Debugging and diagnosis is not being taught
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As one of the senior developers where I work, I am tasked with mentoring the junior members of the team. This is a part of my role I really enjoy, as I get to pass down my hard won knowledge and experience to the next generation of software developers. What I have found over the years is that they all seem to lack one vital ingredient. How to debug / diagnose a problem. I have seen many of them struggle to use the debugger, set breakpoints, step through code, use the F12 browser tools etc. Even those with First Class honours degrees have struggled with this. I remember when doing my own degree (many years ago) we were taught these basic skills (using a Borland C++ IDE). Is this vital skill no longer being taught to new graduates? I feel this is a vital skill in any software developer's tool chest.
"There are two ways of constructing a software design: One way is to make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies, and the other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies. The first method is far more difficult." - C.A.R. Hoare Home | LinkedIn | Google+ | Twitter
I wasn't taught anything related to debugging when I was at University. In fact, when I got my first job I had support tickets with the customer claiming something was happening. I fell into the trap of asking my team leader "X says this is happening, can you think of a reason why?" It was only after being constantly told "Can you reproduce it? If so, have you debugged it to see why it's happening? If not, then we obviously need more information" that I really fully embraced debugging. It seems silly, but up until then I'd only worked on personal projects which were less complex and the bugs were self-explanatory so I only debugged rarely. If they don't teach it in College/University then I don't have a problem with senior developers teaching more junior developers the values. We have a few developers at my current place who, while being really adept and forward-thinking, sometimes forget to debug and inspect. A gentle nudge every now and then gets them back on track. But you're right, while there's plenty of material on building code taught at Uni, there doesn't seem to be much in the way of properly debugging and diagnosing code. And I don't think anything prepares students for those situations where a client or customer has made something up!
MQ / Tor.NET / Angry Potato
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As one of the senior developers where I work, I am tasked with mentoring the junior members of the team. This is a part of my role I really enjoy, as I get to pass down my hard won knowledge and experience to the next generation of software developers. What I have found over the years is that they all seem to lack one vital ingredient. How to debug / diagnose a problem. I have seen many of them struggle to use the debugger, set breakpoints, step through code, use the F12 browser tools etc. Even those with First Class honours degrees have struggled with this. I remember when doing my own degree (many years ago) we were taught these basic skills (using a Borland C++ IDE). Is this vital skill no longer being taught to new graduates? I feel this is a vital skill in any software developer's tool chest.
"There are two ways of constructing a software design: One way is to make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies, and the other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies. The first method is far more difficult." - C.A.R. Hoare Home | LinkedIn | Google+ | Twitter
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As one of the senior developers where I work, I am tasked with mentoring the junior members of the team. This is a part of my role I really enjoy, as I get to pass down my hard won knowledge and experience to the next generation of software developers. What I have found over the years is that they all seem to lack one vital ingredient. How to debug / diagnose a problem. I have seen many of them struggle to use the debugger, set breakpoints, step through code, use the F12 browser tools etc. Even those with First Class honours degrees have struggled with this. I remember when doing my own degree (many years ago) we were taught these basic skills (using a Borland C++ IDE). Is this vital skill no longer being taught to new graduates? I feel this is a vital skill in any software developer's tool chest.
"There are two ways of constructing a software design: One way is to make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies, and the other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies. The first method is far more difficult." - C.A.R. Hoare Home | LinkedIn | Google+ | Twitter
I don't think that lack of debugging knowledge is the issue, so much as an inability even to understand what steps to take in problem analysis. Look at some of the questions here and you can see that some so called developers do not really understand the code they may even have written themselves. I suspect there are far too many people following a career into IT because they think it pays well, rather than because they have an interest in problem analysis and finding solutions.
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I don't think that lack of debugging knowledge is the issue, so much as an inability even to understand what steps to take in problem analysis. Look at some of the questions here and you can see that some so called developers do not really understand the code they may even have written themselves. I suspect there are far too many people following a career into IT because they think it pays well, rather than because they have an interest in problem analysis and finding solutions.
