How large a role does subjectiveness play in programming?

Question

I often read about the importance of readability and maintainability. Or, I read very strong opinions about which syntax features are bad or good. Or discussions about the values of certain paradigms, like OOP.

Aside from that, this same question floats about in my mind whenever I read debates on SO or Meta about subjective questions. Or read questions about best practices and sometimes find myself or others disagreeing.

What role does subjectiveness play within the programming realm?

Sometimes I think it plays a large role. Software developers are engineers in a way, but also people. A large part of programming is dealing with code that's human readable. This is very different from Math or Physics or other disciplines with very exact and structured rules. Here the exact structure and rules are largely up in the air, changeable on a whim, and hence the amount of languages in existence. And one person may find one language very readable, and another person may find their own language the most comforting.

The same with practices. One person may not like certain accepted practices. I myself find splitting classes into different files very unreadable, for instance.

But, I can't say rules haven't helped in general. Certain practices have and do make life easier. And new languages have given rise to syntax and structure that make life easier. There's certainly been a progression towards code that is easier to read and maintain even given a largely diverse group of people. So maybe these things aren't as subjective as I thought.

It reminds me, in a way, of UI design. Certainly it's subjective, but then there's an entire discipline involved in crafting good UI and it tends to work.

Is there something non-subjective about the ideas behind maintainability, readability, and other best practices? Is there something tangible to grasp when one develops a new language or thinks of new practices?

Answer 1

Arguably your question is really about the distinction between programming, which is mathematical, algorithmic and scientific, and software engineering, which is subjective, variable and human-focused.

Great programmers are not necessarily great software engineers, and vice versa. The two skillsets, while not exclusive by any means, have less overlap than they appear at first. Their relative importance depends a lot on the project: a brilliant programmer working alone can turn out amazing examples of technical genius, and it doesn't matter that nobody else can understand or maintain it, because he's not going to share the code anyway. But move into an enterprise environment -- like corporate in-house software development -- and I'll gladly trade you ten "cave troll" geniuses for a mediocre programmer who understands the importance of readability and documentation.

It's been my experience that the world needs great software engineers more than it needs great programmers. Relatively few people in this day and age are writing software which is truly performance-critical (OS kernels, compilers, graphics engines, realtime embedded systems, etc), and the Internet allows mediocre programmers to quickly grab algorithmic solutions for problems they couldn't solve alone. But nearly everyone writing professional code has to work within a team. And team productivity rises and falls dramatically on the ability of its members to communicate effectively and distribute workload efficiently, two skills which are highly subjective and impossible to prove by rigid formula.

Most software engineering principles are built on experience rather than objective law. Much like the social sciences, we study, learn, adapt and apply -- but with no real guarantees of outcome. All we can say is that some things seem to work better than others in most groups.

Answer 2

I think, a lot of it is necessarily determined by how much our mind is able to process at one time. So it comes down to how much the language and tools enable a team or a developer to break down the problem into chunks that are meaningful by themselves, but not so large that it becomes too hard to grasp them. The common theme is the art of organizing information (in this case, the code, the logic, ...) But that's not so different from Maths or Physics, by the way.

Answer 3

It all depends on your point of view :-)

But to answer your questions, I think one way to view subjectivity is to recognize that software languages, tools, and best practices are a shared means of communication among individuals. Yes, a programming language is a formal way of instructing a computer how to behave, but a programming language may also be viewed as a way to define and communicate specifications to a high level of detail (the code is the ultimate spec, is it not?).

So as far as we may want to concern ourselves with the degree of subjectivity in software languages, tools, and best practices, I would say that the lack of subjectivity may indicate how well communication is facilitated.

Yes, individuals have certain proclivities that are expressed in their habits and tendencies, but that should not ultimately matter too much in the perfect platform for development.

Answer 4

Just as the best authors borrow from many styles, the best programmers keep a huge range of patterns in their mental arsenal. Slavishly following a few patterns and adhering to some absolute truth is both lazy and dangerous.

Put it another way, the day we rely on robots for code review is the day I quit.

Answer 5

Turning to my Maths PhD wife I asked if there's any subjectivity in mathematics. Her answer is yes there is, mainly in the way we as humans achieve the answer.

If a mathematical proof is the result, how you get to that result can vary. If the dataset is large you may need to use a computer, which can introduce errors, and thus debated about whether that is the right approach. Or sometimes mathematicians can disagree on the theory - one is trying to prove that x is true while the other is trying to prove that x is false.

I think the same thing exists in computer science. A correct answer is a program that runs correctly, but that definition of correct may be different for each project. Sometimes correct means no bugs. Sometimes it means running efficiently.

From here programmers can argue how best to achieve the "correct" result. A good example of this is is the FizzBuzz application. A simple answer would be just a for loop, but Enterprise FizzBuzz is also "correct" in that it produces the correct answer, but is generally laughed at as "bad" engineering due to its overcomplication of the idea (it was a joke app after all).

How large a role does subjectiveness play in programming? I'd say it's a very large part of what we do, simply because we are human, and because there are multiple ways of getting the "correct" answer so there is disagreement over which way is the best.

Answer 6

Studies have been done showing that certain practices reduce defect rates in software. For instance, a study found a strong correlation between cyclomatic complexity and the probability of being fault-prone. Other studies show the average effectiveness of design and code inspections are 55 and 60 percent. So it appears to be in our best interests to favor simplicity, check metrics, and do code reviews.

We're talking probabilities here, though. If I review your code, I'm not guaranteed to find 60% of your bugs. There are also few absolutes in software development; experienced developers know that the correct answer is generally "it depends." That said, there are a number of practices with objective data in their favor.