Coding Horrors: You can gather all your technical debt into one easy framework!

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Serious Hardware/Software Crap > The Cavern of COBOL > Coding Horrors: You can gather all your technical debt into one easy framework!

«‹›1503 »

Internet Janitor: May 17, 2008; "That isn't the appropriate trash receptacle."

Volmarias: seconded. I've used Processing to ease beginners into working with Java, and students typically respond very well to it. It makes it possible to first teach statements and expressions, then functional abstraction and only afterwards begin discussing OOP. Once they have written a number of games and programs in Processing making the transition to Java is generally pretty painless.

# ? Oct 6, 2013 16:46

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# ? May 16, 2024 08:25

Wheany: Mar 17, 2006; Spinya^{ha^{ha^haha}ha}ha_{ha_{ha_haha}ha}ha!; Doctor Rope

Pollyanna posted:

That's partly why the guy brings up a "simple interactive graphical environment" as an alternative to learning about OOP. It's a lot more obvious and provides the abstraction/metaphors that humans need to really understand it.

I'd love to try something like that, actually.

Try Greenfoot or BlueJ.

# ? Oct 6, 2013 17:25

Pollyanna: Mar 5, 2005; Milk's on them.

Processing is pretty cool so far, thanks for the tip.

Wheany posted:

Try Greenfoot or BlueJ.

I tried BlueJ, but for some reason it bugs out when I use it. I'll see if Greenfoot is better.

Internet Janitor posted:

Volmarias: seconded. I've used Processing to ease beginners into working with Java, and students typically respond very well to it. It makes it possible to first teach statements and expressions, then functional abstraction and only afterwards begin discussing OOP. Once they have written a number of games and programs in Processing making the transition to Java is generally pretty painless.

Do you have a course guide or example class or something? It'd be really nice to follow something like that.

# ? Oct 6, 2013 17:36

Wheany: Mar 17, 2006; Spinya^{ha^{ha^haha}ha}ha_{ha_{ha_haha}ha}ha!; Doctor Rope

Pollyanna posted:

I tried BlueJ, but for some reason it bugs out when I use it. I'll see if Greenfoot is better.

Seeing Greenfoot was the thing that made me realize that there is no reason the first Java lesson has to be "public static void main"

# ? Oct 6, 2013 17:57

Internet Janitor: May 17, 2008; "That isn't the appropriate trash receptacle."

Pollyanna: I do have my course materials organized with brief step-by-step writeups online. If you were going to dive in you would first want to go through a few of the Processing tutorials to familiarize yourself with the basics I would've covered in the first day.

# ? Oct 6, 2013 17:58

Doctor w-rw-rw-: Jun 24, 2008

Pollyanna posted:

That's partly why the guy brings up a "simple interactive graphical environment" as an alternative to learning about OOP. It's a lot more obvious and provides the abstraction/metaphors that humans need to really understand it.

I'd love to try something like that, actually.

aaaaand another full circle, this time to Smalltalk.

# ? Oct 7, 2013 04:50

IT BEGINS: Jan 15, 2009; I don't know how to make analogies

php:

<?
if (pg_num_rows($pg_res) == 1) {
    $fromcity = pg_result($pg_res, 0, "city");
    $fromstate = pg_result($pg_res, 0, "state");
    $fromcompany = pg_result($pg_res, 0, "name");
    $fromaddress = pg_result($pg_res, 0, "address");
    $fromaddress2 = pg_result($pg_res, 0, "address2");
    $fromphone = pg_result($pg_res, 0, "phone");
}
?>

Please look up the function pg_result. Notice how it's not in the php.net documentation. Want to know why? It was deprecated 10 years ago.

I don't know what's worse: the fact that we are calling the old version of pg_fetch_result() 6 times instead of doing something sane; the fact that we are using functions that have been deprecated for 10 years; the fact that this function still works.

# ? Oct 7, 2013 05:10

Zorro KingOfEngland: May 7, 2008

Java code:

private static final int DAYS_IN_A_MONTH = 30;

You know there's gonna be some great code when you open a file to see this staring at you.

# ? Oct 7, 2013 15:51

Flobbster: Feb 17, 2005; "Cadet Kirk, after the way you cheated on the Kobayashi Maru test I oughta punch you in tha face!"

Zorro KingOfEngland posted:

Java code:
private static final int DAYS_IN_A_MONTH = 30;
You know there's gonna be some great code when you open a file to see this staring at you.

Clearly a forward-thinker who envisions the world as it should be. (Each month with 30 days with a 5-6 day party week in the middle during in the summer. Northern hemisphere summer.)

# ? Oct 7, 2013 16:43

Plorkyeran: Mar 22, 2007; To Escape The Shackles Of The Old Forums, We Must Reject The Tribal Negativity He Endorsed

Pretty sure local summer with the dates being out of sync for half the year would be how it'd be implemented in the real world.