Richard MacCutchan wrote:
I suspect there are far too many people following a career into IT because they think it pays well, rather than because they have an interest in problem analysis and finding solutions.
I would tend to agree. Many people coming into IT are career professionals rather than following a true passion for the industry.
"There are two ways of constructing a software design: One way is to make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies, and the other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies. The first method is far more difficult." - C.A.R. Hoare Home | LinkedIn | Google+ | Twitter
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It's the only cross platform and cross environment mode, and can be implemented in the release code itself to catch bugs. It is not bad in itself, it's just a tool - also GDB sucks, the only decent debugger I used is VisualStudio, which is usable basically only on Windows platforms.
GCS d--(d+) s-/++ a C++++ U+++ P- L+@ E-- W++ N+ o+ K- w+++ O? M-- V? PS+ PE- Y+ PGP t+ 5? X R+++ tv-- b+(+++) DI+++ D++ G e++ h--- r+++ y+++* Weapons extension: ma- k++ F+2 X
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I don't think that lack of debugging knowledge is the issue, so much as an inability even to understand what steps to take in problem analysis. Look at some of the questions here and you can see that some so called developers do not really understand the code they may even have written themselves. I suspect there are far too many people following a career into IT because they think it pays well, rather than because they have an interest in problem analysis and finding solutions.
This is true for many careers. Many mechanics can't find problems in cars because they don't know how they work, they simply follow the company's instructions. So do many electricians. If you know how the thing you made works, you also know where and what to look at to discover problems. If you don't, i.e. you copy-pasted code without minimal knowledge, you can know every single debugger function and still be useless as a bike to a fish.
GCS d--(d+) s-/++ a C++++ U+++ P- L+@ E-- W++ N+ o+ K- w+++ O? M-- V? PS+ PE- Y+ PGP t+ 5? X R+++ tv-- b+(+++) DI+++ D++ G e++ h--- r+++ y+++* Weapons extension: ma- k++ F+2 X
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This is true for many careers. Many mechanics can't find problems in cars because they don't know how they work, they simply follow the company's instructions. So do many electricians. If you know how the thing you made works, you also know where and what to look at to discover problems. If you don't, i.e. you copy-pasted code without minimal knowledge, you can know every single debugger function and still be useless as a bike to a fish.
GCS d--(d+) s-/++ a C++++ U+++ P- L+@ E-- W++ N+ o+ K- w+++ O? M-- V? PS+ PE- Y+ PGP t+ 5? X R+++ tv-- b+(+++) DI+++ D++ G e++ h--- r+++ y+++* Weapons extension: ma- k++ F+2 X
den2k88 wrote:
be useless as a bike to a fish.
Sent from my Amstrad PC 1640 Never throw anything away, Griff Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay... AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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As one of the senior developers where I work, I am tasked with mentoring the junior members of the team. This is a part of my role I really enjoy, as I get to pass down my hard won knowledge and experience to the next generation of software developers. What I have found over the years is that they all seem to lack one vital ingredient. How to debug / diagnose a problem. I have seen many of them struggle to use the debugger, set breakpoints, step through code, use the F12 browser tools etc. Even those with First Class honours degrees have struggled with this. I remember when doing my own degree (many years ago) we were taught these basic skills (using a Borland C++ IDE). Is this vital skill no longer being taught to new graduates? I feel this is a vital skill in any software developer's tool chest.
"There are two ways of constructing a software design: One way is to make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies, and the other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies. The first method is far more difficult." - C.A.R. Hoare Home | LinkedIn | Google+ | Twitter
"If you hear hooves, think of horses not zebras" is another of my favourites. Had one guy at a place I used to work always assumed every database issue was due to faults in the NAT firmware in the routers or maybe the network cards were dropping packets so needed updating. He'd spend his time researching new drivers etc etc, and when he still couldn't get it working I would take a look and nine times out of ten he had misspelled the server name in the connection string, or omitted the instance name or something like that.
