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by MatthewPhillips 4883 days ago
That's the problem with soft-coding, you trick yourself into believing that modifying a configuration file is not modifying code, but it is. It's code that isn't compiled, isn't regression tested.

As far as re-shipping, nearly every language nowadays has a method for automatic updates. Here is what Chrome uses: https://code.google.com/p/omaha/
2 comments
bunderbunder 4883 days ago
It's absolutely modifying code.

But it's modifying code that your support team is allowed to modify in the field. By contrast, depending on the business policies in place any code that has to go through a compiler might also have to go through meetings, reviews, QA testing, a release cycle, IT department scheduling, acceptance testing, blah blah blah.

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jedbrown 4882 days ago
By this logic, every user is "programming" when they change their facebook account settings or configure the appearance of their desktop. Call it what you want, but configuration via "config files" of some sort (perhaps managed by a GUI) is a totally different beast from modifying 'main'.
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