From hacker to programmer
Completeness
The difference between hacking and developing software might lie in the quality of testing and documenting projects.
A friend of mine who runs a free software consulting business was lamenting that when he asks his engineers if a project is "finished," they often reply "yes." Yet when he goes back to check the work before invoicing the customer, he finds no or inadequate documentation, no evidence of quality checking, and no communication with the developers of the original source code for inclusion of the changes to the software. In short, the work amounts to a quick "hack" instead of a finished work.
Unfortunately, this happens a lot with software developers, and often those who are hired from "the community." Used to working on smaller projects in which "the code is the documentation" or for end users who do not pay a lot of money for working software, they do not have the experience or rigor necessary for larger projects or commercial code production.
With the very best programmers, projects start before the code is written by making sure that the requirements of the customers are well understood. Timelines are written for the work process, which includes time and resources for quality assurance and documentation. Afterward the design is considered, the code is written, and then the "real work" starts.
[...]
Buy Linux Magazine
US / Canada
UK / Australia
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Support Our Work
Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you’ve found an article to be beneficial.
News
-
Linux Hits an Important Milestone
If you pay attention to the news in the Linux-sphere, you've probably heard that the open source operating system recently crashed through a ceiling no one thought possible.
-
Plasma Bigscreen Returns
A developer discovered that the Plasma Bigscreen feature had been sitting untouched, so he decided to do something about it.
-
CachyOS Now Lets Users Choose Their Shell
Imagine getting the opportunity to select which shell you want during the installation of your favorite Linux distribution. That's now a thing.
-
Wayland 1.24 Released with Fixes and New Features
Wayland continues to move forward, while X11 slowly vanishes into the shadows, and the latest release includes plenty of improvements.
-
Bugs Found in sudo
Two critical flaws allow users to gain access to root privileges.
-
Fedora Continues 32-Bit Support
In a move that should come as a relief to some portions of the Linux community, Fedora will continue supporting 32-bit architecture.
-
Linux Kernel 6.17 Drops bcachefs
After a clash over some late fixes and disagreements between bcachefs's lead developer and Linus Torvalds, bachefs is out.
-
ONLYOFFICE v9 Embraces AI
Like nearly all office suites on the market (except LibreOffice), ONLYOFFICE has decided to go the AI route.
-
Two Local Privilege Escalation Flaws Discovered in Linux
Qualys researchers have discovered two local privilege escalation vulnerabilities that allow hackers to gain root privileges on major Linux distributions.
-
New TUXEDO InfinityBook Pro Powered by AMD Ryzen AI 300
The TUXEDO InfinityBook Pro 14 Gen10 offers serious power that is ready for your business, development, or entertainment needs.