techscapades

Maintenance programmers get a bad wrap. They're seen tucked away in the corner, frustrated, cleaning up others' bugs. Occasionally, they'll hack a new feature into old code, but without being there from the beginning, their code is usually clumsy. There's little chance to get in on a sexy new project building something cool.

In comes the scheduled maintenance programmer. The difference is in the problem they are presented. They're given a software product prior to it blowing up and challenged to make sure it's gonna keep running smoothly. Change the spark plugs, flush and fill, calipers and rotors -- whatever it takes.

The principles of XP/TDD teach us to refactor our own code to ensure the highest quality before ever delivering it, but technical debt inevitably slips through. Often we abstract more than necessary, creating unnecessary complexity. Other times we miss an abstraction, forcing duplicated code. The scheduled maintenance programmer's role is to remove that debt, run/write additional tests (and automate them where not already), refactor to improve maintainability, and keep the ship moving at full steam ahead.

I want to work in a shop where these guys are respected. Where they take a Porsche, tune it up, and make it run like a Ferrari.

I loved the post on 37 Signals about throwing out your bad shots. Many people struggle with not posting every photograph they take -- look at facebook to see copies of similar, but equally crappy, shots in your friends' albums. In reality, looking back half-objectively, you could have left out a ton of cruft and still given a great overview of your trips and fun times.

I've been as guilty as everyone else.

I am getting a little better (only posted 8 shots from about 50 I took while on the boat wakeboarding), but I still have a long ways to go. I still keep every single shot on my hard drive -- even those solid black ones -- perhaps hoping someday I’ll get ahold of some forensic tools and dig out a gem inside there (enhance... enhance... enhance). In reality, I hardly look at even the top 5 pics from any photoshoot from more than a year ago.

Delete can be a tough button to press, but it shouldn't be.

When you're looking at code and you know some of it isn't used -- or maybe it's even commented out -- don't be a afraid to let go of it. We have version control so that you can always get it back.