Re: The Desktop and the Gnomeprint

[Tom Vogt <tom lemuria org>]

Bowie Poag <bjp@primenet.com> wrote:
> > Should code preceed design?  Or, in other words, should the ability to code
> > something be guaranteed before the design is created?  Or should the ability
> > be postulated and a design generated first?
> 
> I still don't get what you're asking here. Code -IS- design. 

sorry, but I don't agree on that. code is implementation of design.


> > The way I've always thought a UI should be developed is the following:
> > 
> > 1)  Text description and evaluation of desired features
> > 2)  Static Mockup to see if it's visually pleasing/efficient
> > 3)  Unstable code to see if it's worth completing
> > 4)  Completed code
> > 
> 
> Thats really not how a programmer does his work. A programmer sits down
> with a goal in his head, and just begins pounding the anvil, so to speak.

that's not a programmer, but a HACKER. :)

not trying to put anyone down, I've done a lot of software exactly that way.
but there are other projects where I spend the majority of time in the
garden with a pen and a piece of paper. it really depends on what you are
doing and for whom you are doing it.


> A programmer doesn't really sit down with pen and paper and figure out the
> technical odds and ends of HOW hes going to do something -- He just does
> it.

they teach the whole business very differently at the university where I
hope to get my diploma next year. :)


> Sure, its an ideal, to have programmers perform that 4-step Cha-Cha dance,
> but theyre not going to follow it. Programmers are incredibly unique, and
> individualistic workers. To force all of them into a paticular work habit
> is counterproductive. 

that's why we have a discussion list here, don't we? so that people who feel
more inclined to thinking as to programming (at least concerned these
specific points) can do their thinking and let the programmers harvest the
results.


-- 
The universe does not have laws -- it has habits, and habits can be broken.