Comments on Kamal Shah's Blog: Flexible code versus less code

Vinay, your point is well taken. I agree that it i...

2009-12-05T07:22:41.353+05:30

Vinay, your point is well taken. I agree that it is best to do something well at the first shot rather than revisit it later to improve it. When I was a manager, I used to say this to my team too.

The key, in my opinion however, is to differentiate between doing a 'good' job and doing a 'perfect' job in the theoretical sense. Is it really required to make something really flexible when it may not be used by anyone else?

There are certain things that definitely need to be flexible. By all means, make them flexible. All I'm saying is be conscious of the fact and then do it.

Don't do it because it is 'right'. Be practical.

This, as with most other things in software, is a trade-off that we need to think about and then decide.

Kamal

Kamal, this particular point of your caught my att...

2009-12-04T22:40:26.235+05:30

Kamal, this particular point of your caught my attention:

"It is much easier to bang away a solution that fits your current needs and then sit down and make it 'flexible'".

I totally agree with your concept, however, from my experience if something is not done well right the first time, in the fast-paced software world that we are in, the "AND THEN SIT DOWN" part never happens. There would always be something else that is due...

Even if you were to have the time to work on the same module later, say several months down the line, you would be forced to do a full regression test of what you already delivered - unless you choose to duplicate code throughout. The advantage of sometimes doing it right the first time around, is that you have resources already devoted to it, and the knowledge/requirements are fresh in mind. You may not have this luxury later, and could potentially cause more headaches if you attempt to touch that down the line.

Vinay

I like this post... and was following this techniq...

2009-12-03T15:15:19.573+05:30

I like this post... and was following this technique from way long :)

Haha. Very cool. Two things - you used the 'F&...

2009-12-01T18:39:39.407+05:30

Haha. Very cool. Two things - you used the 'F' word, I guess this cuts kinda close to heart. :-) Second - over-running a decimal number counter is a *very good problem* to have!

Actually, we needed to represent the value as a fo...

2009-12-01T07:05:21.914+05:30

Actually, we needed to represent the value as a four character string. So, hexadecimals would enable us to fit in more customers. But the point I was trying to make was the readability and the simplicity was lost when using hexadecimals was not at all needed.

Using Hexadecimal and decimal is the same when it ...

2009-12-01T00:43:52.000+05:30

Using Hexadecimal and decimal is the same when it comes to the limit defined by the variable you choose, say short or long. It would not make any difference :-).

Wil is right, keep it simple and do not over engineer the solution.

Cheers
Obul