Use weird tests to capture tacit knowledge

Re:Use weird tests to capture tacit knowledge by adql on Wednesday March 20, 2024 @08:46AM (#39765670)

> The perfect solution to this problem is creating a script that automatically adds a new app to all the relevant places and stuffing it into a Justfile, but that's a pretty big piece of work that requires thought and error handling and a whole slew of other stuff. Instead, it's comparatively easy to just capture these constraints in a test:

Just write the goddamn script. You can put comments in that too. Not saying it shouldn't have tests but the solution to bunch of steps that need to be done always, and in same, easy to automate way is not "make sure the checklist is always there so other people waste the optimum amount of time on it".

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Re:Use weird tests to capture tacit knowledge by contr-error on Wednesday March 20, 2024 @09:03AM (#39765849)

Another thing that came to mind: do-nothing scripting[0].

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29083367

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Re:Use weird tests to capture tacit knowledge by giraffe_lady on Wednesday March 20, 2024 @03:22PM (#39770903)

But then no one adds an app for a few months, during which the requirements change but the script isn't updated. Then it fails and someone who wasn't there when it was written is off in the weeds trying to sherlock the reason this thing exists in the first place and how to update it, making their minor change seem much larger & riskier to reviewers. Or worse it doesn't fail, but the incomplete run introduces a defect no one is looking for.

You simply can't make judgements about what should be done to a codebase from a distance in the abstract like this. Sometimes you should write the script, sometimes you shouldn't. You need specific knowledge of the circumstances to exercise good judgement about it which we certainly don't have from this comment section.

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