… is not something I’m known for. Being an introvert, I’d rather avoid the uncomfortable dialog. If I can’t avoid it, I want to end it as quickly as possible. My “normal” method is to lay out my argument as logically as possible. If that doesn’t work, I go for the throat and attack the inner most issue at hand. Pulling out the nasty gore and exposing it to daylight, so we can address the core problem and move on as quickly as possible.
So…
I am struggling with my current client. The lead is… um challenging. Let me give you a bit of background.
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It looks like I’ll be going back into the field when I return from vacation. Honestly, I’ve run out of tasks to keep me busy at the office and I don’t like make-work tasks. I don’t mind handing them out to other people 
, but I hate coming up with things for myself. I don’t create from scratch. I solve problems. Present me with a problem and I’ll find a solution. That isn’t the same things as someone who can come up with problems we didn’t realize we had and find new solutions. I’m not the pie-in-the-sky idea man. I’m more of the grimy fix-it dude.
Anyway, I like books. I love books. This can be a problem. 1) I almost always have one, possibly two, maybe even three reference books in my laptop bag. Carrying around these books gets very heavy. Hard on my body when they are strapped to my back. Hard on my gear. 2) The woman poo-poos my reference book collection. I have a large rolling cart jamb-packed full of books in the office closet. I removed the bar for clothes and rolled in my cart. 3) Airlines charge by the pound. If I don’t take 3 or 4 big books with me, our travel gear would be considerably lighter. 4) Ad-nausuem.
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Good Enough
Hi. My name is <withheld> and I have a coding problem. I’m an obsessive/compulsive programmer. For every feature request, I can think of 5, No 10! (so-called) improvements.
You say you need a knife to cut a tomato. I think Swiss Army knife with a saw, scissors, tweezers, multiple screwdrivers, leather reamer (yes I’ve actually used it for its intended purpose), can/bottle openers (including wine) and oh yeah a couple blade that could cut up your boring tomato.
Am I thinking ahead?
Am I simply showing off?
Am I getting my nerd on?
Am I ignoring the needs of my users so I can mentally masturbate?
Is there any real difference in any of these questions?
Let the war in my head begin…
Yes. I mean, No! I’d never do that. Well, maybe I would. But it’s cool.
So how does it end?
How do I find the disciple to develop a widget that is good enough without anything extra?
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An architecture astronauts that is?
As I said yesterday, I’m spending some time to studying design patterns. I’m ears deep in research on MVC which has led me to MVP and beyond. I’ve got some nasty code tightly bound to a WinForms UI. I want elegance and flexibility. What I have is neither.
So…
It is time to refactor. Read more…
After a relaxing weekend, I had a terrible night last night. All of the pets are in ‘spring-mode.’ The dog wouldn’t lay down. The kitten was racing through the bedroom and the pushiest of our cats decided that I was paying enough attention to her… at 4 am. Needless to say, I didn’t get much sleep last night. Read more…
I couldn’t sleep last night. I worked in the garage until after 23:30, then spent time installing new parts on the master bathroom shower. It was after 00:30 when I finally crawled into bed. Then I couldn’t sleep. I read for a while, which didn’t help. I learned about the “Query Pattern” and that got me thinking about some development I’ve been working on for the last couple weeks. I laid in bed ‘thinking’ until about 02 when I got up to play Peggle until 03:30. Read more…
