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It used to mean that, but a programmer changed the meaning. They could. (a) rename the column, be the guy who broke the system and spend all weekend trying to

It used to mean that, but a programmer changed the meaning. They could. (a) rename the column, be the guy who broke the system and spend all weekend trying to fix 6 systems he never knew existed, written in Access, Excel, Crystal Reports, VB6, Delphi and a CMD file on a contractors laptop. (b) keep the column name, deliver the feature, go home.

pif 4y ago
There's no point in keeping the same name so that a system can keep running, if the data meaning has changed. Bad programmers chose (b). Good programmers choose (a). Better programmers refuse the change request.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
ilyt 4y ago
If data meaning changed tho those 6 systems would break too, no ?
- throwaway39978 4y ago
  It might not be math-related; could be something as simple as a requests table being named to indicate that api X was used and now it uses API y and there is some reporting on that somewhere that doesn't care which API was used. Ideally the table would have been named more generically but in an earlier stage startup there will be mistakes in naming things no matter how hard you try to avoid that. So the only thing that actually breaks here is that a small number of engineers that care about this might misinterpret what it means unless they learn the appropriate tribal knowledge. Ideally it gets fixed but if you look at all of the things that can be improved in an early stage startup, this kind of thing is pretty minimal in importance so it becomes tech debt.
  - maaarghk 4y ago
    Anyway, where were we? Oh yeah - RIP Fred Brooks.
Ma8ee 4y ago
I really hope you are joking 100%, because (b) Go home and be happily oblivious that six other systems silently started to produce wrong results since the meaning of the column has changed. But, of course, that is someone else’s problem, some other day, when several months of reports and forecasts have to be recalled and updated.
js8 4y ago
That's why you should also have comments, and maintain them. Then if the name is hard to change, you can at least document the new semantics.
deniska 4y ago
We prefer option c: add a new table/column with similar looking name. Then few years later start wondering why there're two almost identical entities, and why one of them behaves weirder than another.
quickthrower2 4y ago
To be clear I am pointing out incentives to make a worse choice, rather than the better choice.

pif 4y ago

There's no point in keeping the same name so that a system can keep running, if the data meaning has changed. Bad programmers chose (b). Good programmers choose (a). Better programmers refuse the change request.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

ilyt 4y ago

If data meaning changed tho those 6 systems would break too, no ?

throwaway39978 4y ago
It might not be math-related; could be something as simple as a requests table being named to indicate that api X was used and now it uses API y and there is some reporting on that somewhere that doesn't care which API was used. Ideally the table would have been named more generically but in an earlier stage startup there will be mistakes in naming things no matter how hard you try to avoid that. So the only thing that actually breaks here is that a small number of engineers that care about this might misinterpret what it means unless they learn the appropriate tribal knowledge. Ideally it gets fixed but if you look at all of the things that can be improved in an early stage startup, this kind of thing is pretty minimal in importance so it becomes tech debt.
- maaarghk 4y ago
  Anyway, where were we? Oh yeah - RIP Fred Brooks.

Ma8ee 4y ago

I really hope you are joking 100%, because (b) Go home and be happily oblivious that six other systems silently started to produce wrong results since the meaning of the column has changed. But, of course, that is someone else’s problem, some other day, when several months of reports and forecasts have to be recalled and updated.

js8 4y ago

That's why you should also have comments, and maintain them. Then if the name is hard to change, you can at least document the new semantics.

deniska 4y ago

We prefer option c: add a new table/column with similar looking name. Then few years later start wondering why there're two almost identical entities, and why one of them behaves weirder than another.

quickthrower2 4y ago

To be clear I am pointing out incentives to make a worse choice, rather than the better choice.