I do understand the difference between engineering in the "real world" and the "software world". There is no doubt that the latter is immensely more complex (see Fred Brooks).
Nonetheless, in cases where somebody may get hurt (physically, emotionally, financially, etc) we have to make a greater effort. All I was saying is that we have to either lower our expectations of how good affordable software can be or accept much higher costs for it.
Dropbox love to advertise that they are an extremely safe solution to data storage, thus leading people to believe that their data is safe. Unless every line of code in the authentication module is reviewed and checked and tested, that statement cannot be true. So there is a paradox there.
I guess I may have positioned Dropbox too extremely, but Dropbox breaking is much worse than say a music application, some game or other non-critical software. And with Dropbox I believe that development should be approached more like NASA would do it than EA would. People can get hurt!
"As for Dropbox, when I see programmers jump all over other programmers for making a mistake, even a big mistake (or series of mistakes compounded), I think schadenfreude. People who engage in such gleeful condemnation are making an implicit claim to their own perfection. I'd think twice about doing that."
Believe me that that was not my intention. I am without not as good a programmer as anybody at Dropbox!
Nonetheless, in cases where somebody may get hurt (physically, emotionally, financially, etc) we have to make a greater effort. All I was saying is that we have to either lower our expectations of how good affordable software can be or accept much higher costs for it.
Dropbox love to advertise that they are an extremely safe solution to data storage, thus leading people to believe that their data is safe. Unless every line of code in the authentication module is reviewed and checked and tested, that statement cannot be true. So there is a paradox there.
I guess I may have positioned Dropbox too extremely, but Dropbox breaking is much worse than say a music application, some game or other non-critical software. And with Dropbox I believe that development should be approached more like NASA would do it than EA would. People can get hurt!
"As for Dropbox, when I see programmers jump all over other programmers for making a mistake, even a big mistake (or series of mistakes compounded), I think schadenfreude. People who engage in such gleeful condemnation are making an implicit claim to their own perfection. I'd think twice about doing that."
Believe me that that was not my intention. I am without not as good a programmer as anybody at Dropbox!