LinuxSA Mailing list archives

  From: W. Sierke <ws@senet.com.au>
  To  : LinuxSA <linuxsa@linuxsa.org.au>
  Date: Sun, 22 Jul 2001 22:40:16 +0930

Re: BIND 9.1.0 fails badly

Alan Kennington wrote:


> About 30 years ago, probes were launched into a harsh environment
> with no hope of applying any hands-on servicing or manual re-boot,
> and they are still out there working beyond the solar system.
> What has happened to the art of software development since then?!

The Write Stuff!

How they do it for the shuttle:

(from http://www.fastcompany.com/online/06/writestuff.html )

> What's going on here is the kind of nuts-and-bolts work that defines the
drive for group perfection -- a drive that is aggressively intolerant of
ego-driven hotshots. In the shuttle group's culture, there are no superstar
programmers. The whole approach to developing software is intentionally
designed not to rely on any particular person.
>
> And the culture is equally intolerant of creativity, the individual coding
flourishes and styles that are the signature of the all-night software
world. "People ask, doesn't this process stifle creativity? You have to do
exactly what the manual says, and you've got someone looking over your
shoulder," says Keller. "The answer is, yes, the process does stifle
creativity."
>
> And that is precisely the point -- you can't have people freelancing their
way through software code that flies a spaceship, and then, with peoples
lives depending on it, try to patch it once its in orbit. "Houston, we have
a problem," may make for a good movie; it's no way to write software.
"People have to channel their creativity into changing the process," says
Keller, "not changing the software."


Nice work if you can get it, and want it.


Wayne


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