Re: FN-FORUM: Programmers (was:- iframes)

date posted 14th May 2007 22:41

> How do you know who is a better programmer? DO qualifications count over
> time spent, or balance between the two. What about professional body
> membership like the BCS, does that offer any valid guarantees? Or is it
> still a case of recommendations?

According to "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" the answer is
that qualifications mean very little on their own. You need to find
someone who cares about the quality of their work. As we know, anyone can
knock up a reasonable-looking website that works in IE, but it takes
experience and care to make a high-quality site that works whatever is
thrown at it.

A good programmer will be someone who can (a) learn new ideas quickly, and
(b) can trouble-shoot and fix bugs quickly and reliably. Perhaps another
way of putting it is that it's understanding and wisdom that's important,
not just knowledge.

[P.S. anyone else intrigued by the similarities in the idea of Quality as
discussed in "Zen..." and "The Timeless Way of Building ", part of the
"Pattern Language" trilogy by Christopher Alexander?]

Cheers!

Anthony - B.Eng (hons), Mechanical Engineering (Soton) ;)
--
www.fonant.com - Quality web sites