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As one of the senior developers where I work, I am tasked with mentoring the junior members of the team. This is a part of my role I really enjoy, as I get to pass down my hard won knowledge and experience to the next generation of software developers. What I have found over the years is that they all seem to lack one vital ingredient. How to debug / diagnose a problem. I have seen many of them struggle to use the debugger, set breakpoints, step through code, use the F12 browser tools etc. Even those with First Class honours degrees have struggled with this. I remember when doing my own degree (many years ago) we were taught these basic skills (using a Borland C++ IDE). Is this vital skill no longer being taught to new graduates? I feel this is a vital skill in any software developer's tool chest.
"There are two ways of constructing a software design: One way is to make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies, and the other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies. The first method is far more difficult." - C.A.R. Hoare Home | LinkedIn | Google+ | Twitter
I found that so .. straight-forward that I could not have imagined it is something that needs to be taught.
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It's the only cross platform and cross environment mode, and can be implemented in the release code itself to catch bugs. It is not bad in itself, it's just a tool - also GDB sucks, the only decent debugger I used is VisualStudio, which is usable basically only on Windows platforms.
GCS d--(d+) s-/++ a C++++ U+++ P- L+@ E-- W++ N+ o+ K- w+++ O? M-- V? PS+ PE- Y+ PGP t+ 5? X R+++ tv-- b+(+++) DI+++ D++ G e++ h--- r+++ y+++* Weapons extension: ma- k++ F+2 X
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making stupid and glaring mistakes isn't taught either - but they're damn good at that. so why the difference?
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I found that so .. straight-forward that I could not have imagined it is something that needs to be taught.
Me too, I only tend to debug my own code these days, the single step function is the one I use the most...
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I don't think that lack of debugging knowledge is the issue, so much as an inability even to understand what steps to take in problem analysis. Look at some of the questions here and you can see that some so called developers do not really understand the code they may even have written themselves. I suspect there are far too many people following a career into IT because they think it pays well, rather than because they have an interest in problem analysis and finding solutions.
:thumbsup: Agreed. There is a big difference between being able to use debugging tools and being able to do problem solving. Kinda like the super intelligent person who lacks common sense. A course in OR (Operations Research) could help. Working with real time systems will really test those skills. :)
If you can keep your head while those about you are losing theirs, perhaps you don't understand the situation.
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It seems that problem solving at all is not a skill taught to anyone anywhere... Actually - 'you have a problem' is considered rude to tell a student, as it implies the need to take responsibility, which totally uncommon these days (and to force it on someone is unforgivable)...
"The only place where Success comes before Work is in the dictionary." Vidal Sassoon, 1928 - 2012
Kornfeld Eliyahu Peter wrote:
It seems that problem solving at all is not a skill taught to anyone anywhere..
Agreed. And even more broadly, critical thinking skills simply aren't taught. That's the nature of schooling being based upon multiple choice and t/f exams.
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harold aptroot wrote:
It's even worse than that: debug-by-printing is often explicitly recommended.
And why is that so bad? I have found a lot of bugs just adding a couple of messageboxes / wprintf in places of the code If you are programming things that might have a timing component, debugging alters the real world use case when you hit the stop points. Saving a couple of values there and printing them later on the screen doesn't screw your performance or timing relational so bad. And as de2k88 said... you might use it always. You can even "debug" the release version with it. I think this is like the "goto"... it is not bad per se. But I can agree with you that it might get messy pretty fast.
M.D.V. ;) If something has a solution... Why do we have to worry about?. If it has no solution... For what reason do we have to worry about? Help me to understand what I'm saying, and I'll explain it better to you Rating helpful answers is nice, but saying thanks can be even nicer.
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As one of the senior developers where I work, I am tasked with mentoring the junior members of the team. This is a part of my role I really enjoy, as I get to pass down my hard won knowledge and experience to the next generation of software developers. What I have found over the years is that they all seem to lack one vital ingredient. How to debug / diagnose a problem. I have seen many of them struggle to use the debugger, set breakpoints, step through code, use the F12 browser tools etc. Even those with First Class honours degrees have struggled with this. I remember when doing my own degree (many years ago) we were taught these basic skills (using a Borland C++ IDE). Is this vital skill no longer being taught to new graduates? I feel this is a vital skill in any software developer's tool chest.
