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Using the 5S Principle in Coding

santhoshsundar.medium.com

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Re: Using the 5S Principle in Coding

#41

Post by bruce511 »

codelikeawolf wrote: post #8

When I used to work in manufacturing, my company was super into Lean. I even ended up getting an ASQ Six Sigma Green Belt certification. My favorite thing to say to people when they asked what 5S stood for was "Shove Stupid Shit Someplace Secret". In my experience, that wasn't an entirely inaccurate interpretation. Joking aside, I think this article does a decent job of translating Lean manufacturing principles to co…

Every time I get involved in a project it seems to start with this neatly organised tree where everything is squirreled away.

By contrast my own systems are often just one giant folder. Conceptually I'm just not bothered by large directories with 20000 files. And I'm happy to mix files of different types in one folder (OMG .c files and .ico files in the same folder like a barbarian!!!)

I find the system is simple, and everything I need is in one place. But it freaks people out.

I guess we're all just wired differently.

(Obviously there is organisation, I have different projects in different folders etc, but there's no "extra" organisation. I don't make more folders just because this one is "full".)

Re: Using the 5S Principle in Coding

#42

Post by mvkel »

This _feels_ good to a single dev working on a project, where the rules are intuitive, no explanation is needed, and deadlines are fluid.

But I have to imagine this creates a lot of friction within a team, all trying to adhere to rules under the guise of efficiency, at great opportunity cost. And what's the ultimate impact to the customer? Do they care how elegant the codebase is?

It's worth noting what The Toyota Way is. It's a way to ensure high production quality. It is also slow. This is why Toyota effectively abandoned The Toyota Way in the mid 2000s, and why they were raked through the coals over recall issues in 2013. Growth.

If deadlines are involved, I struggle to see the argument for making view files beautifully atomic vs. say, making an improvement that adds customers / reduces churn.

Re: Using the 5S Principle in Coding

#45

Post by vmurthy »

bruce511 wrote: post #41
codelikeawolf wrote: post #8

When I used to work in manufacturing, my company was super into Lean. I even ended up getting an ASQ Six Sigma Green Belt certification. My favorite thing to say to people when they asked what 5S stood for was "Shove Stupid Shit Someplace Secret". In my experience, that wasn't an entirely inaccurate interpretation. Joking aside, I think this article does a decent job of translating Lean manufacturing principles to co…

Every time I get involved in a project it seems to start with this neatly organised tree where everything is squirreled away. By contrast my own systems are often just one giant folder. Conceptually I'm just not bothered by large directories with 20000 files. And I'm happy to mix files of different types in one folder (OMG .c files and .ico files in the same folder like a barbarian!!!) I find the system is simple, an…

It maybe that this works for you individually, but does it work well as part of a team? I think it's one of those cases where one needs to do what is convenient for most of the team rather than one member?

Re: Using the 5S Principle in Coding

#46

Post by buttercraft »

BurningFrog wrote: post #20
buttercraft wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is when you guess ahead of time what directory structure you need and get it slightly but not obviously wrong. Start flat, and when that becomes a problem, you'll know why it's a problem and how to restructure it.

In general, problems are much easier to solve when you have them, than when you try to guess what they will be.

This is a good generalization but I worry that it's too broad. I.e. if your lifeboat is sinking, it's too late to find a better lifeboat.

Re: Using the 5S Principle in Coding

#50

Post by gabll »

smithbits wrote: post #9

It's worth keeping in mind that lean manufacturing and all the interesting things that Toyota did that get written up are about building cars. In software the equivalent process is compiling and deploying code. Writing software is equivalent to designing, prototyping and testing a car. So while there are many interesting lessons to learn they are about the deployment and running of code, not about writing it. In the…

The lessons of lean manufacturing may not apply to design processes themselves, but a lean transformation in manufacturing often relies a lot on certain design choices (poka-yoke in assembling, standardization to cut setup times, etc). Design is often one of the most important factors in successful lean companies. I totally get the point, though.
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