Porting software
Here's some things I've learnt of the last few weeks porting an ASP application over to PHP and open source tools.
• Always make sure that what you're trying to port is well documented. Don't expect to be able to read the code and know what's going on, what database tables interact or what the original designer was thinking. If there's no design documentation from when the application was originally developed, you'll proabably have trouble :( Note: printing the source code is a good idea, but again, it's no supplement for real documentation.
• Allow much more time than you expect. Much more.
• Ensure your development environment can handle both the original and the intended codebase. It's not a good idea to port Windows software if you only run Linux :( VMware or VNC, while suitable for short-term assignments really don't cut it when they make up 50% of the development environment. It'll make you pissed off, and avoid the work. Likewise, have a clean work environment (desk) too.
• Have a steady supply of Red Bulls, and even more importantly, an understanding girl/boy/life friend. Repeated late nights (especially near the deadline) means they go to bed on their own, and that's not good for either of the parties involved. Bed is so much nicer than a laptop, especially at 3:30AM. It's even nicer when you have a pretty waiting for you.
• Be sure to stretch every few hours, or you will cease up. The only solution then is to spray yourself with WD-40, which can get the laptop messy.
• Don't procrastonate on your 'blog when you should be coding, unless it's a well needed rest from bloody Response.Write function calls.
What’s documentation?
I think it’s kind of like replying to blogs? But with a bit more humour, and a bit less usefulness.
It’s “seize” not “cease” :)
Hale, surely by now you know Matt has the entry editing skills of a blindfolded corpse :)
When used in that context, it means “cease moving through seizure.”
“..especially at 3:30AM. It’s even nicer when you have a pretty waiting for you..”
I’m sure when you slump into bed at 3.30am it aint gonna be “pretty”, chances are you will wake her up and she’s going to be grumpy as she has to work the next day early.
If you go to bed @ 3:30am do you still get up @ 7?
I’d rather be working at 7 then 3:30 is all :P
I find wikis are awesome for documentation as long as people use a basic format and their brains. Mediawiki is an awesome free one setup on windows in about 5 mins even (although developed and runs on LAMP - see I know OSS stuff :P)
I must admit personally I’m dissapointed with our documentation strategies at work. We just hired a PM from a government superannuation place and he said they could often have 4 lines or even 4 pages of docs per line of code !! And 63 test environments before it got live… bit extreme but we have: 0, 0 :P