[self-interest] UnitTests

Jan-Paul Bultmann janpaulbultmann at me.com
Mon Jan 10 23:27:29 UTC 2011


On Jan 10, 2011, at 11:45 PM, Randy wrote:

> He only briefly makes the argument that any medium can be improved by adding resistance. I believe resistance makes bad results harder, but it also makes good results harder. 

I think it is not about adding resistance to the language, it is more about the discipline to clean mess up. A system like C++ will punish you if you don't and will force you to touch code you really don't want to.
(
The here be dragons type of thing ;), like these http://stackoverflow.com/questions/184618/what-is-the-best-comment-in-source-code-you-have-ever-encountered
).
> 
> He argues more effectively that a programming environment can be improved by offering a mechanism to insure you maintain constraints you think are important (TDD).
Is it really about constraints, or more about help? Sure TDD at first seems like a huge overhead but in the end you will lose the fear to tinker and refactor existing code. Instead of cleaning up code because you are forced to, you will because it's not scary anymore. Thus if everybody does so you will approximate "clean code" that looks like you expected it to. Like you wouldn't consider a debugger a constraint.

> I find that more compelling, but it is a suggestion on how to improve an environment, not how to select a language.

True.
We had that discussion before, what is language what is environment.
He was trying to point out a problem that smalltalk had and how to address it in similar languages e.g ruby.
What I was thinking is this.
If the point is valid that it is too easy to make a mess with smalltalk, and this is what helped killing it. 
Then this happened even though Smalltalk had Unit Tests, the very cure he describes.
Making a mess is an even bigger problem in Self. Potentially every Object that uses something String like could have its own version.
And we don't even have the help of Unit Tests.

I find myself constantly creating throwaway images, because I break tiny things when I tinker with them.

Testing facilities could be awesome in self, creating Mocks and Stubs in Self and injecting them would be a piece of cake.

> Creating an otherwise low-resistance language with the property that you can't create anything without a test would offer an interesting check of his hypothesis.  Is there such a language? If not, is it even possible? (Who tests the tests?)
> 
> He would do well to take his own advice about adopting attitudes that don't put people off ... the dripingly sarcastic tone, the bounce in his step as he walks ... heck, the fact that he feels he even needs to walk, the toss of each card to create trash for someone else to pick up with the lingering posed gesture that emphasizes how he doesn't have to attend to that problem .... they all suggest to me he wants me to know he is much more space-fillng, much larger, and perhaps therefore much more important than the average speaker. 
> Personally, even though his arguments have merit, I find it an uphill battle to credit them when the presenter finds it necessary to spend all that energy conveying self-importance.
> 
Actually didn't feel like that, I found it rather funny :)

> Considering my watching his presentation as me dealing with a medium: this is a good example of how unnecessary resistance can be added to purely detrimental effect.  
> 
> 	--Randy
> 
> 
> On Jan 9, 2011, at 4:42 PM, Jan-Paul Bultmann wrote:
> 
>> Hey,
>> I just wanted to share this with you,
>> it gave me a good laugh.
>> 
>> http://blip.tv/file/2089545
>> 
>> It also has an interesting point.
>> Smalltalk died because you could make a mess too easily. And I think this is especially true to Self, because of its behaviorism.
>> 
>> Cheers Jan
>> 
>> 
> 
> 
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