The Whiteboard

user55340

12:00 AM

The culture that the community, moderators (and past moderators) have instilled is to not close those more discussionesque questions - a light touch when possible.

user55340

Except when it blows up (as HNQ typically does) and then the mods go in with a heavy touch.

user55340

Anyways... need to go.

user55340

1:15 AM

@ThomasOwens given your new found super syntax tag powers... do you think you could poke at c++-11 too (as programmers.stackexchange.com/review/suggested-edits/124097 added c++ in part to enable syntax highlighting)

user55340

@Ixrec The alternative is to close the question early. Much of the community and the moderator culture there appears to have decided to leave questions open for as long as possible, even those borderline ones.

user55340

@anongoodnurse Then I have done what you should have as mods: I have VTC'd the question as not on-topic b/c it is not about parenting, but about how to hurting good parenting. You attacked the respondents, when you should have guided the questioner. That behavior reflects on all of the moderators: you have all defended the undefensible. — Jeremy Miller Nov 14 at 4:07

user55340

When you look at the closed questions - they really have to go fairly far off the topic to get there.

user55340

And, well, thats the culture that they've set up there about what is on topic and not... and how far you have to go to close as primary opinion or too broad.

Robert Harvey

1:30 AM

This discussion should not be about me. I'm nobody special. I'm an example of a class of individuals who are perhaps unable to find StackExchange-parenting useful because of the structural issues. As you note, I don't write in the style of a conciliatory school guidance counselor...and if that means a post or two of mine is dumped here and there...no worries. — dwoz Nov 14 at 16:56

user55340

I worry that with that level of permissiveness as the dominant closing culture here, that the close relationship with SO would lead to nearly every question being a flash mob of people answering and commenting on all the interesting questions without care for the actual architecture and design questions. It would be NPR all over again.

Robert Harvey

That's exactly right.

Especially because of the NPR legacy.

user55340

Without the tools for people to be able to prevent that flash mob of low quality answers and questions from starting in the first place, it would run away again.

user55340

The only tool that we have to address the HNQ flash mob is to close it before it gets there. Once it gets to the flash mob point, the tools that we have are inadequate for curating the answers.

user55340

Unless we want to start flagging every low quality (but not VLQ) post that has 5 up votes... and get a lot of declined flags because mods don't consider that to be part of what is within their mandate.

user55340

1:34 AM

Or having another incident like SO had where people are complaining about vote brigading on chat and meta.

enderland

@MichaelT I think, even if a post is upvoted, if you have a low quality review post (where a VLQ flag puts it) and get enough recommend deletes it will delete (even for positive answers)

user55340

@enderland but the thing is, it isn't a very low quality post, and it won't kick into the queue with more than 2 votes.

user55340

Sure, 6 recommend deletes will do it... but 1 "looks ok" will kick it out.

enderland

yeah, this is true

user55340

And 3 delete votes on a 0 vote answer won't delete it.

enderland

1:36 AM

that raises a moderator flag though

(if more delete votes than looks good)

user55340

Would you delete a post with +4 and not awful? Just not good.

user55340

In general, mods seem to be meta criticism adverse unless its something they really want to take a stand on.

enderland

@MichaelT each site is different for how they handle these too, I get the feeling p.se mods handle flags more directly and immediately than we do on Workplace

user55340

44

A: Is fewer lines of code always better?

Code with as few lines as possible is definitely the best code and every semi-colon you see is basically the developer admitting they weren't clever enough to use advanced constructions like the comma operator or short-circuiting operators to keep the line going as long as possible like you can s...

enderland

@MichaelT I've upvoted that :D

user55340

1:48 AM

@ThomasOwens if I flagged that for a "please delete", would you?

user55340

@enderland I'll admit to it being funny... and certainly a good example of a popular answer.

Robert Harvey

No disrespect to Mr. Fowler, but I don't agree that any fool can write code a computer can understand.

enderland

@RobertHarvey depends if a compile/runtime error is understanding :P

user55340

@RobertHarvey Any fool can write code a computer would understand... very few of those can write useful code that a computer would understand.

Robert Harvey

474

Q: Why is this program erroneously rejected by three C++ compilers?

I am having some difficulty compiling a C++ program that I've written. This program is very simple and, to the best of my knowledge, conforms to all the rules set forth in the C++ Standard. I've read over the entirety of ISO/IEC 14882:2003 twice to be sure. The program is as follows: Here i...

enderland

1:51 AM

@RobertHarvey that's one of my favorite totallly-off-topic questions on SE :)

user55340

-1

Q: If Oracle loses its interest in Java, could it survive only by its community?

