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Civility in critiquing the ideas of others is no vice. Rudeness in defending your own ideas is no virtue.


Philip Storry takes me to task (or "Rich Text 2.0")
Wed 25 Oct 2006, 08:18 AM
Last night, I wrote of using code that had last been saved and compiled eight years ago, and I confess I was somewhat proud of the upward compatibility and stability of both Notes and our Midas Rich Text LSX.  In a comment, Philip Storry directed me back to his blog for So many wasted opportunities..., where he sets me straight about the missed opportunities that are implied by this.  I'll save the best quote for you to read there, but one excerpt I like is:
If Ben did need to change the code, his complete lack of familiarity would be a major problem. Reliant upon comments that made sense at the time, and vague documentation that relies upon assumptions common before the liberating experience of developing with Buzzword 2.0, Ben will be lost if he ever does need to change this code.

He'll have his own little Y2K moment, except he'll also have to face the horror that HE is the COBOL programmer he needs to hire!
A great read, and I feel properly chastened.

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Upward compatibility
Wed 25 Oct 2006, 12:07 AM
I was working on the rich text comparison issues I mentioned yesterday, and I noticed something that made me rub my eyes and check twice.  The standard Review It! sample database we use to show off red-lining has been around for a long time.  In fact, see the image below:

Design elements from 1998

The standard agent for use in the sample is the Process Standard Comparisons with UI, and it was last modified and saved in October 1998, eight years ago. 

That bears repeating.  Eight years ago.  It was compiled in the fairly new Notes R4.6 using Midas 1.51, and is now running without any problems in ND7.0.2  using Midas 3.61. Three full releases of the Notes/Domino family and two full releases of the Midas Rich Text LSX product line.  Of course, the Midas Version 1.51 code itself would not handle the complex structures added in R5 and ND6, but the agent was compiled in that version and just keeps working.  We test each sample db for each release of Notes and each release of Midas, but we don't bother to recompile if we don't have to, and I guess with this one, we never had to.  That is upward compatibility.

Maybe it is just me, but I find that amazing.

Copyright © 2006 Genii Software Ltd.

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