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We Really Don't Know Jack About Maintenance
davecb writes "The ACM has been kind enough to print Paul Stachour's and my 'jack' article about Software Maintenance. Paul first pointed out back in 1984 that we and our managers were being foolish — when we were still running Unix V7 — and if anything it's been getting worse. Turns out maintenance has been a 'solved problem in computer science' since at least then, and we're just beginning to rediscover it."
Doesn't modular programming solve this problem? If you design the core software correctly from the get-go to be truly modular, then any changes in the future are a matter of swapping in or out desired modules, and snapping on new ones?
Maybe I'm too naive, but is there REALLY that much spaghetti code these days?
Decades ago, companies which developed technology were...technology companies. With real engineers, and highly technically skilled management. Today, companies with business-oriented management and zero technology background own and develop systems. They often do it poorly, with insufficiently empowered engineering teams, and insufficiently skilled engineers.
So today we've got a lot of Java and .Net shops filled with junior-level programmers and no disciplined, experienced systems engineers. Is it a surprise that when MS brought programming to the masses that the masses failed to learn engineering?
In the early 70's I had the pleasure of working with both Prof. Tony Brooker and I.R, MacCallum, both of whom had made major contributions to the Atlas timesharing system, Brooker had designed and MacCallum implemented most of the Compiler-Compiler, a meta system that included a parser generator and an MDL with interpreter to walk the parse tree and generate code. I bring these guys up to make a simple point, both were skilled technologists in their own areas, but as many University academics, they were narrow; an could not understand the need for maintenance, incomprehensible looks, the software will ROT ... etc etc.
They just could NOT get their minds around changing external circumstances, working in tiny groups, version control, V2... was easy as was getting their all 3 systems updated. Pre/Post/Co - requisites, SCM, package management, bug-tracking were all to come as the world started to really use this stuff and they also had no communication disconnect, because there were less than 1000 and they all knew each other,
Yes its a HUGE problem, but unfortunately does need real understanding!
"... some righteous macros to make the code more readable..."
OMG, somebody fire this jerk. In most cases adding macros MAY make the code more readable for you, but the next poor guy who comes along can no longer look at that section of code to see what's going on, but must now combine the code he's reading with a macro that he can only assume was implemented properly in the first place.
And if by "righteous" you mean some complex and convoluted code boiled down into a single line... then you should not only be fired, but shot.
Unless the above should have been in [sarcasm] tags, in which case, the immortal words of Miss Emily Litella apply. (grin)
Any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so.
In this age of 20yo CEOs and single-quarter companies it's hardly suprising that most software is no better than a rigged demo.
Just make it shiny enough for someone to buy the company and then let their support staff of MS trained monkeys deal with it
Then we have the "artists" (in both the software and hardware field) who have survived for twenty years without "all that sh1t". Course, like the CEO, they've gone on to their next challenge long before the chickens come home to roost. And it's not their fault everyone else is incompetent, is it?
I continue to be amazed, on a weekly basis, by the complete lack of experience shown by the actions and products of very large companies.
Oh, I reject the claim that
The author has obviously never maintained hardware: it has bugs, patches, upgrades just like any other part of your system.
-- Butlerian Jihad NOW!
This is why you refactor the code alongside the original. Fix bugs in parallel. When there's a new bug, you roll back to the old, non-refactored code and see if it goes away. If so, you stay on the old, crappy code until you can fix the new, cleaned up code. Then you swap back to the new code. You repeat this testing phase until switching on the new code doesn't introduce any critical regressions, then continue living on the new code for a few months before nuking the old code.
Yes, this is slower than doing development on a single version of the code, but it's a short-term penalty until the code is cleaner and more flexible, at which point you then make up for the period of slowness in the minds of your bosses by proceeding to successfully add twelve new features in a single week---you know, the ones that have been punted for six years because they were too risky to make in the current fragile code base.
The trick is to alternate between rewrites and enhancements. Don't stay focused on rewrites too long or you'll seem unproductive. Don't ignore it for too long or you'll find yourself blocked and eventually become unproductive. The only way to survive is to stay somewhere in the middle.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.