Re:Generics in Go with Ian Lance Taylor (2019)
by hinkley on Tuesday February 18, 2020 @07:21PM
(#22361866)
The way I like to describe it from a systems or operations perspective is this:
Slow (or flaky) build processes create gamblers. You don't want people gambling with prod.
When it's expensive (time or attention) to verify your work, people start lying to themselves. They tell themselves they've done enough, or that red test or wrong data on the screen is "just a glitch", and you know they do this because when they get caught breaking stuff they will tell you the same thing they told themselves.
The progression that works is this:
You make the tool.
You make the tool reliable.
You make the tool straightforward.
You make the tool cheap.
You make the tool mandatory.
People keep skipping step 4 and thinking rhetoric (even verbal abuse) will save them. If you meet idiots all day...
Slow (or flaky) build processes create gamblers. You don't want people gambling with prod.
When it's expensive (time or attention) to verify your work, people start lying to themselves. They tell themselves they've done enough, or that red test or wrong data on the screen is "just a glitch", and you know they do this because when they get caught breaking stuff they will tell you the same thing they told themselves.
The progression that works is this:
You make the tool.
You make the tool reliable.
You make the tool straightforward.
You make the tool cheap.
You make the tool mandatory.
People keep skipping step 4 and thinking rhetoric (even verbal abuse) will save them. If you meet idiots all day...