I have recently reading this article form DZone which mentions some information about Oracle view on Java. Considering if Oracle stop evolving Java, can OpenJDK and the community or even another company like Azul keep Java alive as it is, can the community continue with Java without Oracle ?

java oracle

user55340

@JonEricson please tell me that this isn't a borderline question.

enderland

@MichaelT I was thinking about that when I read it too....

user55340

@RobertHarvey could you edit that into a raw link rather than one box?

user55340

I might have to otherwise bring out my blinking lights.

Jon Ericson

1:53 AM

@MichaelT Yeah. That's not going anywhere useful.

user55340

(just the "whee! Flashes on the screen behind the game I'm playing)

user55340

Wait... not there yet...

enderland

@MichaelT this seems like it could be considered "borderline" at first glance, too...

0

Q: Setting precision for RR in the NTL library

I am using the RR class in the NTL library. I set the precision to 128 since I need higher precision for my computations in the program. From the documentation for RR, I see that it offers from min 53 bits and max upto word size of the machine but when I print the values with cout, it only has 9 ...

floating-point

user55340

What is RR and NTL? I don't want to punt to SO until I understand that.

enderland

well there's no code there anyways, "is my cout the error?" without code doesn't strike me as good

user55340

1:56 AM

two migrate votes at the moment.

enderland

oh. hey. one of those is mine lol

Jimmy Hoffa

@RobertHarvey ???

Robert Harvey

@JimmyHoffa Mind blown.

Jimmy Hoffa

It's too long, I don't understand what it's supposed to be

enderland

@JimmyHoffa writing code by coloring

user55340

1:58 AM

blinking lights .gif

Robert Harvey

Eh, another failed migration. I discussed this a bit with Shog9, thinking that it might be fallout from the 3-vote rule.

user55340

Nope - not failed... just LONG stalled.

Jimmy Hoffa

oh, I zoomed in and saw. I see

user55340

Check back in 30 minutes.

enderland

@RobertHarvey that user isn't q-blocked on SO?

user55340

1:59 AM

This was happening before the 3 vote thing.

Robert Harvey

Not q-blocked.

user55340

Even before the 3 vote thing, I've had questions get stuck in migration and take half an hour to get there.

Robert Harvey

It turns out that migrations are placed into a queue, where the target site accepts them (or not). There's a retry counter; some duct tape, chewing gum and a few coat hangers are involved.

Probably has something to do with Stack Overflow having its own database.

user55340

@RobertHarvey possibly.

user55340

> This question looks like it is in the process of migrating but broke somewhere in the middle. Could you give it the appropriate shove (or unlock it so that the Roomba can some day delete it?) – MichaelT Oct 22 at 16:11 helpful - It is migrated fully as I see it now. Strange.

Robert Harvey

2:02 AM

Don't know what their problem is. I deal with cross-database queries all the time. :P

user55340

programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/300590/…

user55340

(you can see it migrated away - programmers.stackexchange.com/posts/300590/revisions )

Robert Harvey

> locked by Community♦ 7 mins ago

I don't think that question is going anywhere any time soon.

user55340

@RobertHarvey Mentioned I saw it take 30 minutes before.

Robert Harvey

Yeah, but after it had been locked?

user55340

2:05 AM

I blame caching.

user55340

Yep.

Robert Harvey

Cache this.

user55340

If you want to give me some ~~cache~~ cash...

Robert Harvey

So it's only a sorta lock.

enderland

1

Q: You can now vote to migrate posts!

If you can cast close votes, you now have a new privilege! Up until recently, only moderators could migrate an off-topic question to Stack Overflow or Programmers.SE - if you haven't noticed yet, the close > off-topic > migrate dialog now offers two new migration paths (migrating to CR.Meta was ...

discussion featured site-policy migration vote-to-close

user55340

2:10 AM

@enderland Might have to write an answer there.

enderland

I thought you might, I am surprised they put CR as a migration path without asking anyone here

user55340

just afraid we'll get all the "no source, migrate to P.SE" questions that show up there.

user114359

Yet again, I spend a bunch of time debugging, wondering why my code isn't working... only to remember that a half hour ago I ran a SQL update and didn't commit. I blame Oracle for this.

enderland

did this question get deleted by roomba? I posted to the CV room suggesting it be reopened - programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/300071/…

user55340

> deleted by Community♦ Oct 27 at 3:00 (RemovedAbandonedClosed)

user55340

2:19 AM

> locked by Community♦ 22 mins ago

user55340

Still not there yet.

enderland

ahhh, sad. I forget whether it was good enough or not, but it was pinned in the CV room :)

user55340

> Is there an algorithm to detect repetitive blocks in html text (using the order of tags maybe )?
For example here :

<table>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td>Shady Grove</td>
<td>Aeolian</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Over the River, Charlie</td>
<td>Dorian</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>

I need a way to know that the block <tr> <td> <td> is repeated so I can store the content in a for dimensional array in java.

