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Reusing and Recycling Code
An anonymous reader sends us to a writeup about when and how to recycle code, excerpting:
"As developers, once we start separating our code into abstract ontological typologies, we make use of the human mind's phenomenal ability to work with types. Our code becomes less about jump tables and registers and more about users, email messages and images. What once was a problem of allocating resources and operations within the computer becomes an abstract, logical problem within a collection of objects....Over time, by constantly working to reuse our own code, we choose practices that work well for ourselves and discard practices that don't work as well or slow down our workflow. For developers flying solo or those working on small projects, this evolutionary process is a sufficient way of going about things. But there's trouble when we add other players into the mix--other developers, a user interface person, a database person, a sysadmin, a project mana-jerk: as a developer, they don't have access to our 'experience' of the code and we don't have access to theirs. "
And then there's the skilled but arrogant jerks who deride anyone they think they're better than, which is almost everyone. Just one of those guys can bring dysfunction to what would otherwise have been a productive team. You REALLY don't want to get stuck with one of them on your team project.
And it's a real shame, too. Some of those guys actually are as talented as they believe themselves to be, and if they weren't such assholes, could have made the team better by showing the others better ways to do things. And no, I don't mean hand-holding or playing teacher, but just the influence of having the others see what really good work looks like. Leading by example, in other words.
These guys aren't useless, however. There are problems that are well-suited to single-handed solutions. Just keep them far away from anything that requires close collaboration, and both they and their employer's will be happy.