Grumpy Dev Syndrome is the term I came up with a while back to describe that funk that devs (developers) can get into when everything just seems to suck and the only answer is to unload your irritation on someone else.

The dark side of Grumpy Dev Syndrome is when users get the thick end of it but the far more amusing side, for someone as sarcastic as me, is to just have a rant in a quiet corner of the webs.

Here I am, brain the size of a planet, and they tell me to take you up to the bridge. Call that job satisfaction? ‘Cos I don’t.
–Marvin the android

Causes of grumpy dev syndrome

Grumpy Dev Syndrome is a combination of Marvin the android level depression and utter frustration with a difficult task. The tops things that cause me the Grumpy Dev Syndrome are (in no order of annoyance):

• Unreasonable demands from managers, users, or oneself
• An unreasonable lack of documentation by other devs
• WordPress development*

* Currently, for me, WordPress is the most guilty of all Grumpy Dev Syndrome triggers. Seriously, I really do not like working with it.

You think you’ve got problems? What are you supposed to do if you are a manically depressed robot? No, don’t try to answer that. I’m fifty thousand times more intelligent than you and even I don’t know the answer. It gives me a headache just trying to think down to your level.
–Marvin the android

Curing grumpy dev syndrome

There is no cure for grumpy dev syndrome, accept getting a job involving no actual work.

I have discovered, quite by accident, that one can get instant relief from being a grumpy dev by yelling at someone who really, really deserves it. Sadly, however, yelling at people is mean and I don’t like to do that. On the plus side, writing a rant about how much stuff annoys me is almost as good.

That is why there is now a “Grumpy Dev Syndrome” category on this dev blog. It is so the grumpy devs (currently just me) can sound off where no one will read it. That is assuming no one reads dev blogs.

Pardon me for breathing, which I never do anyway so I don’t know why I bother to say it, Oh God, I’m so depressed.
–Marvin the android