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Understanding Software

Understanding Software

By : Max Kanat-Alexander
3.8 (11)
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Understanding Software

Understanding Software

3.8 (11)
By: Max Kanat-Alexander

Overview of this book

In Understanding Software, Max Kanat-Alexander, Technical Lead for Code Health at Google, shows you how to bring simplicity back to computer programming. Max explains to you why programmers suck, and how to suck less as a programmer. There’s just too much complex stuff in the world. Complex stuff can’t be used, and it breaks too easily. Complexity is stupid. Simplicity is smart. Understanding Software covers many areas of programming, from how to write simple code to profound insights into programming, and then how to suck less at what you do! You'll discover the problems with software complexity, the root of its causes, and how to use simplicity to create great software. You'll examine debugging like you've never done before, and how to get a handle on being happy while working in teams. Max brings a selection of carefully crafted essays, thoughts, and advice about working and succeeding in the software industry, from his legendary blog Code Simplicity. Max has crafted forty-three essays which have the power to help you avoid complexity and embrace simplicity, so you can be a happier and more successful developer. Max's technical knowledge, insight, and kindness, has earned him code guru status, and his ideas will inspire you and help refresh your approach to the challenges of being a developer.
Table of Contents (15 chapters)
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Free Chapter
1
Table of Contents
2
Understanding Software
3
Credits
4
About the Author
6
Customer Feedback
7
Foreword
15
Index

Chapter 11. Simplicity and Strictness

As a general rule:

The stricter your application is, the simpler it is to write.

For example, imagine a program that accepts only the numbers 1 and 2 as input and rejects everything else. Even a tiny variation in the input, like adding a space before or after "1" would cause the program to throw an error. That would be very "strict" and extremely simple to write. All you'd have to do is check, "Did they enter exactly 1 or exactly 2? If not, throw an error."

In most situations, though, such a program would be so strict as to be impractical. If the user doesn't know the exact format you expect your input in, or if they accidentally hit the spacebar or some other key when entering a number, the program will frustrate the user by not "doing what they mean."

That's a case where there is a trade-off between simplicity (strictness) and usability. Not all cases of strictness have that trade-off, but...

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