4 ms·

I finally checked out the link. You're looking for material to use in a comic? And I'm trying to give you a serious answer. Maybe these experiences will help

I finally checked out the link. You're looking for material to use in a comic? And I'm trying to give you a serious answer. Maybe these experiences will help: Had a coworker get promoted way past his level of incompetence. He never accomplished much before, but afterward he spent all of his time lobbying for his ideas and undermining those of us that were trying to get work done. Wasted a lot of time dealing with him until mgmt got a rare clue. Another coworker would ask a 5 minute question and an hour later come back and spend a 1/2 hour telling me over and over how my answer helped him solve his problem. Incomprehensible emails from corporate telling us something that might or might not be important. We had to try to decipher them to be sure. Much unproductive discussion ensues. Had an company exec that liked to go around glad handing everyone. Nice guy, but man could he blow a couple hours of our time. Woman in the next cubicle arguing with her kids over the phone - loudly - for two hours. A loud snuffler in another cubicle. Still can't understand how he didn't give himself brain damage. Yak shaving: get a bug report. Run the debugger: crashes with no message. Research debugger failure to no avail. Go to file a problem report: reporting tool is down. I'm sure a lot of people have this problem: naming things. Can't code until you figure out what that variable should be called.

hansvm 6y ago
> I'm sure a lot of people have this problem: naming things. Can't code until you figure out what that variable should be called. i, j, k, foo, bar, baz, and don't waste a moment thinking about it till your solution is finished and warrants a once-over (or till it has grown sufficiently complicated that a real name is finally necessary even if temporary -- try to work in small enough units that this never happens).
- vageli 6y ago
  This reminds me of advice I learned in school for writing: if you are having trouble coming up with an introduction, just write as if you already introduced the topic and come back to the intro afterward.
- 8note 6y ago
  I generally think that if I can't find a good name for a thing, I don't actually know what it does yet, so Im not ready to code it. I, j, and k have clear definitions as basis vectors, so they can be used, but I don't think I'd ever call a variable foo or bar
  - amelius 6y ago
    Use an APL keyboard and you'll have more options. https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=95872.0 https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=95872.0 I do think we need a modern hacking keyboard though.
    - PopGreene 6y ago
      (I know this is going to date me.) I used APL before and during college on a terminal with a type ball. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_2741 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_2741) APL is a great language.
  - hansvm 6y ago
    > I generally think that if I can't find a good name for a thing, I don't actually know what it does yet, so Im not ready to code it. I can understand that viewpoint. On the other hand, you have to develop that understanding somewhere, and on some problems I find that sketching out a solution in code is more productive than using a whiteboard or some other mechanism, especially if I already have a rough idea of what needs to happen. E.g., I might know that I need to keep around a little intermediate state, and I'll throw that in an unremarkably named variable and iteratively build up the rest of the algorithm. Once I have _some_ solution I can go back and see if the variable was really important, prove it correct (or find additional work to do), and dole out meaningful names. The idea isn't that different from how when building up something which needs a loop you might start with "while (True) {}", figure out where you need to break, and then go back and factor in an appropriate stopping condition once you understand exactly what the loop needs to do to accomplish your goals.
- tpxl 6y ago
  Just use Java, then your FooClassFactory instance can just be named fooClassFactory :)
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]

hansvm 6y ago

> I'm sure a lot of people have this problem: naming things. Can't code until you figure out what that variable should be called. i, j, k, foo, bar, baz, and don't waste a moment thinking about it till your solution is finished and warrants a once-over (or till it has grown sufficiently complicated that a real name is finally necessary even if temporary -- try to work in small enough units that this never happens).

vageli 6y ago
This reminds me of advice I learned in school for writing: if you are having trouble coming up with an introduction, just write as if you already introduced the topic and come back to the intro afterward.
8note 6y ago
I generally think that if I can't find a good name for a thing, I don't actually know what it does yet, so Im not ready to code it. I, j, and k have clear definitions as basis vectors, so they can be used, but I don't think I'd ever call a variable foo or bar
- amelius 6y ago
  Use an APL keyboard and you'll have more options. https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=95872.0 https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=95872.0 I do think we need a modern hacking keyboard though.
  - PopGreene 6y ago
    (I know this is going to date me.) I used APL before and during college on a terminal with a type ball. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_2741 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_2741) APL is a great language.
- hansvm 6y ago
  > I generally think that if I can't find a good name for a thing, I don't actually know what it does yet, so Im not ready to code it. I can understand that viewpoint. On the other hand, you have to develop that understanding somewhere, and on some problems I find that sketching out a solution in code is more productive than using a whiteboard or some other mechanism, especially if I already have a rough idea of what needs to happen. E.g., I might know that I need to keep around a little intermediate state, and I'll throw that in an unremarkably named variable and iteratively build up the rest of the algorithm. Once I have _some_ solution I can go back and see if the variable was really important, prove it correct (or find additional work to do), and dole out meaningful names. The idea isn't that different from how when building up something which needs a loop you might start with "while (True) {}", figure out where you need to break, and then go back and factor in an appropriate stopping condition once you understand exactly what the loop needs to do to accomplish your goals.
tpxl 6y ago
Just use Java, then your FooClassFactory instance can just be named fooClassFactory :)
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]