PragPub 2010-04: Issue #10 by The Pragmatic Bookshelf

Author:The Pragmatic Bookshelf
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: PragPub—Monthly Magazine
Publisher: The Pragmatic Bookshelf, LLC
Published: 2010-04-01T04:00:00+00:00

find the cause,

fix the problem.

It seems easy, doesn’t it? Yet the steps aren’t always easy to follow.

Easily Reproduce The Problem

If you can’t reproduce the problem easily, how can you ever be sure that the problem is fixed? And then how can you be guaranteed that your fix worked? Would you bet your job that you fixed a problem that you were not able to reproduce? Probably not.

And note that I said “easily.” If it takes you a day or even an hour to set up your application to the state where the bug occurs, then that isn’t “easy.” Sure, it can take you a day or two to do your first reproduction, but after that it shouldn’t take more than 5-10 minutes to do it again. This is important, because you will be doing this over and over again when you finally get to fixing the problem.

Sometimes disciplining yourself to start by reproducing the problem is difficult. And yes, when you are called at home at 2:30 in the morning, maybe a Band-Aid is what is needed. But when you get to the office, after getting your cup of caffeine you should try to reproduce the problem with the pre-Band-Aided code. That way you see if your Band-Aid is a permanent fix, or (hopefully) you will see something better to do.

Note that in my story above, that’s the first thing that I did. Before opening the code base, I went to see if I could reproduce the problem.

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