9 ms·

This really makes me think we should be focusing on cost/benefit, risk/reward, pros/cons at all times. If we have a bug in these 5 copies, will it be too hard t

by spion 2y ago

This really makes me think we should be focusing on cost/benefit, risk/reward, pros/cons at all times. If we have a bug in these 5 copies, will it be too hard to fix in all of them? No? What about these 10 copies? If that sounds like its starting to get difficult, maybe now is the time.

danielmarkbruce 2y ago
That means you have to think. Most people hate thinking. Seriously.
laserlight 2y ago
> If we have a bug in these 5 copies, will it be too hard to fix in all of them? Yes, it will be, because copy-pasted code is never the same verbatim. First and foremost, name changes make it almost impossible to identify different copies. Then, there are different tweaks for each copy to make it suitable for the context. I always DRY early, because it's always free to copy-paste later.
- spion 2y ago
  I could make the same argument for not using DRY. The DRY-ed code is hard to change, programmers feel honour-bound to keep using it and tweaking it by adding a variety of parameters to more and more cases, and at the end becomes impossible to understand or update, slowing down development. Now, what probably should've been 3 abstractions is one incredibly convoluted "abstraction" that makes no sense, and its 3x harder than 3 individual abstractions to deduplicate and inline. It further pulls and invites complexity, as its current size is implicit invitation to include additional cases and places. Furthermore, while without DRY fixing bugs may've been tedious, now with DRY it may be almost impossible due to high risk of breaking a lot of things that depend on that code. (You might be lucky enough to be able to and have written extensive tests with 100% edge case coverage for it - if that's the case then you've postponed the moment of pain somewhat) Both can be true. It depends on the context whether benefits exceed costs. Decisions should be made based on a specific context and with thinking applied, not generic rules.
deleted 2y ago
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kitkat_new 2y ago
5 copies are already extremely difficult. It's not like they just jump into your eye when you edit some code.
- spion 2y ago
  It depends on the context. In some context, they might actually jump out. In some context, even if they don't, it might be fine, because the larger modules containing the code already have excellent tests and are solid and stable

by spion 2y ago

danielmarkbruce 2y ago

That means you have to think. Most people hate thinking. Seriously.

laserlight 2y ago

> If we have a bug in these 5 copies, will it be too hard to fix in all of them? Yes, it will be, because copy-pasted code is never the same verbatim. First and foremost, name changes make it almost impossible to identify different copies. Then, there are different tweaks for each copy to make it suitable for the context. I always DRY early, because it's always free to copy-paste later.

spion 2y ago
I could make the same argument for not using DRY. The DRY-ed code is hard to change, programmers feel honour-bound to keep using it and tweaking it by adding a variety of parameters to more and more cases, and at the end becomes impossible to understand or update, slowing down development. Now, what probably should've been 3 abstractions is one incredibly convoluted "abstraction" that makes no sense, and its 3x harder than 3 individual abstractions to deduplicate and inline. It further pulls and invites complexity, as its current size is implicit invitation to include additional cases and places. Furthermore, while without DRY fixing bugs may've been tedious, now with DRY it may be almost impossible due to high risk of breaking a lot of things that depend on that code. (You might be lucky enough to be able to and have written extensive tests with 100% edge case coverage for it - if that's the case then you've postponed the moment of pain somewhat) Both can be true. It depends on the context whether benefits exceed costs. Decisions should be made based on a specific context and with thinking applied, not generic rules.

deleted 2y ago

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kitkat_new 2y ago

5 copies are already extremely difficult. It's not like they just jump into your eye when you edit some code.

spion 2y ago
It depends on the context. In some context, they might actually jump out. In some context, even if they don't, it might be fine, because the larger modules containing the code already have excellent tests and are solid and stable