[thelist] What's a Programmer To Do?

Jack Timmons jorachim at gmail.com
Sun Apr 5 21:21:00 CDT 2009


On Sun, Apr 5, 2009 at 7:19 PM, Martin Burns <martin at easyweb.co.uk> wrote:

> Which is quicker: write a (eg) login system from scratch, or take one
> off the shelf?


Your example isn't a good one, since a login system is pretty easy to do
anyway ;)

But, my stance is more on developing your own framework and tools.


> Which is more likely to be mature: the system that you've knocked up
> in a few days, or the one that's had thousands of days, and hundreds
> of implementations behind it?
>
> Where's your time better spent: understanding the client and doing
> customisations to a system that's 80+% there already, or building bog-
> standard functionality from scratch?
>

Using a system thousands of people have access to, so not only are they
(hopefully) fixing vulnerabilities, but (more than likely) looking to find
methods of exploiting them. Giving the customer a bloated piece of software
that they're only really using a small percentage of?
Just playing devils advocate, as you did previously. Really, this whole
debate is nothing more than a war on preference. Ultimately, the coder's
best bet lies in going with what they're best at, and trying to continually
improve themselves.

-- 
-Jack Timmons
http://www.trotlc.com
Twitter: @codeacula



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