Pros
jfrog is a company made up of lots of talented, smart, passionate people. the technology is first-rate, our developers are brilliant, and i strongly believe in the market for the jfrog suite of products. artifactory and bintray are going to live on, in some form or another. much of what is being developed there will define this space for devops needing CI / CD solutions
Cons
that being said, there are lots of weaknesses at jfrog. as in any company, when human beings are involved, there is plenty of room for egos, moods, politics, and miscommunication to take over. truly great organizations manage to work through these difficulties by doubling-down on a commitment to building teams. it is possible to grow and scale, to value the talent that you have, while maximizing the skills of each and every team member (after all, you spent a lot of time and money to hire them, and believed that they were a good fit for what you wanted to do). it is possible to live by your self-stated code of ethics, statement of mission, expressions of passion, verbal commitments towards transparency & honesty, and what has been enveloped within a layer of abstraction known at jfrog as the "codex". we were all given a book, early on in our jfrog tenure, called "the codex". it was a nicely produced book, vaguely reminiscent of a middle school yearbook, with pretty photos and pithy quotations. the intent was, i believe, to encapsulate the values that jfrog stands for, while demonstrating a commitment towards honesty, openness, and "doing the right thing". alas, spike lee would not be proud. our version of "doing the right thing" was quite shallow, in the end. after a time at jfrog, there was often talk in the ranks of how our managers were not behaving in a way that held up the codex as a real thing. i've had numerous conversations with colleagues at jfrog, where we agreed that the actions and behaviours of some members of jfrog management were out-of-line with the values espoused in the codex. in fact, their actions and words were actually quite hypocritical (in our opinions). these conversations were sometimes driven by me, oftentimes by others. suffice it to say that i was not the only one to think these thoughts. i have spoken with many current and former jfrog employees. we have shared dozens of stories. there is absolutely a culture of fear at work here, where certain high-level managers (C-level and Director-level), govern with an iron fist, with the unspoken (and sometimes spoken) word that if you rock the boat, if you disagree, then you will pay the price (belittling language, no chance to advance, implications that you will not have a job). in fact, i know for a fact that one of these reviews on glassdoor, which was an overwhelmingly positive one, caused an uproar; raised a ruckus; ruffled someone's tail feathers. the reviewer said great things about jfrog. it was readily apparent to those within the company who wrote it, and the reviewer was not trying to hide. but that person's managers had a private meeting, to reprimand that person. they said that as a manager as well, it was not appropriate to write a review of jfrog, without first running it by them. for approval, apparently. um. have you ever heard of freedom of speech? our employer cannot tell us how to live every aspect of our lives. this review violated no NDAs, broke no laws, and in fact was shining a glowing light on this company. yet management felt it was acceptable to berate the reviewer, for no good reason?!? unprofessional. U-N-professional. not cool.
