amw-zero

40 ms·

451.
by amw-zero 6y ago
Last I checked, all businesses continuously modify their codebase. So planning for change seems to be the only way to survive in such an environment. Not sure what your experience is where you’d label this as “wrong.”
452.
by amw-zero 6y ago
Here’s the thing. I’m very harsh about criticism of DRY. On the one hand, it does make sense to question your beliefs and to avoid being dogmatic. On the other, it’s very clear that DRY is an absolute prerequisite for any kind of software q
453.
by amw-zero 6y ago
Read this paper. Then read his book, The Relational Model for Database Management: https://codeblab.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/rmdb-codd.pd... . It’s mind boggling how much he anticipated about data m
454.
by amw-zero 6y ago
I’m very pro FP in general, but saying that its inherently more fit for writing software is a baseless claim. People are also unnecessarily harsh about OO, as if somehow the entire industry is operating orders of magnitude less efficiently
455.
by amw-zero 6y ago
I’ve always found it odd when people say there are no design patterns in FP. The same patterns do not translate, but different patterns exist, no?
456.
by amw-zero 6y ago
Yes it was lost. You did not communicate your point well. Try and avoid sarcasm and simply say what you mean.
457.
by amw-zero 6y ago
"Formalism" is a fancy word for saying that a system has to have an agreed upon shape - hence form . Programming languages have structure - you can't just type random text, there is a specific syntax, with specific semantic
458.
by amw-zero 6y ago
A programming language is a formalism. The definition of computing is a formalism. The relational database is a mathematical formalism of data. I'm just curious - what programming are you doing that doesn't involve math?
459.
by amw-zero 6y ago
Agreed on lightweight formal methods. TLA+ and Alloy have been really eye opening to use, and it's almost at no cost. They're just tools for expressing logic and analyzing models.
460.
by amw-zero 6y ago
I'm glad you asked this! I generally give these business systems the name of "interactive information systems." That's exactly primarily what I work on as well (and I imagine what most people work on, but not all of cour
461.
by amw-zero 6y ago
I’ve read a lot from Djikstra, but never this one. After giving it a read, it’s one of his most concise summaries of his overall philosophy. If he’s wrong about anything, it’s how formal methods are not up to speed with the scale of softwar
462.
by amw-zero 6y ago
Right. So it’s based on your own personal aesthetics and opinions. Which is fine. Just don’t be so convicted in code review, because you’re just spouting opinions.
463.
by amw-zero 6y ago
How else would you know if they are improvements?
464.
by amw-zero 6y ago
This isn’t a relevant argument. The fact that you constructed an absurd scenario and there’s a clear winner in it does not imply that there is always a clear winner. In fact, my experience is that in the majority of times there is not a cle
465.
by amw-zero 6y ago
How do you know that one name is better than the other? I see renames all the time where I preferred the original version.
466.
by amw-zero 6y ago
> the refactor improves abstraction quality The quality of abstractions is entirely subjective. > coupling is diminished / cohesion is improved This is also entirely subjective. The idea that eliminating coupling is inherently go
467.
by amw-zero 6y ago
There’s nothing wrong with optimism. But this line of thinking is a bit naive unfortunately. I’d say pretty much no one agrees on what “better” looks like. Better to someone often means applying a pattern that they just discovered in a blog
468.
by amw-zero 6y ago
Yes that’s fair. We know things that are within the model (i.e. math). Some models are very useful, after all.
469.
by amw-zero 6y ago
Of course math is a formal system. If you take Zermelo-Frankel Set Theory as the foundation of math, it has a very clear, formal set of axioms. And we do not know for certain that math is objective truth. If we did, there would be no philos
470.
by amw-zero 6y ago
DRY is absolutely essential. You can defer abstractions, sure, but ideal software is DRY.
471.
by amw-zero 6y ago
The problem with Sandi’s catchy phrase, is that it’s a claim with absolutely no backing. What is the cost model for software? How do you measure the cost of an abstraction vs. duplication? It’s really silly to argue about this stuff. This c
472.
by amw-zero 6y ago
How much of a carpenter’s day is spent assembling wooden structures vs. measuring and cutting?
473.
by amw-zero 6y ago
Well, in all seriousness that’s basically what dependent types are.
474.
by amw-zero 6y ago
Using a large amount of memory is totally fine for an enterprise SaaS app that a user is going to spend multiple hours a day in. There isn’t a one-size-fits-all web. Not every app is a blog or serving text content.
475.
by amw-zero 6y ago
Unfortunately, his ultra-conviction and closed mindedness prevents me from enjoying this content. He has a very long rant on one of these or another series talking about how there’s no benefit to garbage collection, under any circumstances,
476.
by amw-zero 6y ago
What’s special about Erlang pattern matching? Haskell and ML are at least equivalent.
477.
by amw-zero 6y ago
Regression to the mean is the most powerful force in nature. Try as you might, you have to use what everyone else is using. Which is also very hard to continuously do in an industry that has ADD.
478.
by amw-zero 6y ago
Intuition is definitely subjective, and that is ok. I do respect different intuitions while trying to understand them. And the best thing for that is doing what you did, which is provide a more clear example. Unfortunately, the example make
479.
by amw-zero 6y ago
> The interpretation of a linear difference of 0.001 in probability depends on the two numbers you're subtracting No it does not and I have shown why. A difference of 0.001 in probability means that the two events differ in their li
480.
by amw-zero 6y ago
The difference in those probabilities is the same. In each case, the event with the greater probability is 1-in-a-thousand times more likely to occur than the lesser. Let's walk through an example with these numbers. Each case has 2

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