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by morgante 852 days ago
I wouldn't put SOLID in the same category as KISS/DRY. The latter are pretty universally understood principles, but I've never used SOLID despite passing dozens of challenging technical interviews and leading teams across startups and Google.

It's jargon from a subculture of enterprise Java, not a universal term.

1 comments

> It's jargon from a subculture of enterprise Java, not a universal term.

The name itself might be, but the principles apply to software development in general. You don't need to memorize the acronym, but saying you've "never used SOLID" isn't the brag you think it is. If you can get past the acronym and understand the actual principles I think you'll find they apply to most software you write. Unless you never have to maintain the software you write, then it's super easy to go a whole career without understanding the SOLID principles. It's the "20 years of experience" vs "20 * 1 year of experience". Folks in the former group generally understand the SOLID principles even if they can't name them. Folks in the latter group will insist they don't apply to the software they've written in their long and storied careers of job hopping.

> You don't need to memorize the acronym, but saying you've "never used SOLID" isn't the brag you think it is.

You said that if "they don't know what SOLID, KISS, and DRY are, are the same candidates who are poor problem solvers."

I've written plenty of maintainable software, but there are whole realms of software outside enterprise OOP. I have 0 interest in memorizing specific jargon.

> I've written plenty of maintainable software

This may very well be true, and I'm not saying it is not true, but after working in software for multiple decades, I can tell you that many developers think they are much better than they actually are.

> I have 0 interest in memorizing specific jargon.

This isn't about memorizing jargon. It's about understanding the basics of enterprise software development. It is no more "memorizing jargon" than knowing the difference between private and public interfaces. Do you study and memorize the definitions of private and public methods in order to pass an interview? Of course you don't--this is something you know by virtue of having written production software.

I would be hard pressed that you would even consider spending more time interviewing candidate who can't tell you the difference between private and public methods. "Tell me about SOLID, KISS, and DRY" is another question in the same bucket of fast screening questions.

> This isn't about memorizing jargon. It's about understanding the basics of enterprise software development.

Google3 is one of the biggest repositories of enterprise software in the world.

I've been in dozens of engineering design reviews and SOLID has literally never come up.

> Do you study and memorize the definitions of private and public methods in order to pass an interview?

There's a pretty major distinction: public and private methods are part of the language.

SOLID is a set of buzzwords invented by a random influencer and propagated through a subculture. I glanced at them quickly and the principles seem generally sound, but I wouldn't interview based on knowing them by name.

Does Linus Torvalds use SOLID?

Probably a better programmer than you. Do you know who is Linus Torvalds?

Do you even have a Putnam?