Cart
|
[XML-DEV Mailing List Archive Home] [By Thread] [By Date] [Recent Entries] [Reply To This Message] RE: XP and fruit-picking
 Just rant, so unit testers should return to their RADE tool screens. After doing some review. From the XP pages: "Simplest does, however, mean a minimal solution." It may be all you can get, but I'm not convinced it is always the winning strategy. It may be all you need but you have to know the problem well enough to figure that out. Simple at the finish isn't always simple to do. Build fast, test often. That's fine but that ain't news. There is no substitute for testing, but any programmer who hasn't figured out why a function should ideally do one task hasn't built many. Building in simple integratible stages is assuredly good practice, but it still pays to know what the stages are and when they happen. o Otherwise, the walks around the block become frequent and long. o Otherwise, hype takes over and Simple Is Better becomes Listen To Me Only. o Otherwise, when you write the proposal, it reads like a manifesto instead of a business proposition and you lose. "Everybody wants to rule the world." Theft is a way to do it as long as you can convince the jury you had the community interests at heart. On the other hand, Nabster is going down. Gnutella can hear the knock at the door. Everything the "info wants to be free" and "the web isn't subject to YOUR laws" guys said turned out to be dead wrong. Code talks... so do the courts. XP isn't wrong, just not particularly novel. I don't think I ever worked a project that used the capability maturity model or actually used the kind of conceptual diagramming techniques of CASE. I've seen hardware designed like that because it enables simulation over breadboarding and when discussions of conceptual modeling come up, it is useful to point out the difference between expensive breadboarding and compiling a software build. Still, diagramming has its place if for nothing else, keeping notes in a brainstorming session. I don't find UML easier to read than code. I find it easier to use as a document when the implementation language is not yet chosen. Merits to both. XP smacks of too much zedNess, the tendancy to grab the latest trend because one hasn't done enough or seen enough to read the environment and inquire if the zed really is required or even matters, then proclaim it the final (zed) solution and beat the bejeebers out of naysayers. That is fanaticism at its worst and it is the reason the web isn't the healthy business environment it could be. But the web is still a baby, and I suspect it has to crawl a little longer. XP may be part of learning to walk. It like any method works if practiced but only because Computers Don't USUALLY Lie. Some people do it right because they already know what has to be done. They have already done it wrong, done the unit tests, and are now simply trying to do the next generation. They don't need a new religion or even a coding partner. They need to get it done sooner, they know where the stumps are and they look like they can walk on water. Truth is, their Bozo shoes are inflated as they get off the bus and enter the showfloor. Their noses are already red. Competition enables products to duke it out. But don't be so cherry as to think the best code always wins or even should. The sharpest competitor, enshallah, usually does. Or as they say, "the race is not always to the swift but that is the way to bet". That is why Microsoft continues to cream most competitors. They are simply the best. They made hash of Netscape and many others because they did not hesitate once they understood the rules of the game. they mastered them and executed relentlessly. That gets it done. Regardless of emotions, they win on merit time and time again. It keeps the bucks flowing toward Redmond and that keeps the code flowing back. Go ahead and pick the low hanging fruit and enjoy them. But if a crew of expert pickers with automated ladders shows up and picks faster, you may go hungry, and you know, that is life. The grove guys had the right idea. The Simple Is Better guys didn't know what right was. If a simpler better idea has surfaced, do it. For now, the incomplete and incompatible data models are biting XML and the SimpleFirst guys made that happen. Try again. If you think XP is the way, go extreme. But don't think that wins of necessity unless you are ready to go where the iron crosses grow, to borrow a movie phrase, and don't whine. Complexity is often just what one doesn't understand yet. That is why we duke it out on this list: to help everyone see what it is we don't understand yet. That is community. Not shared goals, but shared understanding. Len http://www.mp3.com/LenBullard Ekam sat.h, Vipraah bahudhaa vadanti. Daamyata. Datta. Dayadhvam.h 
|
PURCHASE STYLUS STUDIO ONLINE TODAY!Purchasing Stylus Studio from our online shop is Easy, Secure and Value Priced! 
Download The World's Best XML IDE!Accelerate XML development with our award-winning XML IDE - Download a free trial today! Subscribe in XML format
|
|||||||||
