Re:Consumer products vs. software (Score 1)

Speaking as another "qualified" software engineer myself, (30 year veteran) I whole heartedly agree. It is probably a fundamental law of the universe that no complex programable system can ever be bug free, (I believe another computer guru - Dyksktra said that slightly differently) just take a look at DNA, mother nature hasn't succeeded after billions of years!

I really don't think the focus should be on trying to develop software that is free of defects, but on the processes a company uses to resolve, track, and rapidly get fixes back in the hands of the consumers. This is my biggest complaint against Microsoft. Sure I see them coming out with security patches all the time, but that is because they are responding "just good enough" to keep the biggest guns pointing at their heads from going off

If Microsoft wanted to demonstrate that they truely care about their customers experiences and their software product quality, they would provide FREE and EASY mechanisms of allowing their customers to have the ability to provide them with feedback. Built in to all their products would be convienent feedback, bug tracking and product updating mechanisms.

If a consumer reports a bug, he should expect that the vendor will make a reasonable effort to fix it and get the fix back to him/her in a reasonable amount of time. My experience with Microsoft is that it is very difficult to provide them feedback, and that they have the gall to charge you (for support) if you attempt to do so. Microsoft should view the idea of having a process which allows customers to give them feedback freely, as a favour to Microsoft! It will help them improve their products more rapidly and make their customers much more happy when they get fixes back.

Perhaps this is a good basis for suing Microsoft, not because they produce buggy software, but because they do not make much of an effort to find and fix the bugs and get the fixes back in the hands of their customers quickly and freely. As pointed out in other replies, the customer already pays in many ways for the bugs. Microsoft owes their customers the decency of having a good process in place to get the bugs reported, allow their users visibility of the bug tracking process, and make a good effort to get them resolved, without further trying to exploit and charge em yet more.

As an aside - The first bit of feedback I would provide Microsoft with is - their LACK of documentation sucks and I think IS neglegent. IMHO ;-)