Robert Harvey

Not really a very good quality question.

enderland

hmmmrm. did I edit that? I don't recall a question like that

Robert Harvey

2:22 AM

No edits except by OP.

The HTML wasn't even in the original question.

enderland

oh. hmmm

user114359

0

A: You can now vote to migrate posts!

If you come across a question asking for help with a design as opposed to the code, that is technically on-topic at Programmers and may be a candidate for migration there. Programmers welcomes design review questions, but they have to be reasonably scoped with clear design goals. "Critique my de...

user55340

@Snowman beat me.

user55340

I was starting out with:

user55340

> Congratulations, you are the only site that has a direct to Programmers.SE migration path.

Please make sure you familiarize yourself with the [various things that will get closed](http://meta.programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/6483/why-was-my-question-closed-or-down-voted).

user114359

2:24 AM

@MichaelT do you have enough rep to edit my answer without queuing?

user55340

Nope. And there's no queue on meta... its "either or"

Robert Harvey

So they put the migration path back?

enderland

on code review, not Stack Overflow

user55340

if you have enough rep, you can edit. If you don't, you can't.

Robert Harvey

Ah, I see.

enderland

2:26 AM

I trust Code Review a fair bit more than SO though

user55340

I trust CR's volume not to be overwhelming.

user114359

@MichaelT I forgot about that. I edited in that link.

user114359

We don't have a "design-review" tag. Those are mixed in with design which also contains some crap questions that aren't about specific design issues. Crap like this:

user114359

207

Q: Started wrong with a project. Should I start over?

I'm a beginner web developer (one year of experience). A couple of weeks after graduating, I got offered a job to build a web application for a company whose owner is not much of a tech guy. He recruited me to avoid theft of his idea, the high cost of development charged by a service company, an...

design programming-practices junior-programmer technical-debt deadlines

user114359

186

Q: How can one manage thousands of IF...THEN...ELSE rules?

I am considering building an application, which, at its core, would consist of thousands of if...then...else statements. The purpose of the application is to be able to predict how cows move around in any landscape. They are affected by things like the sun, wind, food source, sudden events etc. ...

design design-patterns business-rules prolog logic-programming

user114359

2:32 AM

I was hoping to post some links to examples of good design review questions that show what they should migrate.

Robert Harvey

Finish it the way you started, and clean up the technical debt in the next version (if there is one). Your boss won't know the difference. Make sure you test it well. — Robert Harvey Jul 15 '14 at 4:13

Nice.

Prolog was something I never could get my head around. Same with FORTH. Two things I really wanted to like, but don't.

enderland

@RobertHarvey @MichaelT

0

Q: Setting precision for RR in the NTL library

I am using the RR class in the NTL library. I set the precision to 128 since I need higher precision for my computations in the program. From the documentation for RR, I see that it offers from min 53 bits and max upto word size of the machine but when I print the values with cout, it only has 9 ...

floating-point

user55340

Yep... see... between 22 and 43 minutes.

Robert Harvey

'bout damn time.

Robert Harvey

3:00 AM

0

A: Can we do smallcaps in posts?

If you start with the sub instead of the sup, as in \**Now you sit there like a stunned mullet.* <sub><sup>- BARRY DICKENS, 1985.</sup></sub> you will wind up with something like this: *Now you sit there like a stunned mullet. - BARRY DICKENS, 1985. Which is a bit closer to what you are...

Fun with SMALLCAPS.

Ixrec

7:39 AM

does anyone else think it's undesirable for a highly voted answer to be literally laughing at premise of the question in large, bold text? programmers.stackexchange.com/a/302841/161917

Robert Harvey

"No" would have been sufficient. — Robert Harvey 10 secs ago

@Ixrec This is one of those times when the community gets it wrong.

Ixrec

indeed

Robert Harvey

I toned it down a bit.

Ixrec

thanks

Robert Harvey

@ddyer: Too large for the margin to contain, eh? — Robert Harvey 20 secs ago

Ixrec

7:54 AM

lolwut

Robert Harvey

Fermat's Last Theorem

In number theory, Fermat's Last Theorem (sometimes called Fermat's conjecture, especially in older texts) states that no three positive integers a, b, and c can satisfy the equation an + bn = cn for any integer value of n greater than two. The cases n = 1 and n = 2 were known to have infinitely many solutions. This theorem was first conjectured by Pierre de Fermat in 1637 in the margin of a copy of Arithmetica where he claimed he had a proof that was too large to fit in the margin. The first successful proof was released in 1994 by Andrew Wiles, and formally published in 1995, after 358 years of...

