[Melbourne-pm] Stack traces
Adam Clarke
adam.clarke at strategicdata.com.au
Tue Feb 12 21:30:56 PST 2013
On 13/02/2013, at 4:21 PM, Andrew McNaughton <andrewmcnnz at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 13/02/13 15:41, Toby Corkindale wrote:
>> On 13/02/13 13:02, Sam Watkins wrote:
>>> On Wed, Feb 13, 2013 at 10:50:56AM +1100, Toby Corkindale wrote:
>>>> I've seen Java stack traces that are easier to figure out than this.
>>>
>>> <snip 646 line stack trace>
>>>
>>> Frankly, I think the solution is - don't use all that ridiculous
>>> bloated crap!
>>> Keep it simple. If you can write it in one line, do so;
>>> Don't write 20 pages when 1 will do. Don't use bloated 3rd party
>>> modules,
>>> only if they are as clean and simple as possible for the necessary task.
>>
>> It's not really as simple as that.
>>
>>> Read "The Practice of Programming" ...
>>> Chant "Simplicity, Clarity, Generality" ...
>>
>> But there's also: Don't Repeat Yourself.
>> Don't copy and paste code around when you could use a single package.
>> But as requirements get more complex, so do your dependencies, which
>> may themselves be simple, but be made up of many further dependencies.
>> Even if they are all relatively simple in and of themselves, the
>> combination of all grows complex.
>
> So we have simplicity at the top level with all the complexity hidden,
> until you get to the stack trace. If you're using the same frameworks a
> lot and want to hide the complexity in the stack traces too, it likely
> makes sense to write something to filter the stack traces to recover the
> simplicity there.
>
> Of course this also exaggerates the tendency for the programmer to lose
> track of the performance implications of all that complexity they're
> hiding. Sometimes it matters.
Please note, tongue firmly on cheek!
So we have a choice. We can stand on the shoulders of giants, sometimes
slipping off and falling into their excrement. Or we can stand on a pile of
our own excrement desperately trying not to sink into it before we reach
the level of those shoulders.
Sounds to me like we are stuck between a sometimes soft place and an
always soft place ;)
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