The Frustrating Paradox of the QA Section
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This reminds me of what my husband used to say back when we were teenagery and he worked helldesk at the local community college. He said he had a paperclip for rebooting the imacs and an icepick for rebooting their users. :-\
Real programmers use butterflies
I was alomost going to post something "he's a man after my own heart", but then I realized that in the case of imacs I'd need to soak in in brine overnight, first. (Aside from avoiding the waste of a perfectly good paperclip).
"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein
"If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010
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Does a rubber chicken work? I could wave it over my code
Real programmers use butterflies
No, a real chicken is required
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No, a real chicken is required
HR warned me off of doing that again. :(
Real programmers use butterflies
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It's send the email that usually unblocks the problem. The tension is gone and suddenly one is using all the right search words!
Yes. This. :rolleyes:
Real programmers use butterflies
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It's send the email that usually unblocks the problem. The tension is gone and suddenly one is using all the right search words!
Not search words - describing the problem in text (or verbally) somehow condenses it to something that offers options (or eliminates them, also good). If I were to blame it on any particular concept it would be the need to "crystallize" the problem instead of letting it float around as a nebulous adversary. I couldn't say how that improves things - or for that matter, if it's the path from one mode to the other that does it. Or, maybe just flapping my gum?
"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein
"If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010
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Not search words - describing the problem in text (or verbally) somehow condenses it to something that offers options (or eliminates them, also good). If I were to blame it on any particular concept it would be the need to "crystallize" the problem instead of letting it float around as a nebulous adversary. I couldn't say how that improves things - or for that matter, if it's the path from one mode to the other that does it. Or, maybe just flapping my gum?
"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein
"If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010
I find that having managed to describe the problem, and plucked up the courage to send/post the query, that up re-reading the sent message, in a more relaxed state, some key phrase that I used can be searched for (OK so it's Google, but there are others). Usually that search then comes up with a lot better answers, or at least clarifiers, for the problem. Essentially it's a bit of Analysis Paralysis that stops one from 'seeing the woods for the trees' (or is that 'wood for the trees'?) while preparing the description, but once sent, the relaxation allows me to finally see the core part. It's that while the problem has been 'crystallised', it's still buried in the dirt of the broader message. The old 20/20 hindsight!
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Hmmm. I'm suspicious of ducks in general. I wonder if one wouldn't lead me astray.
Real programmers use butterflies
The rubber duck is your familiar, mediating between you and the Powers that enable you to program. At times the S/N ratio on the channel goes too low, so the Powers cannot get through. It is then that giving your duck some attention (and a small sacrifice, e.g. your firstborn...) can really pay off. Get on the wrong side of your duck, and you will program nevermore! :D Is that "New Agey" enough, or should I insert some psychobabble as well?
Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows. -- 6079 Smith W.
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The rubber duck is your familiar, mediating between you and the Powers that enable you to program. At times the S/N ratio on the channel goes too low, so the Powers cannot get through. It is then that giving your duck some attention (and a small sacrifice, e.g. your firstborn...) can really pay off. Get on the wrong side of your duck, and you will program nevermore! :D Is that "New Agey" enough, or should I insert some psychobabble as well?
Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows. -- 6079 Smith W.
Okay, I can make some sense of that. I would have pictured a cat though. I have a black one who is slightly cross eyed and whose tail and ears are too big for the rest of him. He is my familiar. What do I tell him? :sigh:
Real programmers use butterflies
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Often, as I describe the problem or the vague plan of attack it seems to solve itself along the way. That was one good thing when (1) I was working in the office, and (2) there actually was (at least) a second developer around. Oddly, still occurs if I'm typing the same mess into an email trying to describe the plan, the obstacles. and the options to remove/evade them.
"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein
"If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010
For a long time I've said that my superpower is that people ask me for help. Then, without me doing anything, the problem is solved. This was awesome when I worked a job doing desktop support via phone. Now you've made me question if it was my superpower or the other people's. Bond Keep all things as simple as possible, but no simpler. -said someone, somewhere
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For a long time I've said that my superpower is that people ask me for help. Then, without me doing anything, the problem is solved. This was awesome when I worked a job doing desktop support via phone. Now you've made me question if it was my superpower or the other people's. Bond Keep all things as simple as possible, but no simpler. -said someone, somewhere
Keeping it simple: who that someone was.[^] Actually it was neither your super power nor theirs. Just a bit of 'runoff' from my super powers.
