BASIC

Posted in Articles on Dec 13 2011


A case study on why you shouldn't put BASIC code in your email:

From: Ray
To: All
Subject: in late tomorrow

All, 

10 GOTO Subject
20 PRINT "I am going to be " + Subject
30 END 

Thanks,

Ray

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From: John

Line 20- is never reached, optimized out.

Perhaps you mean gosub?

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From: Eric

I detect an infinite loop:

- read the subject
- read "All,"
- read line 10
- goto the subject
- read the subject
- ...

and as we all know: recursion is preferable to side-effect based looping.

(def read-email [email]
  (read-subject email)
  (read-email email))

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From: Ray

Re-factored with apologies: 

10 Subject == getConfig(Email[Subject])
20 PRINT "I am going to be " + Subject
30 IF getConfig(Email[TO]).RespondedToThisEmail
40     PRINT "You took this way too seriously - now the email will never end"
50     GOTO 40
60 ENDIF
70 END

Thanks,

Ray 

==================================================================================

From: Dave

Did this message go through an E & A?

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From: Eric

Why are we writing code without tests?

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From: John

At least it’s going through PQA.

==================================================================================

From: John

But will it have two ship its before tomorrow?

==================================================================================

From: Ray

I am so glad that you all are so interested in my project!  In order to move
forward more efficiently, I have created a wiki page to continue to track the
progress: 

http://devwiki.../Basic_In_Late_Email

Please feel free to add yourself and comments to the page going forward.


Thanks,

Ray 

==================================================================================

From: Dave

It's kind of scary how far outside the process this project has gotten in such a
short time. We really need to reign this in.

For example, I'm assigned to setting up an E & A, and I can't help but notice we
have no story cards for this project. We really need to get those cards written
(let's think in MMF's here, gang).

Oh, and Jackie, we'll need to get a Kanban board set up ASAP.

I think we're all agreed that we'll do a review of what Ray has already done
followed by a retro on Friday.

==================================================================================

From: Eric

Is this part of an Impact Area? Should we even be doing this without executive
oversight?

==================================================================================

From: Davin

Good point Eric.

This project is of core importance to this company, and we should give weighty
consideration to forming 2 oversight committees and a special impact area for
this. I'm also wondering if we can earmark any of this for an innovation grant
to help offset the cost to us. Marketing needs to weigh in...

That's really quite funny.


Published Dec 13 2011 - Permalink


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