I am getting the feeling that structured programming languages are having a hard time in the popularity contest. I wonder why? Probably the because the new dynamic languages allows the developer to code whatever wherever and things will work. In this modern space-age I guess that it was destined to happened in technology... till the day where we code in plain English.... oh hell why not Turkish.
For me personally it comes down to one simple thing, I don't care what a developer is coding or in what language. As long as he fully understands what he is coding and the logic contained in it, I will be a happy camper. Question is, how do you motivate the practice to continuously analyze and improve your own work to become more consistent, stable and modular? Especially when everything is so dynamic. What is stopping a developer to unwillingly (or maybe not) fall into to the classical coding traps where an application's code start to spiral out? Yes there is plenty check points that get used during a development cycle to maintain the sanity, but all of these safety protocols are external restrictions. These external restrictions to a person's development can very easily be overseen or neglected (also unwillingly or maybe not).
One approach that can be followed is the clear abstraction between logic and data. Yet I have experienced that developers seems to easily adjust their logic according to change in data. Code changes are made simply anywhere in the logic in an ad hoc manner, instead of applying the proper logic in the appropriate module. For example, quickly putting in code to convert two integer values to a single floating data type because of data structure change... but doing it in a business facade class or transfer object instead in a class or module where all the mapping and/or conversions are done. When I query the developers on this, the most common response is “I don't see the difference”. Yes in execution it probably wont make a difference, but it just take several of these “quick fixes” all over the place to make code more harder to maintain. Hence my strong believe in structure to force code to be placed in the right place, but structure by no means have to be limiting. By finding the right balance I have experienced working with solid structured code yet it was flexible enough to conform to any business request.
Structure and consistency is the key to good modular manageable software, as simple as that. And this principle can be applied on any development platform and/or language. Its one thing to choose a framework or patterns to implement a design, but architects/developers are way to willing to compromise on their own design to conform to a implementation requirement. Particularity with the new and upcoming dynamic languages, promoting code what you want where you want. Personally I wont allow a developer on my team even touch any dynamic language without at least 5 -7 years solid structured and OO programming.
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( 3 / 86 )Its been a while since I made a post, but I have been really busy.
Last Saturday I received my Takemusu Aikido Ikkyu grading. It was tough, but I felt proud of myself afterward. The last 14 months I have been living an active life with lots of cardio training, and this surely supported me during my grading exam. I was required to participate with my fellow student doing the Gokyu, Yonkyu and Sankyu grading syllabus. Then afterward I still had to performed the Ikkyu syllabus... I was pretty knackered!
But apart from one correction, I basically performed every technique from the word go. It felt good to be able to perform such a multitude of techniques with a more natural feeling rather than over thinking it.
Now start my journey to train for Shodan as well as becoming an instructor.
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( 2.9 / 98 )Sometimes the appropriate response to reality is to go Insane - Philip K Dick
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( 2.9 / 127 )"A warrior does not give up what he loves, he finds the love in what he does..." - from the movie "The Peaceful Warrior"
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( 2.8 / 102 )I have been training Aikido for about 3 years, and it has open my eyes and mind to many things. I am currently in preparation to take my 1st grade exam and then it 1st dan. Although I have not actually made any posts concerning Aikido, it is only because I realized that I have only tasted a drop of what is Aikido. Only till now do I feel I have a certain level of understanding about the concepts that make up Aikido.
One concept that Aikido has thought me, is a profound insight about what perception truly entails. For me personally it is the development of a subtle constant focus of everything around you, from people to your environment.
There has been books written about using the principles of Aikido in the business world. But what about software development? Software only being technology still gets designed and used by people. I like to think that I apply the principles I have learned in Aikido to my work environment. Yet it has come to an interesting situation. Taking into account my peers with their strengths and weaknesses I decided to guide them to keep their work simple. As such that the framework I designed was kept simple in standard Java technology. No new or external tools/frameworks/utilities. I knew that if I were to use to much of the latest and greatest that inherently the complexity would have been raised, making their learning curve so much steeper.
