> there were probably three or four who just weren’t up to it and weren’t capable of producing professional code
See the other discussion on HN front page about coding tests in interviewing.
Horizon was a child of the 90s. The software industry has changed a lot since then. Back in those days only Microsoft was routinely requiring programmers to code during the interview, so hiring was nearly random. Software teams often looked like that, with a tiny number of people who could write working code covering for many more who just couldn't at all.
The Daily WTF dates from this time. It's full of stories like the Brillant Paula Bean:
You don't hear stories like that much anymore. The industry settled on testing concrete skills before hiring, and that washed out a lot of the people who previously managed to get hired into projects despite not being able to code properly. Whether Fujitsu does it or not now, no clue. But that situation wasn't unusual back then.
I would say another child of the 90's is management / users being too trusting of technology which IMO is the real reason for this mess. These days, everyone knows that software can make mistakes and one shouldn't rely on a single system / data point when it comes to critical decisions (ie. sending someone to jail).
I don't think that was so much the case in the 90's, attitudes seemed to have been that these sorts of systems don't make mistakes, and therefore can always be trusted. I look at this as the 90's version of "The Titanic is an unsinkable ship"
EDIT: I would add that you can rely on systems / single data points for some decisions. How I see it is trust in a single point of data goes down as the criticality of the decision goes up. If someone sends you a message to meet them for lunch downstairs, that decision has low criticality and therefor you can rely on a single data point / application to make the decision. However for more critical decisions (ie. should we send this person to jail for stealing money), trust in any system should be low by default and a consensus from multiple data sources is required.
Um, I'm working as a professional computer programmer today, in 2024, and I can assure that programming continues to be replete with incompetent programmers who are not capable of producing professional code.
See the other discussion on HN front page about coding tests in interviewing.
Horizon was a child of the 90s. The software industry has changed a lot since then. Back in those days only Microsoft was routinely requiring programmers to code during the interview, so hiring was nearly random. Software teams often looked like that, with a tiny number of people who could write working code covering for many more who just couldn't at all.
The Daily WTF dates from this time. It's full of stories like the Brillant Paula Bean:
https://thedailywtf.com/articles/The_Brillant_Paula_Bean
You don't hear stories like that much anymore. The industry settled on testing concrete skills before hiring, and that washed out a lot of the people who previously managed to get hired into projects despite not being able to code properly. Whether Fujitsu does it or not now, no clue. But that situation wasn't unusual back then.