Ixrec

oh no I got the joke, I was reacting to the guy claiming he had a mystery proof

Robert Harvey

Yeah, guys like that are so easy to diss.

Jimmy Hoffa

12:41 PM

Happy Coffee Day

Thomas Owens

@JimmyHoffa Don't forget to drink your 3-5 cups so you live a long, coffee-filled life.

Jimmy Hoffa

@ThomasOwens each of my "cup"s is what I presume is measured as 2, so I'm already 2 in.

Duga

12:57 PM

In all seriousness: learning how to find and identify quality sources of information yourself is basically the #1 requirement to prevent confusion. Case in point: you got a link to the Oracle tutorial probably because it is free, not because it is a proper guide for new programmers. It really isn't, IMO. Its more written for experienced programmers who want to migrate to Java. — Gimby 15 secs ago

Duga

1:38 PM

The reason, I'd guess, for your previous question being downvoted is that it's not a good fit for StackOverflow; SO is a QA site for specific coding/programming problems - there's plenty of information on the Internet on MVC design in principle or how it specifically relates to PHP or the web. Once you've got some code or theory there's programmers.stackexchange.com or codereview.stackexchange.com - SO itself is really only for the niggly bits you get stuck on. — CD001 29 secs ago

enderland

2:05 PM

I made an edit to that last one and I think it's appropriate here - stackoverflow.com/q/33780251/1048539

@ThomasOwens I just answered that question on Workplace hahhahaha

Thomas Owens

DID YOU SUGGEST SHAREPOINT AND DOCUMENTS FOR REQUIREMENTS MANAGEMENT OMG BAD ENDERLAND

enderland

@ThomasOwens they want a CMS

Thomas Owens

No. They need a requirements management tool

Duga

I edited this to be a better fit for programmers.SE and have flagged it for migration. — enderland 55 secs ago

enderland

maybe? I don't think it's clear enough

> Ideally I'd prefer to have some system which allows to store and compare versions of documents, and attach discussions both to the whole document and the particular change.

that's basically what sharepoint's only viable use case is

Thomas Owens

2:13 PM

Documents are the problem. You don't want requirements documents.

I know - I'm living in a hell that is requirements in documents. Systems Engineering is changing that and life is so much better on newer projects.

enderland

I'm not sure if he's asking, "what tool to manage existing documents?" or "how to manage the whole process"

Thomas Owens

I'm writing an answer now. It's awesome.

user55340

10k funny of the day: programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/143553/…

user55340

Look at the comments.

user55340

(The comment is under the impression that the question id (2003) is the year of the post)

user55340

2:25 PM

@enderland the requirements- on topic here, though given that it's a migration might have been better served on pm.se

enderland

@MichaelT thomas flagged it on Workplace, so I trusted him ;)

also this is basically a dup, but I think is slightly different - programmers.stackexchange.com/q/302901/52929

I'm not sure how to edit it to clarify what he is asking though

user55340

As I said, on topic here, just think that pm would have better served it.

user55340

It feels more like a "want pm answers" more than "want programmer / architect answers"

Thomas Owens

@MichaelT If it's related specifically to software projects, I'd rather have it here than PM.

Software project management and software processes are on-topic here. They are also my areas of expertise.

user55340

Yes. On topic here. On topic there too. I just get the feeling the op is interested in pm answers more.

Thomas Owens

2:38 PM

@MichaelT But software project management is on-topic here. The audience of Programmers includes software project leads, process engineers, and project managers. We need questions of interest to them if we want to attract that audience.

enderland

I edited this slightly. I think you are not asking for "how to use a singleton" but more "what are the ways to do what you are trying to do" -- which might not be a singleton. I have clarified your question slightly and voted to reopen. If this changed your intent too much, feel free to edit and clarify further. — enderland 8 secs ago

user55340

Fair 'nuff.

user55340

Btw, please depoll title wording.

Thomas Owens

@MichaelT ?

user55340

3

Q: How do you follow the evolution of requirements?

What are the ways of managing the evolving requirements without turning them into a mess? We do not have a dedicated analyst in our team so this role is shared by all the members. Our reoccurring workflow is the following: Users send us the initial version of requirements for new functionalit...

project-management

enderland

2:41 PM

@MichaelT I fixed that too, always forget titles...

Thomas Owens

Oh. I don't read that as a poll title. What should happen? Change you to I?

user55340

Given the number of people who have an answer reading just the title...

