Think about it when you are writing your code. You do not want to deal with building-sized Filesaurus. The creature with laser-eyes, poisonous breath, invisibility, and teleportation. How To Avoid It No file is large from the beginning. All files are created empty. However, over their existence, they slowly grow. If …

Law of triviality is C. Northcote Parkinson's 1957 argument that people within an organization commonly or typically give disproportionate weight to trivial issues. "The time spent on any item of the agenda will be in inverse proportion to the sum [of money] involved." A reactor is so vastly expensive and …

Every day may not be good. Sometimes when you get stuck, nothing works as expected, your morale and self-confidence may get low. It could happen to everybody, and it is completely fine. You should not, however, stay in this state for too long. To bounce back you should know what works for you. One such thing could be …

Finishing a task is a daunting challenge. It is not easy to figure out where to start, not to lose direction, and get to the finish. You can apply this rule on different levels. You can divide large work items into smaller tasks. You can split single routine into many smaller ones. Tasks Splitting large task into …

The idea of search-oriented programming is based on two premises: Every useful class, method, or attribute has been used at least once. If nobody is using it, do not use it either. Every line in mature software has been checked by multiple people. Therefore every class, method, or variable has a descriptive and …

Discussions about ideal function lengths are never-ending. My rule of thumb is that the ideal function should fit into your head. If it is longer, it will not fit there, and therefore you cannot reason about it. To determine if the function is too long, place your head next to the screen, and compare its length with …

Working on multiple tasks is decreasing your chance that you will be blocked and increasing the chance that you will become a blocker. Furthermore, every task you are working on is adding additional cost required by context switching. In the most extreme case, you may spend all your day just context switching and not …

Creating software systems requires cooperation of many people. It is important to observe other people to learn about their role, motivations, strengths, and weaknesses. Related Be open 0003: Ship Stuff Be Open: 0005

Starting is the most important step for finishing anything. Without a start, there is no finish. Do not be afraid to start. Where to Start There is a lot of uncertainty at the beginning that could be overwhelming. Do not get overwhelmed and create a list of potential first tasks. These tasks will differ by their …

Starting with the simple version allows you to better understand the problem. Start with the main workflow. Each problem can be divided into multiple problems based on their certainty. Start with the most certain part. Related simply start Conflicting understand requirements 0001: Simply Start Ship Stuff: 0003 …