"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein
"If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010
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Not search words - describing the problem in text (or verbally) somehow condenses it to something that offers options (or eliminates them, also good). If I were to blame it on any particular concept it would be the need to "crystallize" the problem instead of letting it float around as a nebulous adversary. I couldn't say how that improves things - or for that matter, if it's the path from one mode to the other that does it. Or, maybe just flapping my gum?
"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein
"If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010
I think it's that you try to describe precisely, completely, what's - oh no, that's not quite right - ( and correcting yourself ) - and trying to give a clear explanation - and finding you were thinking wrong there or... Yeah, examining both the overall and the details. And each part of the explanation you think about and correct as you give it. ( At least that's how my brain dis-functions. )
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I think it's that you try to describe precisely, completely, what's - oh no, that's not quite right - ( and correcting yourself ) - and trying to give a clear explanation - and finding you were thinking wrong there or... Yeah, examining both the overall and the details. And each part of the explanation you think about and correct as you give it. ( At least that's how my brain dis-functions. )
Not a bad description.
"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein
"If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010
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That's absolutely true. Eventually I came to realize that I had crested the field - at least in business development when I ran out of people I could ask when running into code trouble. :laugh: Probably nothing else would have convinced me. I have terrible Impostor Syndrome.
Real programmers use butterflies
As I am perhaps one of the greatest developers of all time, I've never understood the Imposter Syndrome thing? ;P In all seriousness, you've written some very cool stuff. How in the world could you ever doubt your competence?
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As I am perhaps one of the greatest developers of all time, I've never understood the Imposter Syndrome thing? ;P In all seriousness, you've written some very cool stuff. How in the world could you ever doubt your competence?
Thank you. Well I guess we all have a few failed projects under our belt. I can always count on the committee in my head to remind me of that. :laugh:
Real programmers use butterflies
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Even the not-so-great developers seem to be in short supply these days. They're increasingly getting drowned out by the "do my work for me" brigade. :sigh: IIRC, we used to get the occasional no-effort homework assignment posted between the genuine questions. Recently it seems to be the other way round. And usually multiple copies of the same homework assignment, because half the class is too lazy to think for themselves.
"These people looked deep within my soul and assigned me a number based on the order in which I joined." - Homer
Hi Richard, I suggest that CP is "reaping the wind" of its laissez-faire culture. I'd guess "word has spread" (and the search engines put CP front and center) that CP is a "soft touch" ... imho, it is, compared to SO ... QA posters can, and do, post anything without lifting a finger to even select a few relevant tags. I used to raise the issue of requiring posters to fill out a simple form before their post was published: gave up on that after several tries. So, you have the spectacle of, often, multiple solutions/comments posted that beg the OP to clarify what their question is about. Someone may respond to a question with a comment asking for clarification; that doesn't stop other responders from posting what they think are solutions. Note how few MVP's actually contribute to QA; note how the C# language forum has drifted into being yet-another-QA, with posts about language issues scarcer. You may think I am complaining ... I'm not. I enjoy responding to questions with what I hope are answers of the same quality as the writing in my book Addison-Wesley published (30+ years ago). And, I treasure my (peripheral) involvement in this remarkable community ! Most valuable, for me, is learning from people like you, Richard McCutcheon, OriginalGriff, and others, who are so broadly/deeply informed, and up-to-date on all the latest/greatest.
«One day it will have to be officially admitted that what we have christened reality is an even greater illusion than the world of dreams.» Salvador Dali
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Get a rubber duck. Mine is an excellent listener and solves problems that I can't. :-D
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The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing. -
I find that having managed to describe the problem, and plucked up the courage to send/post the query, that up re-reading the sent message, in a more relaxed state, some key phrase that I used can be searched for (OK so it's Google, but there are others). Usually that search then comes up with a lot better answers, or at least clarifiers, for the problem. Essentially it's a bit of Analysis Paralysis that stops one from 'seeing the woods for the trees' (or is that 'wood for the trees'?) while preparing the description, but once sent, the relaxation allows me to finally see the core part. It's that while the problem has been 'crystallised', it's still buried in the dirt of the broader message. The old 20/20 hindsight!
