December 16, 2025
Spec or wreck
Internal RFCs saved us months of wasted work
Write the plan or watch chaos; commenters say he reinvented the blueprint
TLDR: A leader learned the hard way that vague plans waste months, so he pushed written “request for comments” docs to align teams. Comments split: fans say writing saves projects, skeptics sneer that it’s just rebranding a spec while tools like Jira and Confluence collect dust. Why it matters: clarity wins.
An engineer went on vacation, came back to a “finished” feature that only handled a tiny special case, then pulled a marathon sprint and still missed the deadline. His fix: internal RFCs — a written Request For Comments doc that lays out the plan and invites feedback. The crowd’s reaction? A chorus of “write it down or watch it burn.” One top comment basically turned into a battle cry: “Write a spec or the developers will write one for you — worse.” Another fan called RFCs “formal but lightweight,” shading ticket systems where titles do all the talking and details go missing. Skeptics rolled in hot, waving the “we already have tools” flag — Teams, Jira, Confluence — but the replies were savage: “99% of tickets have no comments” and “Confluence is five years out of date.” Ouch. Then came the meme: “This guy invented a spec?” turning the whole thread into a roast of corporate tool soup vs. actual clear writing. Supporters say writing forces clear thinking and kills misunderstandings; cynics say it’s bureaucracy in a new outfit. The vibe: RFCs aren’t fancy — they’re just the grown‑up way to make sure everyone’s building the same thing, not five different versions.
Key Points
- •A lead engineer’s feature went off track during a vacation despite verbal alignment and diagrams, revealing misaligned mental models.
- •The author adopted internal RFCs (written proposals) to make assumptions explicit and gather feedback before coding.
- •RFCs improve precision by forcing structured reasoning and evaluation of pros and cons.
- •Documents reduce misinterpretation and can include diagrams, examples, and calculations; they are also easy to revisit.
- •To introduce RFCs, run a one-month trial, write initial RFCs yourself, start by asking for comments, and involve influential leaders.