Thomas Owens

I don't read "you" as a polling word. It's a title.

user55340

> Yet, I am unaware of such a software.

user55340

It's just the vibes I'm getting.

user55340

2:43 PM

Willing to wait and see if it does... Especially since a mod is watching it and can act to clean a bit better once it starts getting the wrong type of answers.

Thomas Owens

I don't think we need to police every word in every title. I didn't describe my process for requirements management. I described how, generically, you need to approach starting a requirements management process.

user55340

It's just the vibe I'm getting. I don't have vast reserves of faith in the user base to restrain from giving the short, anecdotes, and software suggestions.

Thomas Owens

@MichaelT They need to learn. And a few deleted answers will help.

user55340

Many seem to read no more than the title and maybe the first sentence (which has a question)

user55340

Given that you are going to actively watch the answers to that question... I'm willing to let it go to see what happens.

user55340

2:50 PM

The people who give the poor answers have nothing invested in the site. Deleting their answers won't encourage them to invest. Deleted answers don't show. Down voted answers make us look mean and negative.

Lightness Races in Orbit

ate was a typo, but it's too funny for me to fix — ThePopMachine 13 hours ago

enderland

I want to understand where does this desire to see "raw HTML" comes from <--- ask them? We're not capable of mind-reading your coworkers. It seems like you already have the answer to your question and I'm not sure as currently written anyone can answer your post. — enderland 5 mins ago

@ThomasOwens one of my previous roommates was very involved in requirements engineering

Thomas Owens

@enderland Requirements engineering is one of the most important parts of software development. At a most basic level, the core parts of software development are requirements -> code -> build / distribute / deploy.

Lightness Races in Orbit

3:06 PM

@enderland enjoy my answer

Rachel

@JimmyHoffa I saw a comment yesterday by you mentioning wondering how many active closers/reopeners we have, so here you go :)

Top Close Voters 2015

Top Reopen Voters 2015

keep in mind it doesn't include deleted posts though

enderland

@Rachel the reopen one is wrong, I guarantee I should be on that one at least ;)

Lightness Races in Orbit

@Rachel ~~that "switch sites" dropdown is broken. only shows me sites starting with "p" :(~~

enderland

I know I have more than 2 reopen votes in 2015. :P

Rachel

I think it only counts successful closes/reopens

Lightness Races in Orbit

3:09 PM

never mind, works now

Jimmy Hoffa

@Rachel I have better queries for closers here:

5

A: Community list of Data Explorer queries

User Participation List here any queries you have that give interesting details about specific user participation. Specific user rankings or metrics for instance: Who's most best? Who's least best? Users average answer rep? What have you (what have me, us. yes). Highest user up vote and down v...

If you want to tweak a fork of the closer query to have a reopener query also go for it and toss the query into the post (that whole post is meant to be all CW)

Lightness Races in Orbit

> I wouldn't recommend running this on StackOverflow due to its size

whoops; perhaps I ought to have read this first

Rachel

@JimmyHoffa ahhh ok, looks like a modification of the original one :)

user55340

@LightnessRacesinOrbit there are also specific user mappings in there.

user55340

Consider putting in a date parameter for start and end.

Lightness Races in Orbit

3:12 PM

@MichaelT I see one

@MichaelT bored now moved on ;p

user55340

Most close votes in October isn't likely too big.

Lightness Races in Orbit

Unfortunately, since Java does not provide a way for an exception to hit a method in the face, these are the only two options. — Elogent 3 hours ago

lol

Jimmy Hoffa

@Rachel and my order by there is wrong; it's comments+edits first (which puts me pretty high woot), fixing to ordered by close count now... and it's since 2012

@Rachel fixed the query now to order correctly

Lightness Races in Orbit

oi where are my damned upvotes

Rachel

3:29 PM

@enderland I think that reopen query is correct, I tested with my own userid and can see that only questions that were successfully opened by me are counted, and the Data.SE data isn't updated so its not counting yeserday

I can verify it by reviewing my reopen votes in my profile history

enderland

that's sad, if only 2 of my reopen votes in 2015 actually "worked" :\

Rachel

yeah, I get the feeling

I actually see one that isn't showing up though, am investigating why now so mayb eI"m wrong

oh wait nm, that was from 2014

that's a bit why I get dishearted with this site though... so many active closers but so few reopeners

most active users would rather leave something closed then try to get it reopened

enderland

from earlier today:

I edited this slightly. I think you are not asking for "how to use a singleton" but more "what are the ways to do what you are trying to do" -- which might not be a singleton. I have clarified your question slightly and voted to reopen. If this changed your intent too much, feel free to edit and clarify further. — enderland 54 mins ago

Rachel

data.stackexchange.com/programmers/query/394492 if you want the query btw.. just replace with your userid

user55340

@Rachel the amount of material that needs the op to interact with the post to avoid closure and how often they do is partly at issue.

