220 karma · joined February 13, 2013
I've been using Jenkins heavily over the past year since a client of our purchased the enterprise version. It was billed to me as a mature open source product that has been refined over the years by people trying to optimize their dev operations. While I'm sure some people really care about it, the user experience is so utterly disappointing it's almost impossible to imagine how it got to this state without neglect.
Even if you ignore all the complicated stuff, the web UI is embarrassing. While I don't suggest a "pretty" UI is necessary for devops, I would think you'd have a quick win just by having some people re-style the existing UI to make it look and feel like something built this century and not require a dozen clicks to get to important information. There are also bugs that are so painfully obvious it makes me wonder how they still exist. An example is if your Github branch has a slash in it (eg. feature/something) you get a 404 error if you try to navigate to that builds' results.
There are also features that appear to have almost no value yet are in the core UI and clearly took some time to build. The weather icons representing various permutations of previous build states is one ridiculous example that comes to mind.
I would respectfully suggest you run through some real world Jenkins experiences like the ones mentioned in the article. Also setting up a new server, configuring non-trivial SCM settings, debugging Jenkinsfiles, etc. To echo the article's sentiment - it feels like I'm constantly fighting with Jenkins to do what I need instead of being guided into a mature set of features.
Conversely - Octopus Deploy is a related product I have been using alongside Jenkins which has been an absolute joy to work with. Everything from initial setup to configuring its agent software on host servers has been straightforward. It has a simple, elegant UI that provides access to important information and actions where you would hope to see them. And most importantly - everything works. I have yet to encounter a bug or experience any broken UI states.
I'm glad to hear CloudBees is making some effort to improve things and I hope PMs like you continue to be involved in the community and solicit feedback, even if it's hard to hear sometimes.
This is so sad
Awww it isn't that bad. They found the Higgs and at least verified we need to look at higher energy levels to find anything new.
> So, if you enjoy your swears, and being awake really late, and have a messy room, don't worry. You have a higher IQ than most!
Edit: Can't see to format it correctly, just check the original source.
Part of migration talk in keynote: https://youtu.be/QHulaj5ZxbI?t=12m43s
Full playlist: https://youtu.be/QHulaj5ZxbI?list=PLOETEcp3DkCoNnlhE-7fovYvq...
Anecdotally, I would suggest the demographic of employees who work remotely plays a part in this. In my experience, employers are more willing to let senior or "better" developers work remotely than less ambitious, less productive ones who need more day-to-day managing. Since quality developers (senior or otherwise) are generally paid more, I would presume this contributes to a higher average salary for remote workers.
> ...scientists were able to lower skin temperature less than a degree Centrigrade without affecting core body temperature. The changes were dramatic. People didn't wake up as much during the night and the percentage of the sleep spent in stages 3 and 4 (deep sleep) increased. ... A 0.4 C decrease in skin temperature caused a decline in the probability of early morning waking from 0.58 to 0.04.
That being said, I think it's a great list to work from. I would expect you can arrive at a fairly good understanding of a candidate's abilities based on how they answer the questions rather than if they can answer them all.