Even before (if ever) we reach the nirvana of an obviously best practice, including the scalability and 'get off at any floor' factors, there is another social factor at work besides 'let's rip it off'.
That is the attempt to 'make programming simple'. It isn't, and never will be, period. I'm not against using tools to get myself and others better organised, but they don't replace thought, nor responsibility. I don't know how many times I've heard toolset salespeople saying (essentially) 'it will save you having to think'. Never heard that? How about 'you can use less skilled people'? 'Most of the design is done for you'? 'It allows you to decide later' (yeah, when then?)? I was once responsible for tool selection for a series of major projects (including some not at the time yet conceived - imagine!). So to try to make this very point I made up two PowerPoint slides. The first showed a single button marked "Do what I mean". And I talked about snake oil. I introduced the second slide with "and now here is a preview of next year's model" ... the single button was changed to read "Do what I ought to mean". I regret to say that people came to me offering funding if I could bring that feature forward into this product year :-) Duncan Fenton -- ** Archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/dev%40lists.cfdeveloper.co.uk/ To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For human help, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
