Write comments that explain why the code isn’t obvious just by reading it. Why did you do things the long way? What did you need to work around? Why didn’t you do the thing that anyone reading the code would expect you to do?

Also write comments that explain the purpose of the functions you use, in case the names of those functions don’t make it clear on their own.

APL is Ithkuil.

The fact that the loop is doing “find first driver matching these strange criteria” seems most obviously obscured by the pattern of assigning a value, then killing the loop or not. This strikes me as the part that makes the algorithm tedious to test, since it forces us to use a collection to test the intricacies of the inner conditions.

Once we isolate “find first driver matching condition” from computing the condition for each driver, I consider the rest a question of personal taste. Specification pattern, composition of filters, something like that. Whatever you find easier to follow.

Tried a Typematrix. At the time, I was a roving freelancer who frequently worked with other people at their machines, so I decided that it was safer to stick with a conventional layout.

Having Enter on the thumb was interesting, but I never got used to it.

I think you’re using the word “work” here to mean what I’m intentionally calling “job”. Maybe not, but if you are, then I agree with you.

Most people want to produce things of value (for some personally held meaning of value) and to do things that matter to others or to be of service. It’s this sense of “work” that I mean. If we stripped away all the conditioning that I infer you mean, I believe this sense of wanting to work would remain for those who aren’t already burned out or depressed.

But yes, there is certainly some religious and irreligious indoctrination to believe in toil as a virtue. I don’t buy it.

Most people like to work. Few want a job. This is not hard.

Wow. I love that story and I’m glad nobody was hurt.

I wonder whether that happened as a result of unexpected behavior by the pitching machine or an incorrect assumption about the pitching machine in that coworker’s tests.

I find this story compelling because it illustrates the points about managing risk and the limits of testing, but it doesn’t sound like the typical story that’s obviously hyperbole and could never happen to me.

Thank you for sharing it.

This seems to happen quite often when programmers try to save time when writing tests, instead of writing very simple tests and allowing the duplication to accumulate before removing it. I understand how they feel: they see the pattern and want to skip the boring parts.

No worries. If you skip the boring parts, then much of the time you’ll be less bored, but sometimes this will happen. If you want to avoid this, then you’ll have to accept some boredom then refactor the tests later. Maybe never, if your pattern ends up with only two or three instances. If you want to know which path is shorter before you start, then so would I. I can sometimes guess correctly. I mostly never know, because I pick one path and stick with it, so I can never compare.

This also tends to happen when the code they’re testing has painful hardwired dependencies on expensive external resources. The “bug” in the test is a symptom of the design of the production code. Yay! You learned something! Time to roll up your sleeves and start breaking things apart… assuming that you need to change it at all. Worst case, leave a warning for the next person.

If you’d like a simple rule to follow, here’s one: no branching in your tests. If you think you want a branch, then split the tests into two or more tests, then write them individually, then maybe refactor to remove the duplication. It’s not a perfect rule, but it’ll take you far…

I don’t need to win that badly.