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Alan Cox on Writing Better Software

Posted by michael on from the use-more-white-space dept.

Andy Gimblett writes "Alan Cox recently gave a talk in which he discussed some current and emerging techniques for producing higher quality software. Some of these will be familiar to Slashdot readers, such as validation tools, type checking, etc, but others seem heavily influenced by his recent MBA. In particular, he has a lot to say about Quality Assurance in the software world, and the kinds of things we should be doing (and some people are doing) to make better software. Story and lots of quotes at Ping Wales, and video at IT Wales."

5 of 391 comments (clear)

  1. Quality by mfh · · Score: 5, Funny

    he has a lot to say about Quality Assurance in the software world

    Quality Assurance in 4 easy steps!

    Dear Managers,

    1. Listen
    2. Close your mouth
    3. Plan everything around #1
    4. Profit!!! (notice there is no line with ??? because you listened!)

    --
    The dangers of knowledge trigger emotional distress in human beings.
  2. Alan Cox by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Who cares about what Alan Cox has to say? He's soooo 2.4

  3. Re:2 words by Unkle · · Score: 5, Funny
    I actually had a coworker marked down on his yearly review last year for wanting to write re-usable code. Our manager's (very VERY flawed) opinion was that, though it might be nice to have the re-usable code, just write it for this specific task because it's just easy and fast.

    The kicker is, this year that same manager wants to re-use the code that my coworker was origionally going to write.

    --
    Against stupidity, the gods themselves contend in vain.
  4. Re:2 words by johannesg · · Score: 5, Funny
    Ha, that's nothing. Long ago I used to work for a company that thought it was a good idea to NEVER reuse code because then you would reuse all the bugs as well. OTOH, they reasoned, if you wrote it from scratch you wouldn't be copying old bugs, thus this was a safer thing to do.

    I'll leave the results as an exercise for the reader...

  5. MBA? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    So now we're taking software writing advice from PHBs now? :)