LIDA, despite the fact that it is built using Microsoft Access for an engine, is truly the product of a computer programmer. And, as you may have learned, most computer programmers aren’t “normal folks.”
Alan Cooper, in his book, “The Inmates Are Running the Asylum,” calls programmer types homo logicus, meaning they have a different way of thinking and looking at the world than most others. What is perfectly logical to a homo logicus type person frequently causes the rest of the world to scratch their heads and wonder, “What were they thinking?”
There are a number of downsides to being a homo logicus computer programmer, but one of the upsides is the tendency to always look for better ways of doing things, quicker ways, more efficient ways.
This tendency is one I have, honed by more than 35 years of writing computer programs, and it has come in tremendously handy as I built LIDA.
People who are just getting started as computer programmers (and sadly, many who won’t evolve their skills) tend to write what they need only when they need it, and they stick it into their code wherever they happen to be at the time. The result is something veteran programmers refer to as “spaghetti code.”
I admit, I did this myself as I was getting started. But it wasn’t long until I needed to do something and remembered, “I already DID this! I need to just reuse it rather than write it again.” So I would copy and paste and feel good that I didn’t have to rewrite it. But again it wasn’t long until I got tired of that and started using what I call in this posting “Code Chunks.”This means that now, whenever I need to add something to the program I’m writing, one of my first questions to myself is, “Is there any possibility I will need to use this again?” If the answer to this is Yes or even Maybe, then I will take that thing I’m adding, and put it aside, in a code chunk, and where I need it to go in my program, instead of copying and pasting, all I have to do is tell the program “go use that code chunk” and boom. Done.
For those of you who have done any programming, one of the ways I might tell my program to do this is to write:
Call BuildSQLString()
and the program knows to go use that code chunk at that place in the program.
There were BIG DIVIDENDS from using this approach, and I’ve been able to realize those dividends in many places in building LIDA. One of those dividends paid off in yesterday’s upgrade to version 0.10.007.The upgrade in question involved changing the Query Results display from a read-only display to an editable display. Because I used the chunk-based approach, this upgrade took me only about 12 minutes to implement, and another 30 minutes to test and tweak and get running.
If I’d had to re-program all that from scratch, it would have taken several days.
That’s just one illustration of why I work the way I do, why I do code chunking, and why I’m worth all the big bucks nobody is paying me these days. (Grin!)This Chunk Programming approach is also applicable to many other areas of life. How? Simply ask yourself, with everything you do, “Is there a possibility that in the future I might need this again?” and if the answer is Yes or even Maybe, then ask, “How can I do it this time that will make it easier or even unnecessary next time?”
That’s what I do, and you might consider it as well.