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Real World Code Sucks

Posted by Soulskill on from the so-does-real-world-math-and-real-world-cooking dept.

An anonymous reader tips an article at El Reg about the disparity between the code you learn at school and the code you see at work. Quoting: "There is a kind of cognitive dissonance in most people who've moved from the academic study of computer science to a job as a real-world software developer. The conflict lies in the fact that, whereas nearly every sample program in every textbook is a perfect and well-thought-out specimen, virtually no software out in the wild is, and this is rarely acknowledged. To be precise: a tremendous amount of source code written for real applications is not merely less perfect than the simple examples seen in school — it's outright terrible by any number of measures."

5 of 292 comments (clear)

  1. Obligatory XKCD by doubleplusungodly · · Score: 5, Funny

    http://xkcd.com/844/

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  2. Re:same... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    It's no different than business school examples vs real world practice.

    And English class samples (such as books and essays that they have you read) versus the comments you read on YouTube.

  3. Re:From the article by Samantha+Wright · · Score: 4, Funny

    The last page bashes Haskell using a snippet from Uncyclopedia as anecdotal evidence that it is "all but impossible to write readable code" in Haskell.

    Beyond it is another dimension: a dimension of whinge, a dimension of fallacy, a dimension of diminished journalistic integrity. You're moving into a land of more shadow than substance, of vague and half-baked wit; you've just crossed over into the Register.

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    Bio questions? Ask me to start a Q&A journal. Computer analogies available for most topics!
  4. Re:Captain Obvious? by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 5, Funny

    The first thought that occurred to me is the equivalent situation in literature: People go to school, read and learn from Shakespeare, Austen, Melville, Twain, Hemingway, Faulkner, Tolkien...and then they go out and write Twilight and Hunger Games. I guess some people simply aren't cut for it?

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    Ezekiel 23:20
  5. Re:Captain Obvious? by UnknownSoldier · · Score: 4, Funny

    * Meskimen's Law: There's never time to do it right, but always time to do it over.

    * Ninety-Ninety Rule of Project Schedules: The first ninety percent of the task takes ninety percent of the time, and the last ten percent takes the other ninety percent.

    http://www.panopticoncentral.net/2010/08/01/murphys-computer-law/