So there is no fancy utility, no automated build tools, no framework simply copied from the web. The work done has been designed from scratch with my fellow developers following all the way. I like to think that they have a better understanding what frameworks in general is all about and why we use them. Question is, by taking a bit more interest in my peers technical skills development, will I be considered as a good architect? Or should I have spend more attention on the solution? Have my heighten perception of those around me cause me to make incorrect decision concerning delivering a project. I read in an article the other day that return of investment in software development does not lie in the lines of code, but in the developers that can read that code and turn it into business sense.
FYI my team have met all their deliverables with probably the most stable code I have seen in the last few years.
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( 2.8 / 103 )Software design patterns have been around for quite some time, and probably has been set as the de facto design approach to development in many companies. My personal approach to it is much more simple, use what you need. I can hear the knives being sharpened. But it has been my experience working with with junior and mid-level skilled developers that they always seek (or even just plainly expect) all the answers be in the technology and/or patterns/frameworks or any other funky fancy why to code a certain way. Yet it is my believe that the true language of technology is simply..... logic.
Approaching software development can be approached in one of two ways, technical or logical. I recall a time where when trying to plan a development task I would always think in code. Pondering what code would I write, what command I would call and where. It was always about finding a simpler and faster way to write the code and be done with it and the world is a better place. Then funny how always it works when running on my pc and on my test data. But installing/deploying it anywhere else it just never seem to work properly, and you need to do code changes to make it work. Then the code keeps changing and changing as it goes on. Not difficult to imagine what you end up with. This might not seem apparent to the developer, simply because he still has the advantage of having the morphed conceptional model in his mind about the work. Yet when the next person comes around, he/she then pretty much end up clueless.
This is a simple concept, and any software development expert will probably accept it as a common and simple problem. Use development methodologies, perform regular code reviews and so on. Although the purpose of all these types of processes is to ensure that code is structured and consistent, but in reality still will not ensure that code will function correctly as required. Senior and experience personal understands the differences, but what about the rest? There seems to be some kind of divide of understanding. I believe this divide is simple, function vs logic. In my experience I have always have to struggle with the 2 concepts when instructing or mentoring my fellow developers.
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( 2.8 / 113 )Last weekend I went on a bike trip to the Eastern Transvaal again. Louis and myself hit the road Saturday morning at about 5:45am to Nelspruit. From there we worked our way up to Graskop where we stayed the night. Weather was fine and we actually did some very enjoyable riding. Not speeding excessfully but kept more a constant speed when riding through the twisty roads. I really enjoyed it. Hardly using the brakes, purely using the engine to control speed. Had steel braided hoses fitted to my K7 a few weeks before just in case if we were to nail it a bit.
There was a point on this trip where I thought to myself 'This bike is now setup nicely'. Everything about it was pure joy. So on Sunday morning we were met with rain and mist. We both took every precaution concerning riding in wet weather. Riding to Sabie, over the Long Tom Pass, Lydenburg and then to Dullstroom. I was wearing every peace of clothing I had in my bag, still I froze my butt off but at least did not get that wet actually.
;)
After breakfast at Dullstroom is was a short stretch to Belfast then it would by the highway straight home. I approached the last turn before entering the town of Belfast, reduced my speed and slowly leaned into the turn. Halfway through the turn in a instance my front wheel came out underneath me. I hit the road and just kept on sliding on my one side. My bike hit the road barrier, front wheel got stuck and ripped loose from the rest of the bike. Due to the low speed and my gear I did not even get a scratch, but the bike is basically a right off. As it seems it was just my luck to hit a slick or oil spot on the road with the wet weather to boot too.
I am so highly annoyed about this! My bike was setup great, we did over 900km of riding the weekend, and I lost my bike about 3km before getting on the highway and heading home! Firstly thanks to the farmer Pieter who lives closed to where I came down, for helping me and letting me leave my wreck at his place until I went to pick it up the next day.
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