On Sat, 10 Aug 2002, Adrian Midgley wrote: > I like the concept of re-factoring, where one takes an existing program and > leaves the user interface essentially the same, retains the API and the rest > of the black box characteristics, but rewrites the innards in whatever > fashion is most effective.
Adrian, If the user-interface (and basically the exposed functionalities) remain the same, what do we gain from changing the innards? I agree with your recommendation for re-factoring - however, I believe it can be far more meaningful. If refactoring the "innards" leads to tools that make it easier to change the user-interface and associated "black box" characteristics, then there is opportunity to fundamentally change how end users interact with these computing machines. The success of HTML stems partly from this effect. ... > We appear to have been promised a larger system than has ever been written, > running .Net (which afaik has never run on any major scale) prepared more > quickly than any otehr large public project, and naturally, since it will be > all new technology, both cheaper and more reliable as well as enormous fun to > use. Down the road, .Net may change how systems are used by everyone. > Oh, real soon now. Doesn't it make your heart sink. I wish them every success. It is an ambitious experiment that will move the field forward one way or another. We can all learn from their results. :-) Best regards, Andrew --- Andrew P. Ho, M.D. OIO: Open Infrastructure for Outcomes www.TxOutcome.Org
