Jason's Development Blog

 Universities love documentation in their Computer Science courses. I once got 100% on a piece of coursework in no short part because I provided 60 pages of documentation. (autogenerated from comments).

Here’s a little tid-bit: Documentation is a dying art. Universities are way behind. Using TDD, with massive function names and tests to document your code and how it should be used, is the way the industry is going, has been going for the last 10 years and continues to be going. Even large parts of game development, often dismissed as “not possible to test drive”, are being test driven (because the dismissers are wrong, and large parts of game programming can be test driven).

But most universities pay a small lip-service to tests and unit testing, it gets mentioned, you write one for your coursework, it vanishes into the great nether. This is wrong.

Computer Science Students are completely unprepared for industry, and the lack of current practices such as Agile Development and Test Driven Design being taught in Universities is definitely one of the reasons for this.

The option placement year is not optional for anyone at University who wants to work as a Software Developer. It’s the only exposure to modern Software Development they’ll get during their time at University. Because the University sure as heck isn’t going to teach them.

Quote of the Day
“By education most have been misled.”
John Dryden, The Hind and Panther, Part III, line 389.

So….Hello! Yeeeah, been awhile huh? Well what’s changed? Well, I have a job for one. A Paid Internship to be exact. I’m almost like a real software developer. Also I’m being introduced to a world of professional techniques like Test Driven Development, which is pretty darn neat and why have I never used it before? Why do universities not try and teach this? You’re hardly prepared for the industry if you do nothing in common with the industry. And that’s a good summary of university education.

On the plus side, I shall has much monies soon. And the work there is definitely interesting, with many Agile Software Development techniques to develop the cutting edge software so I’m learning a lot of practical, real world tricks of the trade.

On the down side, I don’t have much time for other things like personal projects or sleeping until noon. I do so miss sleeping until noon.

Quote of the Day
“When the last days were upon me, and the ugly trifles of existence began to drive me to madness like the small drops of water torturers let fall ceaselessly upon one spot of their victim’s body, I loved the irradiate refuge of sleep. In my dreams I found a little of the beauty I had vainly sought in life, and wandered through old gardens and enchanted woods.”
Ex Oblivione – H.P. Lovecraft