Its like teen sex

Post #41,576 by tuberculosis 6/7/02 3:36:56 PM Reply	Its like teen sex Everybody wants to do it. More people say they are doing it than actually are doing it. Most of those that actually are doing it are doing it badly. I like the philosophy behind it. But it sort of assumes competent developers which is the opposite assumption of most methodologies. Most Methodologies (note capital M) assume average to shitty developers. The unit testing philosophy is totally great. I always used to write unit tests for my stuff, but I never did a good job of saving them once I was happy that something worked. * Note that I also refer to the "average" or "typical" developer as being a member of "The Bubble Sort Crowd". If you're good you know what I mean. Otherwise, you're probably a member. :-P The average hunter gatherer works 20 hours a week. The average farmer works 40 hours a week. The average programmer works 60 hours a week. What the hell are we thinking?
Post #41,580 by drewk 6/7/02 3:58:09 PM Reply	Hmm, wonder which class you'd put me in Note that I also refer to the "average" or "typical" developer as being a member of "The Bubble Sort Crowd". If you're good you know what I mean. Otherwise, you're probably a member. I know enough to know you mean there is a sub-optimal way to implement a sort, and it's the one that most beginning (or just plain bad) programmers will use. And while I don't know the best way to implement a sort, I know that I don't know it. So I know to look it up if I need to program a sort. This is one of the large class of problems that I probably know something about, but don't know it by the same name as people who have had some schooling or formal training. Like in another thread when Ben was extolling the virtues of hashes: I asked if PHP supported them and Thane told me the syntax for it. I said, "Oh, that, I do that all the time." === Microsoft offers them the one thing most business people will pay any price for - the ability to say "we had no choice - everyone's doing it that way." -- [link\|http://z.iwethey.org/forums/render/content/show?contentid=38978\|Andrew Grygus]
Post #41,858 by tuberculosis 6/10/02 4:34:28 PM Reply	Re: Hmm, wonder which class you'd put me in I know enough to know you mean there is a sub-optimal way to implement a sort, and it's the one that most beginning (or just plain bad) programmers will use. That you know enough not to put a naive sort implmentation into production code means you're good. (Frankly I can't remember how to implement a quicksort either but there are enough debugged implementations around that I never have to). The average hunter gatherer works 20 hours a week. The average farmer works 40 hours a week. The average programmer works 60 hours a week. What the hell are we thinking?
Post #41,975 by wharris2 6/11/02 1:58:33 PM Reply	Or, even That you know enough not to put a naive sort implmentation into production code means you're good. (Frankly I can't remember how to implement a quicksort either but there are enough debugged implementations around that I never have to). It's also nice to know there are places quicksorts aren't really appropriate, as well as a couple of additional sorting methods (even if you do have to look them up.) Famous last RPG quotes: "I'll just shoot this fireball down the dungeon passageway..."
Post #41,607 by JimWeirich 6/7/02 8:39:16 PM Reply	We're doing it. But it sort of assumes competent developers which is the opposite assumption of most methodologies. Most Methodologies (note capital M) assume average to shitty developers. Quality of programmers is a first order effect on the success rate of your project. Choice of methodology is only a second order effect. You are more likely to succeed with good programmers and a poor methodology than with a good methodology and poor programmers. Neither RUP nor XP saves you from a Bubble Sorter (gotta love that term :-). That being said, I'm working on my second XP project. Both projects have been small (2 developers), but we've followed the 13 principles pretty closely (including pair programming). The unit testing philosophy is totally great. Agreed. I added a counter to our unit test script a couple of weeks ago. Today we hit the 700 mark, so we are averaging around 60 to 80 unit test runs a day. It gives one great confidence in the code. Another piece of XP that I really like is the Planning Game. I fully believe using the planning game saved my first XP project by making realistic projections of progress possible. After a few iterations it became clear we weren't going to make the deadline, and it gave management the ability to rearrange some schedules to make completion possible. Without the early feedback, we wouldn't have made the adjustments early enough to make a difference. -- -- Jim Weirich jweirich@one.net [link\|http://w3.one.net/~jweirich\|http://w3.one.net/~jweirich] --------------------------------------------------------------------- "Beware of bugs in the above code; I have only proved it correct, not tried it." -- Donald Knuth (in a memo to Peter van Emde Boas)
Post #41,861 by tuberculosis 6/10/02 4:42:08 PM Reply	Cool My current (soon to be ex) company is one of the talkers. We claim to be "using some elements of XP". Fact is we have a 4 week cycle of hacking with a little bit of JUnit thrown in. No pair programming, limited planning, lots of worked weekends (not me - but the masses for sure). Going to start a new project at a new company in a month. Looking forward to giving it a more complete try. The average hunter gatherer works 20 hours a week. The average farmer works 40 hours a week. The average programmer works 60 hours a week. What the hell are we thinking?
Post #41,935 by acagle 6/11/02 11:14:05 AM Reply	Re: We're doing it. The only parts of it that really appealed to me (I'm not all that familiar with it) were the unit testing (aren't we supposed to do that anyway?) and the idea of keeping the ultimate users in the loop helping with the design. I just do data-intensive research type stuff and always tell the requester that they'll need to devote a good chunk of time to trying preliminary versions with dummy data and such to make sure it's what they want. I'm not sure about formulating all of the tests beforehand though, unless you're the one using it eventually and know just about everything you're going to be doing with it.
Post #42,051 by JimWeirich 6/12/02 2:09:58 AM Reply	Re: We're doing it. I'm not sure about formulating all of the tests beforehand though, ... Yuck. I would hate to write all the tests beforehand. Fortunately, that's not what we do. We write one test. And then write just enough code to make that one test work. Then we write another test, and write just enough code to make that second test work. Continue until complete. I know, it sounds weird. Its hard to visualize unless you see it in action. I've been doing the test-first thing now for several years now and it has really helped me to write solid code. I highly recommend the process. There are some good walk-throughs using test-first design on the web. I'll see if I can find one and post the URL here. -- -- Jim Weirich jweirich@one.net [link\|http://w3.one.net/~jweirich\|http://w3.one.net/~jweirich] --------------------------------------------------------------------- "Beware of bugs in the above code; I have only proved it correct, not tried it." -- Donald Knuth (in a memo to Peter van Emde Boas)
Post #42,029 by Meerkat 6/11/02 10:06:37 PM Reply	OT: client/server A place I used to work many years ago had a 'Why is client/server like teenage sex?' sign up in a testing lab. With a few hand-written additions... * Mostly done in the dark * Failing to take adequate precautions will come back to haunt you On and on and on and on, and on and on and on goes John.

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