Debugging the Development Process by Steve Maguire (book review)

Debugging the Development Process

I frequently refer to the section titled "Know Your Coding Priorities" (p. 18).

• Size
• Speed
• Robustness
• Testability
• Maintainability
• Simplicity
• Reusability
• Portability
• Readability

Know Your Coding Priorities

If you were to ask three different friends to drop by the supermarket to pick up some asparagus, green beans, and corn, would it surprise you to find that one friend bought canned vegetables because were the cheapest, another bought frozen vegetables because they were easiest to cook, and the third bought fresh vegetables because they were organically grown and tasted the best? Can you at least imagine such a thing happening?

The three friends buy different types of vegetables for the same reason one programmer will emphasis speed in his code, another will emphasize small size in hers, and a third will emphasize simplicity--their choices differ because their priorities are different.

(p. 17)