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The argument seems to be: 1. I was told not to do X. 2. I did X and I like it. Therefore: 3. “Learn from your own experiences and beware of anyone espousing

The argument seems to be: 1. I was told not to do X. 2. I did X and I like it. Therefore: 3. “Learn from your own experiences and beware of anyone espousing the virtues of the One True Way.” This is motherhood and Apple pie. It sounds like wisdom, but it doesn’t follow logically from his example even if you agree with his feelings about his code. By way of a counter-example, We could pick millions of lines of terrible PHP and Javascript. These were all written by people who learned from their own experiences and didn’t follow any dogmatic rules or guidelines. Why is it that sometimes breaking the “rules” is a good idea but sometimes it isn’t? For a blog post to be useful, it should propose some sort of repeatable criteria for when to defy thirty years of experience/folklore with OOP and when to respect it. Again, I am deliberately avoiding agreeing or disagreeing with his example, just pointing out that the conclusion as stated isn't really useful.

tom_b 15y ago
There seems to be a pressure for coders to blog. Writing well (and creating useful posts) requires the same attention to craft that coding does. Thoughtfulness is a rare quality in both code and blog posts - I savor it when I find it. We probably need fewer coding frameworks and more mental frameworks that encourage thoughtfulness in coding and writing. But I do think there is room in the blog world for writing as journaling. Maybe the usefulness of a blog post is limited to the author, but there may be some value for us as readers in simply seeing another's thought process at work rather than requiring the post to meet some metric of useful.
- AshFurrow 15y ago
  >>> Writing well (and creating useful posts) requires the same attention to craft that coding does. Yeah, for sure. And rushing through writing a quick response when I should be heading out the door for work was probably a bad idea. Next time I'll sit on it until I'm through my first cup of coffee.
  - raganwald 15y ago
    Maybe, but then again, maybe not. A blog is not a hardbound book with gilt corners. You can read the responses, revise it, perhaps learn from the feedback. I certainly do, and in that respect my own writing resembles my code: Writing is rewriting. Therefore, I’d rather see you write and be thoughtful about the responses you receive than hold back until you have researched every idea thoroughly in an attempt to avoid criticism. That is my personal view, I am not sure I can provide any evidence that it is a good idea.
    - AshFurrow 15y ago
      I think the biggest problem I made with this particular post was conflating it with a code sample. Few people who probably argue that OOP is the only way to code. But when faced with an example of another way, people are focusing on that specific example as a way that "I don't understand OOP." I'm finding more and more that what I don't include in my writing makes a strong piece.

tom_b 15y ago

There seems to be a pressure for coders to blog. Writing well (and creating useful posts) requires the same attention to craft that coding does. Thoughtfulness is a rare quality in both code and blog posts - I savor it when I find it. We probably need fewer coding frameworks and more mental frameworks that encourage thoughtfulness in coding and writing. But I do think there is room in the blog world for writing as journaling. Maybe the usefulness of a blog post is limited to the author, but there may be some value for us as readers in simply seeing another's thought process at work rather than requiring the post to meet some metric of useful.

AshFurrow 15y ago
>>> Writing well (and creating useful posts) requires the same attention to craft that coding does. Yeah, for sure. And rushing through writing a quick response when I should be heading out the door for work was probably a bad idea. Next time I'll sit on it until I'm through my first cup of coffee.
- raganwald 15y ago
  Maybe, but then again, maybe not. A blog is not a hardbound book with gilt corners. You can read the responses, revise it, perhaps learn from the feedback. I certainly do, and in that respect my own writing resembles my code: Writing is rewriting. Therefore, I’d rather see you write and be thoughtful about the responses you receive than hold back until you have researched every idea thoroughly in an attempt to avoid criticism. That is my personal view, I am not sure I can provide any evidence that it is a good idea.
  - AshFurrow 15y ago
    I think the biggest problem I made with this particular post was conflating it with a code sample. Few people who probably argue that OOP is the only way to code. But when faced with an example of another way, people are focusing on that specific example as a way that "I don't understand OOP." I'm finding more and more that what I don't include in my writing makes a strong piece.