@egnatz1 wrote:Debugging someone elses code is not fun lol .
I've done more than my share of that. A zillion years ago now, we had a super-smart, highly-competent engineer whose code was practically impenetrable. For example, instead of a dozen lines of code, he'd come up with one heavily-nested line instead, making it much harder to introduce a minor change later on without inadvertently breaking something else. Instead of using variable names that actually meant something (e.g. "RunLoopCounter"), he'd use short little abbreviated variables that would go unexplained and undocumented ("rlc").
It took a lot of pushback to get him to actually write maintainable stuff, as opposed to quick short things that would run but defy all understanding by anyone else. (I know, I know: job security... 
)
@bigdeals.etc wrote:
And why CAN'T we talk with IT departments???? I call CS with other companies too (Stamps.com) and I get their IT dept right away... with remote access even so they can easily see the glitches I see.
Years ago now, that did actually happen here, at least sometimes.
Back around... I dunno, maybe 2005 or so, I remember having to use a captcha login for some kind of eBay process (I have no idea which one now, maybe to open the Sell Your Item form), where you'd be given an image of a 4-digit code that you then had to type in to the password field. (The Ask Seller a Question captcha code is similar, but a bit longer.)
Problem was, one day the captcha image suddenly started sprouting eight digits instead of four, but there was only room for four characters in the password. Mild panic ensued as I couldn't get anything accepted. I sent off a note... someplace on the page... and got back a pretty detailed message from someone identifying themselves as within eBay IT with suggestions on what to do next. I had the problem cleared up within the hour.
A couple of things to note here: I was definitely talking to a someone on the technical side, as the front-line person had routed my message to him or her; and the technical guy had the authority, or permission, or something, to converse directly with me back and forth as needed to get it fixed. These days I have no confidence that a problem report will reach someone without seven layers of intermediaries, and no hope of getting a direct response or dialogue between me and someone who's actually looking at the code.
Now, I know that eBay is serving millions of users, and if they're all trying to beat up the IT people then nothing else will get done. You do have to have a front-line team that will answer the FAQs and filter the incoming stream. But if or when you get someone who sounds like they know what they're talking about and may have useful info to convey, you should be able to let them communicate back and forth with an IT person on your side of the wall if that looks like the best way to get the problem resolved.
Instead, for many years now, I have a strong sense that there's a near-total blockade on any communication of any kind that doesn't go through Marketing, and thus everything seems to emerge in the same kind of singsong writing style that's full of catchphrases but not necessarily useful dialogue. That's not to suggest that those folks can't write normally, but that they're not allowed to. (My "gin and tonic test" states that if a person can only write clearly after having consumed two Tanqueray and Tonics, that person works for the Marketing department. ) Thus we tear our hair over infuriating and silly goofups, blunders, oversights and omissions that, at any other company, would have been resolved right away, in some cases before they ever saw the light of day.
