Stupid Standard Protocols

You'd think that the people involved in defining the protocols for various data interchanges would be pretty smart people, wouldn't you?

Then why does every protocol I've had to develop for have:

• redundant messages - a message telling you how many items are in a list, and an entirely different message with the list, which has a length count in it?
• horrible bit-slicing sections where they take 3 bits to define a counter, then 1 bit for a flag, and then 4 bites for another counter?
• messages whose size is not carried in the message at all, but instead in a wholly different message?

I guess that either the poeple going to standards meetings are dense, too busy sightseeing, or too enamored of their pet project to compromise well.

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Sic Semper Tyrannus!

...the problem is what the "thus" is.

One of the big issues with the code at That Place is that since it has had nearly 15 years of development done on it, there are many tasks that have multiple ways to handle them - logging, socket output, RPC, etc.

This is a Bad Thing(tm)

As a good Ninja Developer, one must strive for a streamlined code base - make sure that there is only one way to do things, and enforce it with an iron fist.

I'm not saying that only one person gets to decide what to do - you can still make decisions by consensus, reading entrails, executive fiat (loser gets run over by the boss's convertible), whatever. But once you have a method in place, use only that method. Don't log some data in files, some in databases, and some to the console, all configured differently. Don't have some configuration by environment variables, some by files, and some from command line arguments.

The reason for this is simplicity - if your other developers, mostly non-Ninjas, have only one way to do something, they will:

• never need to ask how to do X, since there will only be one way, and the code will have examples
• never fix a bug in one system only to leave it in another
• never have to explain how to set up the configuration for a tester more than once

Now, the trick here is the enforcement.

Also, it may well be that your team decides to change the way it does something. This is fine, as long as your team also makes the effort to convert everything to that new system. And this is where the tyranny comes in. You must be heavy-handed in insisting that all vestiges of the old system get removed, even if you have to drop a feature from each of the next few releases.

If you don't, you will have both versions lingering on, perhaps until you get a third version, and then your
troubles are multiplied.

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The Big Three at the start of a Project

cue flashback effects......

revisiting a few topics from an old post, I was reminded today about some of the things that can make or break a project, that some thought at the start can alleviate much suffering.

Things your logging system needs to do:

1. be dynamic - you must be able to change logging levels on the fly without stopping any processes
2. be granular - you need to be able to segregate the severity of the log messages, so that you can eliminate detail as necessary (more on this below)
   
3. be muxable - you need to be able to route log messages to multiple different sinks - syslog, files, another server, etc
4. have a strong locality to the messages - know where they come from - process. thread. date. time. function, etc.

Things your configuration system needs to do:

1. be compact - have your configuration be in one place, a file or a DB
2. be dynamic, unless absolutely impossible - you want to be able to change config on a running process.
3. be contained in one function, so that if you trigger a reconfig, only one call needs to be made.

Things your feature setup needs to do:

1. be configuration-driven - you don't want to require a rebuild to enable a feature.
2. use the Factory pattern, and feature flags to drive it - so you can have one code stream.
3. have a single code interface to determine if something is in use - do not have an "enabled" function and a "licensed" function and an environment variable to set things.

Logging is a really big thing - some people prefer a levelled system, some prefer a bitmapped system. I have suggested a combined system - a level system for the basic part, and a bitmapped section for spheres of concern, like network access, database access, etc. An alternative is to have a keyword filter, so that you can filter on keywords as well as levels.

One logging idea that I have not yet fully fleshed out is a class-based logging - where every class has a logging flag that can be set so that you can log everything that instances of a given class does.

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Eating My Own Dogfood

After trumpeting the virtues of making your codebase a single branch, modified by configuration data, I found myself drifting into the maze of twisty if statements, all alike on a recent work project. So I took a deep breath, hitched up my belt, and started all over again.
This time, I'm subclassing from the existing classes for the new message protocol. The project already as the Command pattern in use, so I'm subclassing the command object type, and the processing object type, and instantiating the command objects via a factory, so that the only thing that needs to check if the protocol is in use is the factory, based on the type of the caller.
It's a little more code, but keeping the logic of which protocl is in use tightly controlled will pay off, as this portion of the project is primed for a lot of new development as the current branch of the industry tries to hold off a new branch that has the advantage of decades of advances in telecomm technology.

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Expecting too much from us?

I ran across this post last week. An admirable sentiment, perhaps, but one that, in my opinion, is unwarranted. Many, many software developers never approach the user interface side of the work, and they have no need for graphic design exposure.

I see articles like this, and wonder if the managerial types are trying to keep the developers from feeling like they already possess a valuable and necessary skill. In a manner akin to those "open ads" for a job that list a very specific set of qualifications, clearly intended to fit the already-chosen candidate, often one whose options are limited by immigrant status, or whose salary is low due to being overseas, this begins to feel like a way to tell the existing developers "You're no longer good enough, we don't have to hire you unless you're a polyglot Renaissance man"

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More validation of my opinions

Not that I need much.....

It was written for "artistic" types, but applies to software types

Points 3,4,9 and 10 resonate most, pity too many developers feel differently about OOP

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Like I said......

Someone else has seen the "Back where I used to work, we did things different" syndrome
Clinton Forbes

So remember folks, don't treat your new cow orkers like idiots, or they will hate you for it.

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