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Uncle Bob and Silver Bullets

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Re: Uncle Bob and Silver Bullets

#181

Post by vkhorikov »

bad_user wrote: post #63

My problem with Uncle Bob's opinions is that they are pretty common within the industry, even if "discipline" really isn't the issue and all those negative feelings people allude to are warranted. In general, people are made to feel guilty for not being able to use the shitty tools and techniques we are given. Lets take for example ORMs and Hibernate in particular. I can't tell you how many times I've seen horrors re…

Do you need an ORM? http://enterprisecraftsmanship.com/2015/11/30/do-you-need-an...

Re: Uncle Bob and Silver Bullets

#182

Post by dorian-graph »

AlexDenisov wrote: post #169
smacktoward wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or alternately: we can improve developers, but doing so is hugely expensive and time-consuming, and while we can improve them we can never make them perfect . So making tools that can be used safely by imperfect developers is always going to be simpler and more cost-effective.

Exactly, this is what I mean by "do not scale." It takes many years, if not decades for one to become a decent developer. We simply cannot afford this.

We can't afford it with the current pipeline, but perhaps with a better pipeline, we can. Perhaps something more proper and akin to the older engineering disciplines? Or to doctors?

They're doing incredibly important jobs, and spent an appropriate amount of time learning and proving them selves.

Software is now completely critical in so many aspects of the world, and becoming more so. When people's lives are at risk, we can certainly afford 'many years'.

Yes, not everyone is working on perhaps safety-critical systems, but more and more people are. It's not just safety in the physical sense either, but emotional and mental well-being too. Facebook isn't saving potentially affecting lives as how a doctor would (more 'physical'), but social media definitely has emotional and mental effects.

Re: Uncle Bob and Silver Bullets

#183

Post by dorian-graph »

Jtsummers wrote: post #156
arwhatever wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Someone help me with the origin of this (paraphrased) quote, which I have not been able to re-find on my own: "The sooner you admit that you can't fit the whole program's source code in your head, the sooner you can begin incorporating that into your design."

Notes on Structured Programming : http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/ewd02xx/EWD249.PDF Page 3: Summarizing: as a slow-witted human being I have a very small head and I had better learn to live with it and to respect my limitations and give them full credit, rather than to try to ignore them, for the latter vain effort will be punished by failure. The Humble Programmer : http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/ewd03xx/EWD…

Thank you for this! It's nice to have a large repository of EWD's writings.

Re: Uncle Bob and Silver Bullets

#184

Post by unclebobmartin »

bad_user wrote: post #63

My problem with Uncle Bob's opinions is that they are pretty common within the industry, even if "discipline" really isn't the issue and all those negative feelings people allude to are warranted. In general, people are made to feel guilty for not being able to use the shitty tools and techniques we are given. Lets take for example ORMs and Hibernate in particular. I can't tell you how many times I've seen horrors re…

There's nothing wrong with tools. I like tools. I use them all the time. I want better ones.

I also want programmers to be able to use those tools well.

Finally, I look at a lot of crap code written by programmers who throw all their disciplines away because of schedule pressure or other factors. For the sake of going fast they throw away everything that might allow them go actually go fast.

Re: Uncle Bob and Silver Bullets

#185

Post by unclebobmartin »

oblio wrote: post #96
_wc0m wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Completely agree with this. The post where Martin derides modern, type-safe languages (Kotlin and Swift) [0] was just unbelievable to me. "Ask yourself why we are trying to plug defects with language features. The answer ought to be obvious. We are trying to plug these defects because these defects happen too often. Now, ask yourself why these defects happen too often. If your answer is that our languages don’t preve…

Somebody should show Uncle Bob this: https://youtu.be/fPF4fBGNK0U My point being: yes, if we'd be perfect drivers at all times and in all weather conditions there would be no more accidents. Luckily for us auto designers haven't adopted this perspective :)

That was cool!

Re: Uncle Bob and Silver Bullets

#186

Post by unclebobmartin »

atulatul wrote: post #121
mannykannot wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Martin has built up a large following of acolytes, some of whom are very active wherever software development is discussed, in a very dogmatic way (such as the guys for whom TDD is the one true solution to every problem.) He has encouraged this through his didactic style of writing, which focuses on a few of the most basic faults in current development practice, and elevates them to being the roots of all evil, witho…

Agree with this. I like some of his ideas. But a problem I have(possibly of my perception) with uncle Bob is that he gets too aggressive. If you don't have X percent (100%) code coverage, then you are doing it wrong, you are not a craftsman, etc. Well, Dan North put things in perspective a bit- https://dannorth.net/2011/01/11/programming-is-not-a-craft/ The problem is dogma. And it keeps repeating. But probably this…

I have never told people that they must have 100% test coverage. Indeed, I tell them that 100% test coverage is impossible.

