"It should be simple to code"

[cogsy]

@bibenu

“It should be simple to code” is fast becoming the most rant-inducing thing (to me) on this forum.

EDIT: Also applies to “It will be too hard to code”

Usually it’s about device firmware.

There are a limited number of people who can judge how easy or hard it is to change the firmware. The list is something like:

• Developers who have seen the code and made one attempt to change it already.
• Product/Programme managers closely involved in the launch of the product or the firmware update.

Even product/programme managers can sometimes get it very wrong.

Almost anyone else is guessing about the degree of difficulty involved. (I will happily update the list above if I’ve made obvious omissions).

As a professional software dev and team lead, I’ll say this: the person claiming “it’s too hard to code” may be right or may be wrong, but the person saying “it’s easy to code” is always wrong. On big projects, nothing is ever easy. If you think making some change was easy, that just means you don’t realize all the bugs you introduced yet.