[asveikau]

I generally like her writing when I come across it, but I disagree with that one.

Good programmers are humans and make mistakes, of course. However, that doesn't mean good programmers don't exist or that people can't vary a lot in skill or average quality of output.

She is correct that starting with some notion of "good people" is no silver bullet. But the conclusion that "we all suck", I hope that is hyperbole, because it isn't true. (Or maybe: everybody sucks a little bit differently.)

[Tempest1981]

I interpreted her point as, "don't be overconfident or arrogant", such that you think that everyone else sucks. That you're too good to "lower" yourself to everyone else's level.

[lugg]

Yea, I find this take on my post odd.

I am the first person to understand developers are far from perfect, my self included. But it's just code, you can refactor and learn from mistakes.

The thing I don't buy is that this stuff is difficult or that you can't expect good behavior from professionals.

Avoiding side effects, or pushing them out to the edge where reasoning about them is clear is something you should have been taught when you got your expensive piece of paper.

Likewise, avoiding, mutation, over abstraction, early optimisation, and variable reuse are all really basic shit you need to understand, if you're not hiring for these basic qualities, what the fuck are you hiring for? Good looks?