Don't you love when software displays a message that something "completed successfully" when it actually wasn't successful?

Guys, you either handle errors or you don't. Both is fine with me. But don't lie to me.

I have now encountered several cases of unintelligible documentation - functional requirements, security measures, technical how-tos - where I had to ask the author for clarification, and getting as a reply "oh I don't know; I just asked #ChatGPT".

Now I can bash #ai tools, but people who produce documentation that they themselves don't understand have always been a blight on #IT. It's irresponsible, unprofessional, and makes work harder for everyone.

Solving a software problem, on the #vibeCoding scale:

↓ no vibes ↓

• Writing from internalized knowledge
• Reading documentation
• Reading a blog post on the topic
• Lifting from sample code
• Copy/pasting from StackOvervflow
• Adding yet another library dependency
• Using AI to write implementation

↑ nothing but vibes ↑

Hot take:

Human-written tests > No tests > AI-generated tests.

I think I prefer no tests to extremely complex, verbose and unmaintainable test code that just perfectly contorts around a code base and its defects.

The 13 software engineering laws - by Anton Zaides
https://newsletter.manager.dev/p/the-13-software-engineering-laws

Listen at: https://anonradio.net:8443/anonradio

This week we will talk about the Unix Philosophy and how it compares and contrasts with whatever one might call the “Emacs Philosophy.”

The impetus for the discussion is a series of blog posts by @ramin_hal9001 [fe.disroot.org] called “Emacs fulfills the UNIX Philosophy”:

• The original introductory blog post [tilde.town]
• The show notes [codeberg.org]

…as well as a fascinating discussion [mastodon.sdf.org] that took place over this past week on ActivityPub on the topic of the Unix philosophy and history of Lisp on Unix in which some very knowledgeable people have contributed anecdotes and facts.

#technology #programming #SoftwareEngineering #RetroComputing #lisp #r7rs #SchemeLang #UnixPhilosophy

within each of us
our loved ones, in tiny form,
caring's innate yield
    company at a distance
    legacy in case of loss

Joined a new customer project today. The project started recently. Customer provides project director and business analysts. We provide architects/devs.
Watched a recap of a recent kickoff meeting to get familiar with the business domain and the project setup.
In this meeting I noticed that they presented a rough and very (very very) optimistic timeline.

Me: Were any technical people involved back then when you were setting the timeline?
Project Director: No. The dates are fixed. Why?
Me:

New intro now I am retired...

Looking to get into some #Indie #GameDev now I have time. Want to write the games I wanted to write all along: #Roguelike #Roguelite #ProceduralContent...

Also available to help other people with projects/personal development... Commercial or unpaid, drop me a message, the worst can happen is I don't know or am too busy.

Skills: #SoftwareEngineering #SoftwareDesign
#C++ #Teamwork, #C++, #Online

But, I have done something that is super cool and I have nobody to share it with, and nothing to show for it besides some passing tests.

https://github.com/zeyus/liblsl.dart/blob/main/packages/liblsl/ (readme is outdated, see tests)

HMU if you're a #softwareengineering , #networkengineering , #systemsarchitecture or #designpattern nerd, I'd love feedback and suggestions for improvement (or just question my sanity)

My team at Polytechnic Institute of Paris/Télécom #Paris school of engineering is looking for a research engineer to conduct development and empirical experiments in various fields, most notable #software #security and #SoftwareEngineering.

Programming skills in #Rust are particularly welcome, even though we are quite polyglots and would also welcome C/Java/OCaml developers

3-year contract, on site in the south of Paris.

Full job description at: https://institutminestelecom.recruitee.com/l/en/o/ingenieure-ou-ingenieur-de-recherche-en-informatique [institutminestelecom.recruitee.com]

Looking forward to visit @JavaLandConf next week. As a start to the program @edburns blogposts are always a joy: https://mastodon.social/@edburns/114071720537653708

Happy to meet #Community,eg @kiview @martinfrancois @sippsack @sparsick @ascheman @McPringle @patbaumgartner @rdmueller @MBoegie @womanintech &more

“Unless you have actually written code and have worked as a #SoftwareEngineer, you don’t get to have an opinion about #Al taking over #SoftwareEngineering.”

–Abhi Reddy [www.linkedin.com]

Guess what.

One of the best concise but efficient books: UML Distilled by Martin Fowler

https://pixelfed.social/p/brozu/809855255803691609

In 1972, the HP-35 ("The Calculator") entered the market. Universities wanted to ban it because it made engineering problems too easy. Informal competitions between The Calculator and slide rules were held. Some engineers were so adept at slide rules that they outperformed The Calculator.

I think about this when I consider where we are with LLMs and coding.

https://www.hpmuseum.org/cgi-bin/memories.cgi?read=107

LIVE NOW! Questions about #DevOps, #SoftwareEngineering, #SystemAdministration, or something like that? My weekly Office Hour is where you can ask me them. Join me for a chat!

https://mspc.sh/twitch
https://mspc.sh/yt
https://mspc.sh/owncast

Omg I just found out about vibe coding?? Like they're "developers" but they only use #AI-generated code. And employers are now starting to hire vibe code testers to test the code put out by vibe coders?

So you're telling me that instead of AI replacing developers, it actually makes it necessary to hire two developers to do the job of one developer? Now that's a table that's been turned if I've ever seen one #programming #SoftwareEngineering

"Using positional arguments requires less code today, but you pay for this decrease in volume of code with an increase in the risk that changes will cascade into dependents later." (Sandi Metz)

Follow me on this one...

Scryer = Infosec
Wizard/witch = DevOps
Warlock = SysAdmin (works with daemons a lot)
Mage = Frontend
Thaumaturge = Backend
Sorcerer/sorceress = Fullstack
Alchemist = Mobile Dev
Conjurer = Machine Learning
Summoner = IoT
Necromancer = A.I.
Geomancer = Network Technician
Druid = Data Engineering
Shaman = Cloud
Cleric = UX/UI
Paladin = SRE

There is no doubt one of the most difficult things on software engineering is naming things, 30% of my Gen-AI prompts end with "give me a list of 10 options/names/titles for ..."