# ? Oct 7, 2013 17:16

One Eye Open: Sep 19, 2006; Am I awake?

Zorro KingOfEngland posted:

Java code:
private static final int DAYS_IN_A_MONTH = 30;
You know there's gonna be some great code when you open a file to see this staring at you.

Maybe it was software for a Lunation calendar such as was used by the Sumerians, and was just rounding up.

# ? Oct 7, 2013 19:16

Dr Monkeysee: Oct 11, 2002; just a fox like a hundred thousand others; Nap Ghost

Doctor w-rw-rw- posted:

aaaaand another full circle, this time to Smalltalk.

It makes sense that a GUI framework is the most natural OOP teaching example since arguably OOP was invented specifically to solve the GUI architecture problem.

My first job in industry was in Smalltalk and the language rocked pretty hard.

# ? Oct 7, 2013 19:23

qntm: Jun 17, 2009

Suspicious Dish posted:

Goodbye, lovely Car extends Vehicle object-orientation tutorial

quote:

A `Timer` is a horizontal strip on the screen with a stripe
racing across it. A `NumericHalo` is a spreading ripple on the screen
that fades. A `Sound` is a thing on the screen that makes a sound when
a `Timer`�s stripe hits it. A `Trash` is a thing that deletes `Sound`s
when you drop them on it. They all inherit from `Visible`, which
represents things that can be drawn on the screen and perhaps respond
to mouse clicks or drop events, but they do different things in those
three cases. In addition, the `Trash` and `Sound`s are subclasses of
`ImageDisplay`, because the way they handle being drawn is simply to
display a static image, so that code is factored into a superclass.

In what asinine universe is this considered more intuitive than "Car extends Vehicle"?

# ? Oct 7, 2013 19:56

Suspicious Dish: Sep 24, 2011; 2020 is the year of linux on the desktop, bro; Fun Shoe

qntm posted:

In what asinine universe is this considered more intuitive than "Car extends Vehicle"?

In the universe where Car extends Vehicle doesn't explain anything about code reuse, delegation, or polymorphism?

# ? Oct 7, 2013 19:58

Flobbster: Feb 17, 2005; "Cadet Kirk, after the way you cheated on the Kobayashi Maru test I oughta punch you in tha face!"

Yeah, GUI framework is a good OO example but the one presented in that post is pretty poo poo.

Back when I was still in academia, I was fond of the adventure game approach. You had a game engine/service, commands (if a text adventure) rooms, items, a player, monsters, and different subtypes of all these...

You could spend an entire class period asking students to contribute to a class design about how all these pieces related to each other and fit together. A lot of good opportunities to talk about reuse, coupling, and cohesion. And it was a lot more fun for them to implement and come up with a story of their own, too.

# ? Oct 7, 2013 20:18

Macichne Leainig: Jul 26, 2012; by VG

Contrary to popular belief:

code:

Assert.IsTrue(true);

This is not a valuable unit test. I don't think this guy gets the point of unit tests.

(There were just under 6 dozen of these in the last check-in. :negative:

)

# ? Oct 7, 2013 22:30

LOOK I AM A TURTLE: May 22, 2003; "I'm actually a tortoise."; Grimey Drawer

Protocol7 posted:

Contrary to popular belief:
code:
Assert.IsTrue(true);
This is not a valuable unit test. I don't think this guy gets the point of unit tests.

(There were just under 6 dozen of these in the last check-in. )

Possible explanations:
1. "I was going to fill it in later."
2. "I couldn't figure out what to assert on."
3. "It's better than nothing."

# ? Oct 7, 2013 22:44

PleasingFungus: Oct 10, 2012; idiot asshole bitch who should fuck off

qntm posted:

In what asinine universe is this considered more intuitive than "Car extends Vehicle"?

Yeah, that example honestly suggests 'interface' to me more than it suggests 'inheritance.'

e: hey, are you http://c1qfxugcgy0.tumblr.com/ ? Just noticed that your name seemed familiar, and you don't have PMs.

Protocol7 posted:

Contrary to popular belief:
code:
Assert.IsTrue(true);
This is not a valuable unit test. I don't think this guy gets the point of unit tests.

(There were just under 6 dozen of these in the last check-in. )

Sounds like they got stuck in during the initial creation of the unit tests (automatically?), and never taken out?

Then again, there are people who actually write "if (foo == true)", so... who knows.

(a == true and b == false are the two snippets of code that annoy me most in all the world. I hate them and I hate the people that wrote them.)

# ? Oct 7, 2013 22:46

Macichne Leainig: Jul 26, 2012; by VG

LOOK I AM A TURTLE posted:

Possible explanations:
1. "I was going to fill it in later."
2. "I couldn't figure out what to assert on."
3. "It's better than nothing."

