Microsoft Philippines Community

http://railsontherun.com/2008/3/17/rails-the-duplo-generation 

Nice insight to problems when  you have an application that lets you build things very fast, very quick, because of predeterminedconventions and a lot of plugins:

The problem is that a generation of Rubyists has grown up being used to getting everything pre written for them. They haven't yet passed the "Duplo stage" and basically write applications putting a few blocks together, only writing 10 to 20% and barely understand 5%.

On top of that, what really annoys me is that, these very same developers complain about the existing plugins, always ask for more and don't give anything back to the community.

While it offers an insight into the RoR world, it's not very different from some challenges faced with the Microsoft universe either (do you have an officemate that, say, refuses to move on from the defaults of GridView or is totally clueless when you don't use typed datasets in your web application?).

Just a reminder that we must always be moving forward in developing our skills and understanding.

And exert an effort to give back to the community.

 excellent post!

But then again, I see nothing wrong with say, using the Crytography namespace versus creating your own encryption algo(as long as you can share it). Still, this gives us the angle that a developer should of course, understand his code or at least how the namespaces he uses works behind the scenes. But not to the extent of tearing dlls apart. :) <-- extension methods rock!

There's an angle of "sharing" problems in the open-source world, methinks. That open source OSes are, well, too open source that they customize their systems to the point that no two systems are the same anymore.

Eduardo Lorenzo:

But then again, I see nothing wrong with say, using the Crytography namespace versus creating your own encryption algo(as long as you can share it). Still, this gives us the angle that a developer should of course, understand his code or at least how the namespaces he uses works behind the scenes. But not to the extent of tearing dlls apart. :) <-- extension methods rock!

I slightly disagree with the bold part. I can rely on just looking at the interface when I wanted to use a library, but to understand what exactly the library is doing, I need to either read the unit tests, or if those don't exist, read the code itself. In rails, you don't even need to tear apart the DLLs - the code is there for everyone to see. That makes a big difference because there is now less reason for you to complain about the framework - if you see something wrong, just fix it and send the patch back to the community. I think that is what the author meant - the duplo programmers don't do that and instead rely on the rails developers to fix all their bugs for them.

 the comment was directed towards "closed-source" developers. yes of course, an understanding of how a namespace or a DLL works is good. But tearing it apart? For me this is where extension methods comes in. Another thing, if I leave a dll with a client, once they open it up, for me that is like breaking a warranty seal.

A bit off topic now. 

Eduardo Lorenzo:

There's an angle of "sharing" problems in the open-source world, methinks. That open source OSes are, well, too open source that they customize their systems to the point that no two systems are the same anymore.

I don't see that as a problem - I see that as a strength.

Think of it as evolution. You can also think of it as research. Everyone is trying out what they see is the right way - some of them fail and some of them succeed. Most of these are personal machines though so it is not really of consequence to anyone but only to those who do it. But they benefit the community because collectively they'll learn what works and what doesn't.

I'm sure, Microsoft and other closed source software companies also do this internally.

ah.. I failed to mention the extent of "modifications" open source OS users do.

Standards is a good thing.

Evolution and tinkering with an already stable OS are different. And evolution per se, does not affect an entire species. Meaning, there are hundreds of kinds of rodents. Probably the same ending for the open source OS? With this, sub-cultures are not too far from the horizon, then factions, then sub-factions, you get the drift.

Eduardo Lorenzo:

 the comment was directed towards "closed-source" developers. yes of course, an understanding of how a namespace or a DLL works is good. But tearing it apart? For me this is where extension methods comes in.

Well, I found that the fastest way of understanding code it by taking it apart - by reading code and working it out on my mind.

Being closed source does not really make a big difference. It only makes it relatively harder to tear apart the source. Reflector helps a lot in here.

Eduardo Lorenzo:

Another thing, if I leave a dll with a client, once they open it up, for me that is like breaking a warranty seal.

I don't think so. When developers open up a DLL, that doesn't break a DLL. It still works the same.

Eduardo Lorenzo:

Standards is a good thing.

Yes, it is.

Eduardo Lorenzo:

Evolution and tinkering with an already stable OS are different. And evolution per se, does not affect an entire species. Meaning, there are hundreds of kinds of rodents. Probably the same ending for the open source OS? With this, sub-cultures are not too far from the horizon, then factions, then sub-factions, you get the drift.

There still is one Linux kernel that I know of and it is stable. Everyone can tinker with it and install it on their own machines. Not everyone sends out their configurations back to the main code and not all patches that are submitted are accepted by the maintainers. But the knowledge gained by these kernel hackers don't get lost - it's posted somewhere in the mailist lists or blogs. In here evolution does not affect the entire species. There might be thousands of versions of the kernel but there is only one official standard (so far).