[clug] Think Pieces

[Brenton Ross]

On Sat, 2021-07-10 at 20:18 +1000, jm via linux wrote:
> On 10/7/21 11:58, jhock--- via linux wrote:
> > When I studied computing at uni, we would get a pass if the
> > software worked and then a credit if the software was optimised,
> > etcetera, etcetera. No one seems to do that nowadays. It seems to
> > me that most software developers create something, do very little
> > testing and wait for users to find the bugs. 
> 
> That's "agile" for you and MVP (Minimum Viable Product). They seem to
> forget the viable bit. They seem to be trying to apply it everywhere
> forgetting to use the appropriate tool/methodology for the job. I was
> fond at one stage of saying that people are confusing prototype with
> product.
> 
> You forgot marks for good comments which seems to gone the way of the
> dodo. I've started arguments with developers about the importance of
> commenting your code only to be told it's unnecessary by them. The
> amount of code I write for a live varies a lot depending on what I'm
> work on and I find it hard to write good comments myself, but any
> comment that conveys the intent of the code and how/what it's suppose
> to
> be doing can speed in finding problems when you're looking at the
> code
> base especially with large or unfamiliar code bases and/or in
> environment with many cooks.
> 
We might be being a bit unfair to the developers.

If their managers are forcing them to stop working on the code as soon
as it appears to work then we should be focusing on their
organisations, not the coders who are just trying to make a living.

We all know (I hope) that there is a long from "it works" to software
that is robust, optimised and maintainable. Sadly that costs time and
money that some organisations are not willing to spend.

Open source has a similar issue. The "commit early and commit often"
approach can result in users getting access to programs before they are
really ready for general use.

Brenton