A subject that comes up regularly is whether or not a formal Computer Science education makes better developers. I’ve worked with people with various levels of education/training Overall, I have seen no strong correlation between programming ability and level of formal CS education. Honestly, I haven’t seen a strong correlation between any of the different… Read More »
Some things are constant over time. Fundamentals Always Matter Many of the fundamental principles of problem solving and software development always matter at some level. Many of the hardest problems you will need to solve are related to fundamentals that you should already know. Some of the details change. When I started programming, amount of… Read More »
One of the things that separates the professional developer from a hobbyist is understanding the principle of Good Enough (or possibly sufficient). This does not mean the absolute minimum you can do. It is also not the same as cutting corners or making a prototype. This is the recognition of the point of diminishing returns… Read More »
Over my career, I’ve come to realize there are some important truths that you should keep in mind. The senior people have experience. Pay attention to them. Senior people have seen more and likely have insight into subtle and/or complicated issues. They do not always have insight into your issue. But, their experience should not… Read More »
Over the years I have noticed a habit among some developers that I’ve come to call Aphorism Driven Development. Many best practices are taught and remembered through the use pithy statements. Although these statements are easy to remember, they can’t capture the full context and connotations of the practice in question. If someone never learns… Read More »
I realize that the title of this post is likely to generate a lot of noise, but it’s a subject I have been thinking about for much of the last two decades. Over ten years ago, I wrote a post questioning the everything is an object approach several languages seemed to be taking. That post… Read More »
Long ago, I posted a short note On Proficiency where I noted four things I believed were needed to become proficient at an activity: aptitude, interest, knowledge, and skills. My experience learning software development took a different route than many developers today. I started development in very small teams (1-2 developers). I had actually been… Read More »
In a recent blog post, I suggested that the most important result of a developer writing code is the understanding of the problem/solution. Most of the reason for suggesting this change in focus is to help people understand that throwing away code that no longer serves a purpose is a good thing, not a loss.… Read More »
I recently heard an interview with Martin Fowler on the Ruby Rogues podcast. He pointed out a few things about the process of refactoring that I haven’t thought of in a while. Based on that interview and what I’ve read and learned elsewhere about refactoring in the past few years, I decided there are a… Read More »
It’s not a big surprise that most programmers feel that the most important result of writing code is the code itself. Other people might argue that while the code is important, other things are more important: Results of the execution of the code Money made by selling the program Business value realized by running the… Read More »