2

user55340

3:36 PM

I will also point to an instance where the op yelled at me for trying to fix the post.

Rachel

that happens, don't worry about it

user55340

That has turned me off from doing substantial edits.

Rachel

what made me stop is it seemed pointless... a questino was rarely good enough for the active voters here

no matter how much it was edited

user55340

If it takes 2/3 of the active voters to close, and it gets reopened, we can't fix if it goes off the rails later.

user55340

@Rachel edit my meta post. Look at the text.

Rachel

3:45 PM

@MichaelT My opinion is that post is from 2012, leave it alone :p

user55340

I'm trying to clean up a tag that people still use to ask tool questions.

user55340

The age of a question does not grandfather it in for eternity as an open post.

user55340

Unless we want to go back and reopen and undelete what to name a cat.

user55340

just because something was asked three years ago doesn't mean we shouldn't close broken windows that still lead to users familiar with SE to become confused about what is on topic.

Robert Harvey

4:25 PM

> In general, I think people use way too much architecture in their programs nowadays. Architecture (of the "Kingdom of Nouns" kind) should be reserved for very large software systems, and many software programs do not justify the weight of the added complexity.

Lightness Races in Orbit

probably true

still, I find it helps avoid code duplication even in mid sized applications

and don't give me that "it's ok to repeat something once" tripe :P

user41796

sed s/architecture/patterns/

Robert Harvey

0

A: Resistance to abstraction

There are costs for using abstractions. In order for abstractions to pay for themselves, the benefits of implementing them have to outweigh the costs. Sometimes, they do not. As you have already pointed out, they shield you from what's actually happening in your code. If the abstraction never...

Thomas Owens

@RobertHarvey Uhm, how do you define architecture?

Robert Harvey

Fowler's book.

Lightness Races in Orbit

4:27 PM

"stuff"

metacode

code that frames the real code instead of being the real code

Thomas Owens

@RobertHarvey You mean PoEAA?

Robert Harvey

Some of it is incredibly useful. But by the time you get to FactoryFactoryStrategyFactoryReceivers, I think you've wrapped yourself around the axle.

@ThomasOwens Yes.

Lightness Races in Orbit

good everning sir what pattern should i use please guide me

Robert Harvey

The WTFStrategy pattern.

Thomas Owens

> It's also about decisions, in that it's the decisions that developers wish they could get right early on because they're perceived as hard to change. The subjectivity comes in here as well because, if you find that something is easier to change than you once thought, then it's no longer architectural. In the end architecture boils down to the important stuff - whatever that is.

user55340

4:30 PM

Fowler is a consultant and only builds big software.

Thomas Owens

That is how Fowler and Ralph Johnson talk about architecture. And it's right. Every program has an architecture. Hello, World has an architecture.

Admittedly, the architecture of Hello, World is different than the architecture of Stack Overflow.

BRB - grabbing lunch.

Robert Harvey

That's not the kind of architecture I'm talking about. I'm talking about the kind of architecture that doesn't do anything except connect together bits of useful functionality using elaborate frameworks.

user55340

Makes it easier to build those pieces with better defined interfaces.

Robert Harvey

I think there's a place for that. But I also think that there's reams of it in most Java enterprise programs, and wonder if you would need reams of it if only the language were more expressive.

user55340

Think back to that tightly coupled code and make a change.

Robert Harvey

4:34 PM

There are ways to have loose coupling without FactoryFactoryStrategyReceiverEnvelopes.

user55340

I've got an old sudoku solver that I wrote. I would love to update it for other types of puzzle rather than 3x3x3x3.

user55340

I can't. It's accessing the backing array directly.

Robert Harvey

I doubt that you need even a single enterprise pattern to decouple that.

The point is, you didn't need the abstraction to write the 3x3x3x3. Now you do. So you refactor the code, introducing the abstraction.

user55340

To rewrite it would mean making an abstraction for it. A factory for puzzle type and parser for read in. And some other nice patterns that I don't think about when writing but are probably there.

Robert Harvey

I see a lot of programmers here and on Stack Overflow using these patterns before they need them, though.

Just in case.

user55340

4:38 PM

It's a solution to a problem. Don't use it until you know you have that problem.

Robert Harvey

Let's face it. You don't need an IoC container if your program only contains a dozen classes.

There is some breakover point. But it isn't a dozen classes.

user41796

@RobertHarvey heretic

user55340

But if you do, don't shy away from actually using it because of done enterprise perceptions.

Robert Harvey

I should have described this architecture here a long time ago, but...

We have a rules system here. It's a series of simple if then rules that makes a true false determination. The input is a handful of tables from a database, probably one query or two.