Considering the comments on the check in were (abridged) "Added unit tests for data mapping on deserialization" I'm hoping so, because those kinds of tests are kind of important.

# ? Oct 7, 2013 22:53

ikanreed: Sep 25, 2009; I honestly I have no idea who cannibal[SIC] is and I do not know why I should know.

syq dude, just syq!

Those are certainly not as bad as the entirely real a.ToString()!="false".

# ? Oct 7, 2013 22:53

ManoliIsFat: Oct 4, 2002

LOOK I AM A TURTLE posted:

3. "It's better than nothing."

That's true. That Assert failing may be indicative of larger problems, like up being down, day being night, 2nd coming of Jesus kinda stuff.

# ? Oct 7, 2013 23:11

qntm: Jun 17, 2009

PleasingFungus posted:

e: hey, are you http://c1qfxugcgy0.tumblr.com/ ? Just noticed that your name seemed familiar, and you don't have PMs.

No, although this person appears to follow me on Twitter.

# ? Oct 7, 2013 23:27

JawnV6: Jul 4, 2004; So hot ...

ManoliIsFat posted:

That's true. That Assert failing may be indicative of larger problems, like up being down, day being night, 2nd coming of Jesus kinda stuff.

Well in 10 days we'll be cursing the bank software authors that pushed these halfassed assumptions into production.

# ? Oct 7, 2013 23:32

raminasi: Jan 25, 2005; a last drink with no ice

PleasingFungus posted:

Then again, there are people who actually write "if (foo == true)", so... who knows.

You have to do this (I think?) for Nullable<bool> in C# and every time I see one I do a double-take.

# ? Oct 7, 2013 23:48

Plorkyeran: Mar 22, 2007; To Escape The Shackles Of The Old Forums, We Must Reject The Tribal Negativity He Endorsed

I've written the equivalent of Assert.IsTrue(true) because the actual test was just that the preceding code ran without throwing any exceptions and the test framework lacked Assert.DoesNotThrow and the runner only listed tests in the UI which actually asserted something.

# ? Oct 8, 2013 00:11

ManoliIsFat: Oct 4, 2002

JawnV6 posted:

Well in 10 days we'll be cursing the bank software authors that pushed these halfassed assumptions into production.

Hahaha.

GrumpyDoctor posted:

You have to do this (I think?) for Nullable<bool> in C# and every time I see one I do a double-take.

Oh man, why haven't I ever tried that? For how many times I've typed "if(x.HasValue && x.Value)"

# ? Oct 8, 2013 00:22

Volmarias: Dec 31, 2002; EMAIL... THE INTERNET... SEARCH ENGINES...

Protocol7 posted:

Contrary to popular belief:
code:
Assert.IsTrue(true);
This is not a valuable unit test. I don't think this guy gets the point of unit tests.

(There were just under 6 dozen of these in the last check-in. )

It's a good test if you're testing Assert.isTrue :colbert:

# ? Oct 8, 2013 00:26

FlapYoJacks: Feb 12, 2009

Volmarias posted:

It's a good test if you're testing Assert.isTrue.

Perhaps Assert.isTrue may be false?!?!?

# ? Oct 8, 2013 00:26

Scaevolus: Apr 16, 2007

ManoliIsFat posted:

Hahaha.
Oh man, why haven't I ever tried that? For how many times I've typed "if(x.HasValue && x.Value)"

"if (x ?? false)" more obviously indicates that you're dealing with a nullable type.

# ? Oct 8, 2013 01:11

ManoliIsFat: Oct 4, 2002

Scaevolus posted:

"if (x ?? false)" more obviously indicates that you're dealing with a nullable type.

Way classier, thanks for that.

# ? Oct 8, 2013 01:15

Volmarias: Dec 31, 2002; EMAIL... THE INTERNET... SEARCH ENGINES...

ratbert90 posted:

Perhaps Assert.isTrue may be false?!?!?

Thus the importance of writing automated tests. If someone should change the nature of truth, you shall be the first to know.

# ? Oct 8, 2013 01:18

Dr Monkeysee: Oct 11, 2002; just a fox like a hundred thousand others; Nap Ghost

ManoliIsFat posted:

Way classier, thanks for that.

I disagree. That looks more confusing to me because I'm used to the null coalescing operator being used to generate a value I care about not just to check a condition.

I admit (x == true) isn't much better since it forces you to double-check the type of x to make sure the author wasn't a redundant moron.

# ? Oct 8, 2013 01:19

ManoliIsFat: Oct 4, 2002

Monkeyseesaw posted:

I disagree. That looks more confusing to me because I'm used to the null coalescing operator being used to generate a value I care about not just to check a condition.

