Are we Guinea Pigs for Apps?

When I started programming, I was told to ensure that there were no bugs in the code. Testing was rigorous and any bug caught would result in a reward for the tester and be a cause for embarrassment for programmers. This does not mean that there were no bugs in the code. It only ensured that we tried hard to keep them out.

Things seemed to have change now with the adoption of the fail fast principle that has become more popular, especially, with the advent of mobile apps. Now, not just mobile apps, even desktop and enterprise applications arrive with bugs, and this is accepted as the new normal. Why? Because one could just provide an update later to fix the bug. This is giving a wrong message to young programmers. It is letting them know that it’s okay to have a few bugs in the code but we need to deliver quickly. And once that feeling comes in, it will not be just a few bugs.

So, what do we do? While the iterative approach of releasing versions quickly helps keep the product relevant with new features, the velocity of releases should be synchronized to ensure that the number of bugs do not go out of hand. Otherwise, customers are reduced to being guinea pigs, testing unstable versions of products released.

Cross posted at https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/we-guinea-pigs-apps-danesh-hussain-zaki/