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This language is, IMO, damaging to the professionalism and image of software engineering. IIRC, I am echoing content from "Clean Coder", but in "professional" c
by lumb63 4y ago
This language is, IMO, damaging to the professionalism and image of software engineering. IIRC, I am echoing content from "Clean Coder", but in "professional" careers, it is expected that the practitioner is competent and stays up-to-date on the latest tools and techniques in their field.
When I see a doctor, I expect them to be familiar with the latest medical research. I expect they will treat my illnesses with modern medicines and employ the right tools, correctly, and understand how they work at a sufficient level of depth to do the job correctly. For example, I used to make electrical medical staplers; surgeons need not care about how RTOSes work, but they need to know how to interact with the software enough to do their job. Similarly, I'm not saying we all ought to be able to build Git from scratch. I'm saying we ought to master it to the extent necessary. If your use case is committing alone on a single branch, learn "git commit". But for most devs, understanding the tree structure that Git uses to store data and what basic operations are doing "under the covers" builds a mental model that makes Git easy.
We have to have the time to learn the tools that help us do our jobs well. You can neglect that duty to do "real work", as much as a doctor can neglect learning how to use a scalpel so they can "get on with the surgery".
- nextaccountic 4y ago> it is expected that the practitioner is competent and stays up-to-date on the latest tools and techniques in their field. Even when the tools themselves suck? The thing about our profession is that anyone can build better tools. Just like Linus took a week or two to sketch Git with some C code and a bunch of shell scripts (seriously, that was what happened - but he had the BitKeeper design in mind and how to improve on it). There is not regulation that says that in order to build a tool for millions of people to use you need to have a certification or anything.
- 0cf8612b2e1e 4y agoActually, I believe a deliberate goal was to write something distinctly different from how BitKeeper operated.
- nextaccountic 4y agoYes, but without being informed by the BitKeeper's design and shortcomings he would never design Git so quickly
- pdimitar 4y agoWe all know the ideal theory, man. Citing it as if it's something that's even needed to be said is kind of ironic on a forum with mostly programmers in it who, I am pretty sure, by and large possess a fair amount of critical thinking and quick analysis skills. A ton of people have to make do with partial schedules. And I mean a ton, likely no less than 85% of all programmers everywhere. You might want to make a good deep analysis on whether you're not coming from a position of severe privilege and a very positive filter bubble.