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Why I Hate Test Driven Development
31–40 of 69 posts
Re: Why I Hate Test Driven Development
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
I debug because I'm smart, and I enjoy it, and I frequently find bugs that I didn't know existed by seeing inside a frame as it's executing. Debugging is a crucial skill in many fields, particularly embedded work (which is the irony in your comment), and the insight from breakpoints and a couple afternoons of digging is unique among our tools. I hate sweeping generalizations of how programming should be done, regardl…
If you love debugging, I don't think you're a seasoned or valuable programmer.
That's quite a generalization. Debugging does not necessarily mean debugging your own code: you might have stumbled upon a compiler bug, or a timing bug with your hardware, or you may be trying to buffer overflow some massive proprietary database so you can take over the world. All of those tasks will involve lots of time looking at memory addresses and hex dumps, but none of them mean the person doing it is a bad programmer.
Re: Why I Hate Test Driven Development
#33You have got to be kidding.
Debugging code (especially others') is one of the most heinous activities on this planet. I have lost years of my life fixing what others have created broken (intentionally and otherwise). Years and special occasions that I can never get back because some moron's mission-critical code decided to break, with the ultimatum that no one could leave for $(Holiday of Choice) until fixed.
It's because of having to debug that I left development and went into a different area of technology. TDD is the only reason I even consider doing ANY development now.
People who enjoy debugging are the ones I hope work themselves into obsolescence.
Re: Why I Hate Test Driven Development
#34I hate TDD because I have to actually debug them, sometime more so than the actual app themselves. Also, there's the issue of slow TDD suite, which means you have to optimize them or otherwise it will slow down your development pace. TDD is only good when it provide more benefits than its negative(debugging time, time waiting for it to run, time spent ripping out code). That being said, it's better than 0 test. Just…
Unless of course you are writing software that goes into a pacemaker, in which case I would want that tested like crazy for every possible scenario you can imagine including automated fuzz testing. Same goes for databases and quite a few other classes of software.
In short, use common sense.
Personally I love TDD. Not because of the tests, but because the resulting code IS testable, and generally testable code is maintainable and easy to read.
Re: Why I Hate Test Driven Development
#35This is a good thing, isn’t it? So why do I hate TDD? Because debugging is fun. There, I said it. I love debugging. I think lots of clever people like debugging. I've been doing embedded development for quite some time, so you know, flipping bits like a boss, a shitload of open terminals, lots of cables everywhere all the stuff that makes you look like you know what you're doing but debugging is not fun, it never was…
I debug because I'm smart, and I enjoy it, and I frequently find bugs that I didn't know existed by seeing inside a frame as it's executing. Debugging is a crucial skill in many fields, particularly embedded work (which is the irony in your comment), and the insight from breakpoints and a couple afternoons of digging is unique among our tools. I hate sweeping generalizations of how programming should be done, regardl…
If you don't love debugging, I don't think you're a seasoned or valuable programmer.
I call bullexcrement.
I've been coding since before a good portion of the people on this board were sparkles in their parents' eyes. Debugging is a huge time-waster and value-sucker.
Now, if you would say "If you're not good at debugging...", I'd agree with that. But saying one isn't a seasoned or valuable programmer if they don't love debugging just shows a level of immaturity.
Re: Why I Hate Test Driven Development
#36Sweet surprise. I jumped in to see the problems and rather found a positive side. @binspace rightly says, "Humor in programming considered hardful" :)
Re: Why I Hate Test Driven Development
#37I hate TDD because I have to actually debug them, sometime more so than the actual app themselves. Also, there's the issue of slow TDD suite, which means you have to optimize them or otherwise it will slow down your development pace. TDD is only good when it provide more benefits than its negative(debugging time, time waiting for it to run, time spent ripping out code). That being said, it's better than 0 test. Just…
YMMV, while I don't do TDD, my unit-tests are fast because I use mock (I don't need to optimize by the way... it's just .. habits).
YMMV, while people disagree with the use of mocking, I find it to be valuable to write unit-tests. Does it represent the real-life production grade environment? no, so does the UAT/TEST environment.
It is meant to be that way, nobody able to test in real-life production grade environment (real data, real performance measure). Tests are always done in a more controlled situation.
Re: Why I Hate Test Driven Development
#38You have got to be kidding. Debugging code (especially others') is one of the most heinous activities on this planet. I have lost years of my life fixing what others have created broken (intentionally and otherwise). Years and special occasions that I can never get back because some moron's mission-critical code decided to break, with the ultimatum that no one could leave for $(Holiday of Choice) until fixed. It's be…
I can see why missing a holiday would suck, but you don't see the appeal of having a relatively confined and well-defined problem to solve? I find a good debugging very soothing after long stretches of greenfield development. Mind you, I don't want to miss a holiday over it, and I'd rather go and build new shit all day most days, but reality is, you have to debug sometimes, and you might as well take whatever satisfaction you can from the process.
Re: Why I Hate Test Driven Development
#39You have got to be kidding. Debugging code (especially others') is one of the most heinous activities on this planet. I have lost years of my life fixing what others have created broken (intentionally and otherwise). Years and special occasions that I can never get back because some moron's mission-critical code decided to break, with the ultimatum that no one could leave for $(Holiday of Choice) until fixed. It's be…
I, too, very much enjoy debugging at times. There is something very satisfying about digging deep into some code base and coming out triumphant with that elusive single-line fix. It makes you feel like you are smarter than the code's author.
That said, other times it can be really annoying, too.
Re: Why I Hate Test Driven Development
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
I debug because I'm smart, and I enjoy it, and I frequently find bugs that I didn't know existed by seeing inside a frame as it's executing. Debugging is a crucial skill in many fields, particularly embedded work (which is the irony in your comment), and the insight from breakpoints and a couple afternoons of digging is unique among our tools. I hate sweeping generalizations of how programming should be done, regardl…
If you don't love debugging, I don't think you're a seasoned or valuable programmer. I call bullexcrement. I've been coding since before a good portion of the people on this board were sparkles in their parents' eyes. Debugging is a huge time-waster and value-sucker. Now, if you would say "If you're not good at debugging...", I'd agree with that. But saying one isn't a seasoned or valuable programmer if they don't lo…
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