The way it's implemented now, you need:

A fetcher factory

Two fetchers

A comparator

user114359

0

Q: Should there be a [design-review] tag?

Should we have a [design-review] tag? Yes, I know I have sufficient reputation to create one. That is the easy part. Currently, we have have several thousand questions in design which appears to be a mix of design reviews, questions about "why was C designed this way?" and other design-related ...

discussion tags

Robert Harvey

4:41 PM

A retriever

And a class that marries all that together and produces a result.

There are rules and rulesets. If I want to say "Any of" I have to create a ruleset.

user55340

@Snowman meta tag ish.

Robert Harvey

The factories are not dictionaries, and there's tons of Reflection, so the whole thing is incredibly slow. Each rule takes about 1/2 second to run. Some of these things have 40 rules in them.

All that just to verify one license from one vendor.

@MichaelT When I could have just written the whole thing in about a dozen lines of C# code, comparing database fields.

And it would run instantaneously. Well, for the cost of one database retrieval anyway.

Actually, there are three factories, not just one.

[end rant]

Oh, did I mention that the rules are maintained with SQL scripts? Each script has maybe a hundred GUIDs at the top of the script, defining such things as which retrievers to use, what kind of comparison to make, etc.

user114359

@MichaelT eh?

Robert Harvey

Nice. Try to stay civil. We're professionals here, and we're all trying to learn, same as you. — Robert Harvey 31 secs ago

Lightness Races in Orbit

Nope. If it compiles does not mean it's valid code, even if it runs could be by luck no exception was thrown. I'm not trying to do anything. Read my question carefully. Anyway if you lack the programming knowledge to answer such non trivial question then you should not be on this thread. — Joseph 16 mins ago

rofl

@Donald.McLean: Oh, you're beautiful. On behalf of all participants, I can't thank you enough for deleting everybody's comments. Keep up the good work. — Ricky 36 secs ago

also rofl

and on a troll answer from the same guy, no less

user114359

4:58 PM

@MichaelT yes homework is on-topic if asked correctly, but the "copy and paste muh homework in teh textbox" questions are generally off-topic for one reason or another.

user114359

My point is there is a difference between "review my design" and "explain the design of <third-party language or product>" but I am not sure if it is worth the effort

user114359

Maybe the answer is close all those crappy "why was C designed this way?" questions

Lightness Races in Orbit

@RobertHarvey Sounds like you need a new job.

user41796

@RobertHarvey Once the migrate completes, it's all yours to clean up.

Thomas Owens

I wish I had a job where I could pontificate about software development all day.

I wonder if I would get bored of that, though, if it was my job.

Robert Harvey

5:05 PM

Is that what I do? Hopefully I get some actual work done as well.

@LightnessRacesinOrbit We're already using a different model in the new system. I'm serious about the costs, though. It's very expensive wading through all that infrastructure when there's a problem. It's perfectly sensible infrastructure, from a Fowler perspective; it just turns out to be impractical.

user41796

@ThomasOwens Doesn't exist, AFAIK. Even the distinguished engineers and fellows at IBM are constantly working on something.

Thomas Owens

@RobertHarvey No, you don't.

I mean, you don't pontificate all day.

@GlenH7 Yeah, probably. I think it may be called "academia". But you don't necessarily do engineering in academia.

Lightness Races in Orbit

@ThomasOwens Sounds bloody terrible tbh

Thomas Owens

And it takes forever for people to listen to what you have to say. It's better to say it from the trenches.

Lightness Races in Orbit

I'm getting a bit bored of software development, mind you

It's, like, all I do

groan

user41796

5:06 PM

@ThomasOwens I echo your sentiments about academia. Except for the rare prof working on grants with an interesting company, they don't do much either

Thomas Owens

I think a software developer is more likely to believe another software developer, or even a software development manager, than an academic at a university.

Even if they are saying the same thing.

Lightness Races in Orbit

@ThomasOwens I certainly hope so

posts about "my prof said" on SO might indicate otherwise, sadly

user41796

@ThomasOwens And sometimes other devs simply don't want to change, so they don't care who the source is

Thomas Owens

My best professors were the ones who had industry experience - the adjuncts, the lecturers, and those who regularly went on sabbitical.

user55340

The ivory tower produces interesting code that is used once and thrown away (or given to the next grad student to improve)

Thomas Owens

5:08 PM

My worst professors were the academics - the scientists and researchers who only did science and research.

Even in the liberal arts department. I had a professor who did work with technical publication firms as a tech writing. He was far superior to the professors in the communications department who lived on campus all the time.