What you are referring to is a statement I frequently make -- 100% coverage is the goal. It's an asymptotic goal, but it's still the goal. No lesser goal makes any sense.

Re: Uncle Bob and Silver Bullets

#187

Post by unclebobmartin »

tom_mellior wrote: post #33
Terretta wrote: post #10

Here is the post this post is in response to: http://blog.cleancoder.com/uncle-bob/2017/10/04/CodeIsNotThe... I don’t interpret the original piece as saying any of these tools and techniques are not useful. I interpret it as saying average developer mindset needs to shape up. I tend to agree. I work with guys who believe in formal reasoning tools (we collaborated with Amazon’s ARG for example[1]), and use all these t…

> First, do no harm, then use like Light Table, Model Driven Engineering, and TLA+. Looking at some of Uncle Bob's other posts linked from this article, I don't think that's what he's saying. He (Uncle Bob) goes on and on about discipline, but at the same time dismisses anything that might actually force programmers to be disciplined, like type systems that force you to check references for null before dereferencing…

Type systems do not force programmers to be disciplined. Type systems tempt programmers to cheat.

Re: Uncle Bob and Silver Bullets

#188

Post by unclebobmartin »

Stranger43 wrote: post #64
Terretta wrote: post #10

Here is the post this post is in response to: http://blog.cleancoder.com/uncle-bob/2017/10/04/CodeIsNotThe... I don’t interpret the original piece as saying any of these tools and techniques are not useful. I interpret it as saying average developer mindset needs to shape up. I tend to agree. I work with guys who believe in formal reasoning tools (we collaborated with Amazon’s ARG for example[1]), and use all these t…

It's Clear from that that it's been a while since Bob Martin worked in the real world with real bosses, budgets and deadlines. The problem is that the business tend to drive the "if it compiles, ship it culture" but also want to blame some lowly replaceable coder for any mistake so the organization and it's leaders can avoid any responsibility for any damage done due to their decisions to ship first and test later. A…

It's the CEO's job to demand the impossible. It's the engineer's job to deal with reality. When the engineer tells the CEO that the impossible is possible, the engineer has forsaken his/her responsibilities.

Re: Uncle Bob and Silver Bullets

#189

Post by unclebobmartin »

dustingetz wrote: post #54

Uncle Bob (2017) I stood before a sea of programmers a few days ago. I asked them the question I always ask: “How many of you write unit tests on a regular basis?” Not one in twenty raised their hands. Rich Hickey (2011) It passed all the tests. Okay. So now what do you do? Right? I think we're in this world I'd like to call guardrail programming. Right? It's really sad. We're like: I can make change because I have t…

Who does that? Who uses guard rails like that? Accountants.

Re: Uncle Bob and Silver Bullets

#190

Post by jwdunne »

_wc0m wrote: post #89
bad_user wrote: post #63

My problem with Uncle Bob's opinions is that they are pretty common within the industry, even if "discipline" really isn't the issue and all those negative feelings people allude to are warranted. In general, people are made to feel guilty for not being able to use the shitty tools and techniques we are given. Lets take for example ORMs and Hibernate in particular. I can't tell you how many times I've seen horrors re…

Completely agree with this. The post where Martin derides modern, type-safe languages (Kotlin and Swift) [0] was just unbelievable to me. "Ask yourself why we are trying to plug defects with language features. The answer ought to be obvious. We are trying to plug these defects because these defects happen too often. Now, ask yourself why these defects happen too often. If your answer is that our languages don’t preve…

I can see how that would be popular but it's wrong.

You can take that same reasoning and say we should build web projects in C or assembly because any defects are our own fault.

Let's be honest. That's bollocks. It's just the same old "real programmers use X" line. I'm sure there's an XKCD that parodies it.

Sure we need more discipline. Who doesn't? Yet that discipline is far better spent on doing what the compiler can't. It makes no sense doing what a computer can do unless it's really necessary. That's why we're programmers after all, right?

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