Re: PG: Hackers and Painters

[Zachery Bir <address@hidden>]

On Wednesday, May 14, 2003, at 02:40 PM, Russ Ross wrote:

> I hate it when other people touch my code.  It seems like they
> always get it wrong.  I always have to go and clean it up again
> before I can stand to look at it.  Even if I'm not making any
> changes, I've been known on more than one occasion to check out a
> file that someone has modified, fix all the formatting, rewrite
> all the comments, restructure the control flow, and check it
> back in.
>
> By "fix" I mean change it to meet my normal style, not to correct
> some actual bug.  Even if they get the formatting right (which is
> surprisingly rare) I'm not content until it looks and feels exactly
> like my code, both at a casual glance and on a careful read-through.

So, by fix, you mean, "not really fix"?

> I agree with Paul on this one--I'm just way too crabby about my own
> code to cooperate at that level.  I'm like a bitter old man who
> doesn't think anyone can get anything right and I'm still in my 20s.
> I pity anyone who has to share code with me in a few years after
> I've really had a chance to get set in my ways.

Well, thank goodness you've warned us in advance :)

We try to embrace XP here at Zope Corp, and it works amazingly well. I 
haven't yet encountered any territorialist coders. I think that's 
because we espouse a fundamentally different philosophy towards the 
code: We don't own the code. Our customers do. Us Communistical Open 
Sourcers and all...

Personally, I think the lone wolf cowboy attitude needs a trip through 
a refactoring browser. But that's me. Perhaps it's a matter of 
experience. Maybe all my old-timer colleagues would really prefer for 
the young'ns to just get the hell out.

Zac