Sachin Agarwal: April 2008

I was just in LA on Sunday and I got to play with my mom's new home theater system for the first time. WOW. It really makes you fall in love with TV and movies all over again. The picture and sound quality are amazing. And everything was much cheaper than what we spent on similar systems in the past.

My dad has asked me several times in the past, "What makes a good software engineer?" I don't think he completely understands what programming is, or what skills make you better or worse at it. But he does wonder how some products are better than others; some products are clearly more stable, evolve much quicker, and are easier to use. He also sees that the quality of work coming out of India isn't as good as what is done here. So why are some engineers better than others?

I always explained to my dad that writing a computer program is like solving a puzzle. Most people can do it, but people will take different approaches and different amounts of time. Outsourcing something to India is like giving them the puzzle to solve. You'll get a solution back, but it might take longer or not be as optimized.

I've been working on a very difficult feature for Final Cut Pro. I've literally been pulling my hair out for the past couple of months. About 3 weeks ago I was hitting some major issues and was very frustrated. But instead of pushing on and dealing with each crash or bug one by one, I took a step back and wondered if my original design was correct. I was actually able to come up with an entirely new design, throw out maybe 20-30% of my work, but end up with something much more elegant and stable.

For this same project, I have one more hairy piece I need to code. I've been dreading it since I designed the feature months ago. One of the problems with software engineering is once you have a puzzle (feature) in your head that's bothering you, it's hard to stop thinking about it. I have been constantly running through user scenarios in my head, trying to come up with different solutions to my problem but finding holes in each.

I was just on a short flight from LAX to SJC and I knew I would need to tackle this engineering problem soon, once I got to Apple. Then I had my eureka moment. I came up with a solution that avoided all the hairy Final Cut Pro code I was afraid to touch. I came up with something that's little code, very simple, easy to maintain, and only makes one small compromise. Overall it will be the difference between a buggy feature that's a month late, and a rock solid feature that will leave me with enough free time to do even more.

This is why I love writing code. You're solving puzzles, and sometimes you come up with these amazing ways of doing something and it feels great. You design something well so that it's bug free, efficient, and easy to maintain in the future.

From sundaes and cones

-Sachin

Sent from my iPhone

I like to think I have a pretty good idea of what a consumer wants in a product. I've seen how Apple can make simple yet powerful applications. These days everyone has stories dealing with their parents and technology. Everyone dreads those phone calls with the parents trouble shooting with step by step directions. (Luckily those days are over now with screen sharing)

Here is a great interview with the Smugmug founder and how they became a successful paid web service with no VC funding.

Don MacAskill, CEO of SmugMug

and

Seven Startup Lessons from Intuit

1. Paid web services are great. You should make/pay for a good quality product. Anytime something is free, some junk comes in with the good stuff. This could be ads, or could just be bad content or a poor experience.

2. Customer service is extremely important. It's not common on the web, but it should be. Smugmug, Netflix, Seamless Web all have great customer service.

3. People appreciate better products not just because of some huge features, but because of all the little things you wouldn't necessarily say are important to you, but they add to up to make a better product. Obviously, this is true of Apple, BMW, and hopefully anything I make.

4. You don't necessarily need to be the market leader in whatever you are going after. Just make the best product and have fanatical users.

5. Talk to users and build what they want, not what you want. Don't worry about competitive research and trying to best the competition. You're better off talking to users and building something fresh. "Your competitor is not other companies, but the way that things are done now."

6. Your goal should be an extremely high level of customer satisfaction and customer loyalty.

Sooooo good and cheap. Huevos rancheros and waffles. $13.50 for fresh squeezed OJ, a basket of awesome bread, unlimited tea or coffee, and a great entree.

-Sachin

Sent from my iPhone

While at dinner at Blue Ribbon Brooklyn tonight, I received not one, but TWO emails telling me how great the episode is. When was the last time you emailed someone because a TV show was that good?

Check it out. I highly recommend it.

From: Cindy Lee <>
Date: March 31, 2008 8:42:12 PM EDT
To: Sachin Agarwal <>
Subject: awesome!

i am loving this episode. they incorporate march madness =)

From: Roy Simkhay <>
Date: March 31, 2008 8:58:36 PM EDT
To: Sachin Agarwal <>
Subject: HIMYM

Great episode. Awesome ending.