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Symptoms of rotting design

blog.tetrack.com

1–8 of 8 posts

Re: Symptoms of rotting design

#3
post #2

My number one symptom of rotting design is a lot simpler, I keep postponing touching the code... If I do this for more than a couple of days it must be really rotten.

Oh man, by your definition I have some seriously stinking code...

Re: Symptoms of rotting design

#4
post #2

My number one symptom of rotting design is a lot simpler, I keep postponing touching the code... If I do this for more than a couple of days it must be really rotten.

nobody likes to work with legacy code... managing to work with legacy code and without a steady stream of complaints is what separates a good programmer from a noob.

Re: Symptoms of rotting design

#5
post #2

My number one symptom of rotting design is a lot simpler, I keep postponing touching the code... If I do this for more than a couple of days it must be really rotten.

nobody likes to work with legacy code... managing to work with legacy code and without a steady stream of complaints is what separates a good programmer from a noob.

Actually that is what separates the professional from the hobbyist (I've seen both bad professional programmers aka 9-5ers and amazing hobbyists), and when I work professionally both in my startup and in a previous life as an employee I put on my waders and jump right into the thick smelly bog. But especially when you take a couple of years of vacation and work for fun on projects that interest you, you find out that sense of ickiness is probably the best indicator of code rot.

Re: Symptoms of rotting design

#6
post #2

My number one symptom of rotting design is a lot simpler, I keep postponing touching the code... If I do this for more than a couple of days it must be really rotten.

I believe this was mentioned in the Pragmatic Programmer. They used the analogy of broken windows.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fixing_Broken_Windows

Re: Symptoms of rotting design

#7
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

nobody likes to work with legacy code... managing to work with legacy code and without a steady stream of complaints is what separates a good programmer from a noob.

Actually that is what separates the professional from the hobbyist (I've seen both bad professional programmers aka 9-5ers and amazing hobbyists), and when I work professionally both in my startup and in a previous life as an employee I put on my waders and jump right into the thick smelly bog. But especially when you take a couple of years of vacation and work for fun on projects that interest you, you find out that…

One skill that I'm growing to appreciate as I become more experienced is the ability to find a problem and determine if the best action is to do a minimally invasive change, a workaround, or a full restructuring. I don't always make the right call but I'm getting better at it.

Re: Symptoms of rotting design

#8
post #3
post #2

My number one symptom of rotting design is a lot simpler, I keep postponing touching the code... If I do this for more than a couple of days it must be really rotten.

Oh man, by your definition I have some seriously stinking code...

Not necessarily, the question is do you procrastinate on parts of it significantly more than the rest, if you do that part probably does stink.