wasn't an employee, but I worked there for weeks at a time as a contractor. You get your own office and people don't bother you if your door is shut. You are expected to communicate by email or chat. The building is very quiet, and if it's raining outside, which it does often in that area, you can get hours of glorious uninterrupted time to concentrate.

That does sound good as a working environment. Strangely, I still hate most of the software they produce and find it a PITA to use.

That's the fault of product managers and focus group specialists. Programmers don't get much input into the design, at least when I was there. It can be good if you just like to code.

Sounds extremely boring to be honest :p

I'm guessing you're either not a programmer or don't know how to go out and socialize.

From watching watching older Channel9 videos: everyone gets an office, every office has the same size. If you switch the team, you move to a new office in of of the dozens buildings on the campus. All older buildings are 3 floors with parking space next to the buildings.

Has something changed recently? Many devs of Win3/95 era got rich and retired early. So the culture may be different now.

I've seen places like Studio A where there are cubicles and even "open rooms" now. Older buildings have individual offices, but junior employees share them with another roommate (or sometimes two!).

I like two people per room. It is great for knowledge transfer, but unless your partner is rude, there is no distraction. Three people per room is bad, though. Two talking distracts the third.

I think I dislike shared offices most of all. You hear every fart and belch from the other person, you can't ignore their annoying fidgity habits like rocking in their chair, tapping their foot constantly, etc. I'd rather do open plan than that, especially if it's one where desks are not assigned and you can easily change where you sit.

I think the hardest part was that my office didn't have any natural light at all because it was in the middle of the building (and given that it was Seattle, there wasn't exactly very much light to begin with even if you were in a spot that received some sunlight coming in from the outside windows).

I wasn't distracted all that often with a single officemate, but I did have to buy daylight spectrum lamps because I have S.A.D. and vitamin D deficiency.

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