"There are two ways of constructing a software design: One way is to make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies, and the other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies. The first method is far more difficult." - C.A.R. Hoare Home | LinkedIn | Google+ | Twitter
It's worse than that. The code the junior devs write is often so algorithmically and/or architecturally wrong that debugging won't actually solve the problem. Abstracting the problem, breaking the problem down into smaller problem sets, asserting on inputs, writing try-catch handlers, none of this taught. As a result, debugging something that is broken from the get-go is pointless. And debugging existing code that hopefully someone with more experience wrote? Forget it. Simple syntax like null continuation, generics, lambda functions, LINQ, callbacks...it's all Greek to them because they were never exposed to real programming. The mantra my mentee kept repeating over and over again was "oh my god, why didn't they teach us that in school???" :sigh:
Latest Article - A 4-Stack rPI Cluster with WiFi-Ethernet Bridging Learning to code with python is like learning to swim with those little arm floaties. It gives you undeserved confidence and will eventually drown you. - DangerBunny Artificial intelligence is the only remedy for natural stupidity. - CDP1802
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Kornfeld Eliyahu Peter wrote:
It seems that problem solving at all is not a skill taught to anyone anywhere..
Agreed. And even more broadly, critical thinking skills simply aren't taught. That's the nature of schooling being based upon multiple choice and t/f exams.
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It's worse than that. The code the junior devs write is often so algorithmically and/or architecturally wrong that debugging won't actually solve the problem. Abstracting the problem, breaking the problem down into smaller problem sets, asserting on inputs, writing try-catch handlers, none of this taught. As a result, debugging something that is broken from the get-go is pointless. And debugging existing code that hopefully someone with more experience wrote? Forget it. Simple syntax like null continuation, generics, lambda functions, LINQ, callbacks...it's all Greek to them because they were never exposed to real programming. The mantra my mentee kept repeating over and over again was "oh my god, why didn't they teach us that in school???" :sigh:
Latest Article - A 4-Stack rPI Cluster with WiFi-Ethernet Bridging Learning to code with python is like learning to swim with those little arm floaties. It gives you undeserved confidence and will eventually drown you. - DangerBunny Artificial intelligence is the only remedy for natural stupidity. - CDP1802
Marc Clifton wrote:
And debugging existing code that hopefully someone with more experience wrote? Forget it. Simple syntax like null continuation, generics, lambda functions, LINQ, callbacks...it's all Greek to them because they were never exposed to real programming.
I have to regularly explain how the code works at both the architectural level, as well as the code level. This is to get them to understand the underpinning design decisions, as well as the detail of how the code itself works. Generics and LINQ were completely brand new to them. It took several sessions to get them to understand the problem that Generics solves, nevermind understanding the syntax behind it.
"There are two ways of constructing a software design: One way is to make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies, and the other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies. The first method is far more difficult." - C.A.R. Hoare Home | LinkedIn | Google+ | Twitter
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As one of the senior developers where I work, I am tasked with mentoring the junior members of the team. This is a part of my role I really enjoy, as I get to pass down my hard won knowledge and experience to the next generation of software developers. What I have found over the years is that they all seem to lack one vital ingredient. How to debug / diagnose a problem. I have seen many of them struggle to use the debugger, set breakpoints, step through code, use the F12 browser tools etc. Even those with First Class honours degrees have struggled with this. I remember when doing my own degree (many years ago) we were taught these basic skills (using a Borland C++ IDE). Is this vital skill no longer being taught to new graduates? I feel this is a vital skill in any software developer's tool chest.
"There are two ways of constructing a software design: One way is to make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies, and the other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies. The first method is far more difficult." - C.A.R. Hoare Home | LinkedIn | Google+ | Twitter
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Debug by printing can be useful at times. That's the whole point of having log files. It shouldn't be the only tool in the box, but it shouldn't be completely discarded.