I admit (x == true) isn't much better since it forces you to double-check the type of x to make sure the author wasn't a redundant moron.

I don't know. I admit it is unique, may be a little "clever" but I think it clearly indicates you're dealing with this very specific and slightly odd situation of nullable<> bools. I feel you, usually coalesce is "give me a default value if there is none" or "if you don't find it here, check there", but I still like it.

# ? Oct 8, 2013 03:03

IMlemon: Dec 29, 2008

PleasingFungus posted:

(a == true and b == false are the two snippets of code that annoy me most in all the world. I hate them and I hate the people that wrote them.)

Don't forget this classic

code:

return bool ? true : false

# ? Oct 8, 2013 07:20

One Eye Open: Sep 19, 2006; Am I awake?

PleasingFungus posted:

Then again, there are people who actually write "if (foo == true)", so... who knows.

(a == true and b == false are the two snippets of code that annoy me most in all the world. I hate them and I hate the people that wrote them.)

"if (somebool == true)" aids readability and is a reminder of the types as you skim the code, however "if( (x > 3) == true)" implies you are being paid by the character. In either case, it's a stylistic choice as the compiler will produce the same output either way.

# ? Oct 8, 2013 08:10

TheresaJayne: Jul 1, 2011

I recently had to update our unit tests that had become out of date about 2 years ago.

I came across these tests.

assertTrue(expectedValue == result);

:freakout:

Why not just use assertEquals(expectedValue,result);

# ? Oct 8, 2013 09:59

shrughes: Oct 11, 2008; (call/cc call/cc)

Sometimes I catch myself writing foo == true for some boolean foo, and often it's a sign that the variable really wants to be an enum.

(gently caress you, anthropomorphized variable, you have to be a bool.)

# ? Oct 8, 2013 10:13

bucketmouse: Aug 16, 2004; we con-trol the ho-ri-zon-tal
we con-trol the verrr-ti-cal

IMlemon posted:

Don't forget this classic
code:
return bool ? true : false

code:


if(a && b)
{
       if(b)
            hnnnggggggggg();
}

e: oh oh this thing too

code:



for(i=0;i<BIG_NUMBER;i++)
{
x = expensive_func();
total += i*x;
}

bucketmouse fucked around with this message at 11:28 on Oct 8, 2013

# ? Oct 8, 2013 11:23

New Yorp New Yorp: Jul 18, 2003; Only in Kenya.; Pillbug

Consulting horror: Yesterday, I spent 5 hours on a train to Boston to do a demo for some Microsoft folks (and present the same material at a Microsoft-sponsored event today). I get off the train, head over to MS, and discover that my laptop no longer boots. :waycool:

I'm just happy that my demo VMs are in Azure, not on my laptop. Total disaster averted; I can borrow someone else's laptop or present from my Surface.

# ? Oct 8, 2013 12:40

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# ? May 16, 2024 08:25

MononcQc: May 29, 2007

Ithaqua posted:

Consulting horror: Yesterday, I spent 5 hours on a train to Boston to do a demo for some Microsoft folks (and present the same material at a Microsoft-sponsored event today). I get off the train, head over to MS, and discover that my laptop no longer boots.

I'm just happy that my demo VMs are in Azure, not on my laptop. Total disaster averted; I can borrow someone else's laptop or present from my Surface.

I'm paranoid when I go present poo poo at a conference. I keep:

Copy of the presentation in original format (ppt or keynote) on my laptop
A copy of each on a USB drive in case my laptop dies
A copy of each as a PDF both on the laptop or the USB drive in case software goes bad or the backup computer I get lent doesn't have the software needed
Copies of the presentation and everything on my VPS as a final backup
Adapters I need because I won't trust the organizers to have the setup I need

And things I present have to:

work locally in case the network dies or has bad quality
be readable in black and white in case I'm forced to print them out.
Alternatively some projectors are super lovely and will display reds as black or dark brown and I try to make sure this isn't messed up
I have terminal profiles that are dark-on-light backgrounds because they tend to be more readable, and presets with huge text sizes that are readable from far away
code must work on other OSes, possibly over my VPS in case my laptop gets bricked
Have a contingency plan in case power goes out entirely -- I've had to give a presentation during hurricane Irene where we had no power and before generators were going (or knowing how long they'd be going), we had to keep going. It's always in the back of my mind now.

When I gave week-long classes teaching Erlang, I'd also just make my own fully workable virtualbox machines, and I'd carry them with virtual box installers around so that people who inevitably came unprepared didn't need to take an hour to get up and running.

It's going well most of the time now.

MononcQc fucked around with this message at 13:25 on Oct 8, 2013

# ? Oct 8, 2013 13:22

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Serious Hardware/Software Crap > The Cavern of COBOL > Coding Horrors: You can gather all your technical debt into one easy framework!

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