I'd like to think I'd make a good adjunct professor, teaching night courses or something.

user41796

@ThomasOwens The hardest part is dealing with the students who don't really want to be there.

Thomas Owens

@GlenH7 True.

And if I taught as an adjunct, I'd probably get stuck with the intro / entry level classes that also include people from other programs that have it as a requirement and not just the people who want to be there.

user41796

I've considered teaching as an adjunct, but then realize I'd have to deal with students who really didn't care about the craft. And that's when I realize I have others things I'd rather do that I value more.

user41796

I've yet to meet an adjunct who thought they were being treated fairly in the trough of entitlement known as academia.

ratchet freak

Researchers just found the gene responsible for mistakenly thinking we've found the gene for specific things. It's the region between the start and the end of every chromosome, plus a few segments in our mitochondria.

Thomas Owens

5:15 PM

@GlenH7 It depends. It's not a full-time job.

I think it depends on the school too, for both the treatment and the students.

user41796

Agreed

Thomas Owens

Is a big name school (MIT, Harvard, Boston University) different than University of Nowhere, Montana?

Lightness Races in Orbit

@ratchetfreak heh

Jimmy Hoffa

@ratchetfreak how did google decide they needed that much code for a picture, a textbox, and a button??

I had to look and - scotch??

ratchet freak

it's not just that anymore, nowadays there is the "search as you type" which means that ajax and the results page must also be there, the account info with fancy menus in the top right,

user55340

5:23 PM

@ThomasOwens there is a meta post about your survey question.

user55340

11

Q: 404 - spine not found

Recently, I've been noticing a certain trend here on meta: People seem to become increasingly scared of possibly offending someone. Some examples: One of the suggested questions for the 2016 survey asked what, and how much alcohol the user consumes, if any. In response, someone that chose no...

discussion offensive

Thomas Owens

@MichaelT The two examples he provides are so very different.

The contexts are very different, too.

One is asking about habits and preferences. The other is walking on a line that borders sexist in an environment that has plenty of documentation about hostility toward women.

Lightness Races in Orbit

LOL

user55340

sigh

user55340

@Jon, this is the response I expected. We have an excess supply of close votes, such that people are using them on borderline and even old questions, on the theory that they "provide poor examples" to new question askers. To incentivize the behavior you want, my suggestion is to limit the number of close votes per person well below current levels, but allow people to earn more by casting reopen votes after edits. — Karl Bielefeldt 52 mins ago

user55340

5:37 PM

@KarlBielefeldt what is wrong with closing broken windows from old questions? Are you expecting all the questions form 2012 to remain open indefinitely? There are users posting tooling questions based on the existence of a tag and open questions there. This is not a hypothetical. — MichaelT 1 min ago

Thomas Owens

6:00 PM

I just got a call from an Indian guy named Carlos about my Windows computer.

Jimmy Hoffa

6:30 PM

@ThomasOwens must be some kind of code; you're supposed to execute operation I at the intersection of Cordova and Washington

enderland

6:59 PM

@Rachel I don't really understand that reopen vote query tbh. Is it only showing reopen votes that worked? or what?

Robert Harvey

This needs one more vote to reopen.

enderland

@RobertHarvey false

Robert Harvey

CigarDoug has a point. I see people closing things as "Unclear" when they are actually off-topic, and the close voter can't be bothered with a custom close reason.

whatsisname

7:15 PM

I usually put about as much effort into my custom close reasons as the OP puts into their wonky questions

so close to none

psr

@MichaelT I think such questions should be kept. Questions with good enough signal to noise ratio that are useful - are useful. Yahoo Answers has S/N so awful (IMO) that useful answers simply can't be discovered or distinguished. The one good thing missing from NPR days is useful answers, with poor S/N, about subjective topics and holy wars. No other site really had that and now no site at all has that.

(They do require enormous amounts of moderation to keep, so I get it, it's just a bit of a shame).

Rachel

7:32 PM

@enderland Yes, it only shows successful reopen votes

even if the post is closed now, it will still show up if a reopen vote was once successful

user55340

@psr the issue is that we can't clean up the duplicate answers. Or the ones that are links up voted five times.

user55340

The new ones that hit HNQ are the ones that become very problematic to moderate with only blunt tools.

user55340

Many other sites have poor s/n posts of holy wars. Few are easy to find useful later.

user55340

Reddit. Usenet. Slash dot.

user55340

7:47 PM

The problem is - I'll leave a site of all that I see is holy wars. Nikon vs canon? I'm gone. Vi vs emacs? Nope.

enderland

-1

Q: I need help about my html life, my links are not working properly

enter link description here When i open my Earlylifeandeducation.html file cant switch to index.html file, so i cant get to other page by clicking on link. Pls help. Thanks