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List: ruby-talk
Subject: Re: unit testing advice
From: marc <gmane () auxbuss ! com>
Date: 2008-08-02 20:19:59
Message-ID: MPG.22fedfd738cf52f989b5c () news ! gmane ! org
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David A. Black said...
> On Sun, 3 Aug 2008, James Britt wrote:
> > David A. Black wrote:
> >> In fact, one question that has come to intrigue me recently is the
> >> question of whether there are any active programmers who have
> >> literally written code test-first from the time they first learned how
> >> to program onward. I suspect the answer is no -- and if that's the
> >> case, it means that there is no evidence for the position that it's
> >> always, automatically bad to write code without a test.
> >
> >
> > Has anyone ever seen a Learn To Program or Learn Language Blub book that did
> > TDD? I doubt such a thing exists. Instead, people are shown code,
> > encouraged to write code, then (in so many words) told that what they were
> > shown and told is not the right way to code. On the other hand, having a
> > unit test for the 1-liner helloworld.rb seems massively goofy.
>
> The thing is, all the people who argue that testing first is the right
> way to code did not themselves learn to code that way. That doesn't
> prove or disprove anything, but it does make me wonder whether
> teaching someone test methodology right out of the starting gate is
> demonstrably the best way to go about teaching someone programming. I
> tend to think it isn't, though I also think that there are good and
> bad ways to introduce testing into the mix (the best way probably
> being to present it as essentially what they've been doing all along,
> but more structured; and the worst way being the "OK, the fun is over,
> now let's get serious" stuff).
I started on coding sheets. We wrote tests first. We used to
"desk check" our code too. We had to, it might take a couple of days to
get the cards punched before getting one, perhaps two, compilations per
day. I'm in my forties, so this is ancient, but not prehistoric history.
That said, I lean towards what David is saying, that it's a skill to be
learned after experimenting/playing with code. After all, we all learn
to speak before we write. And being able to write well takes a lot more
skill than simply being able to write what we say.
--
Cheers,
Marc
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