[samograd]

> and all the effort you will do is configure and glue stuff together

I've been assigned to my first Java project at work, and during training they would show how much you could do without 'coding'. I guess editing XML files and inserting program code in the strings of said XML files isn't technically 'coding', where I guess 'coding' means writing scary Java code with, you know, type checking and relvant error messages and stuff. Why I need to be able to redefine the class name of our 'beans' internal to the working of our system using a user editable configuration file is beyond me.

/rant

[pfarrell]

Oof! I dealt with a SASL and CAS system that had much of its flow control built into XML strings. Yeah, you may not have to "compile" things, but you end up with a system where everything is a runtime exception. I believe this style of coding was referred to as "inner platform effect" by Martin Fowler.

Glad that I'm far from that project now.

[samograd]

Inner-platform effect: A system so customizable as to become a poor replica of the software development platform

Source: http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Introduction_to_Software_Engine...

[MaysonL]

Sort of a poor man's Greenspun's tenth rule…

[see http://philip.greenspun.com/research/]