Why Edit & Continue is a bad thing

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TrackBack — Fri, 15 Oct 2004 21:49:00 GMT

re: Why Edit & Continue is a bad thing

secretGeek — Thu, 01 Jul 2004 07:20:00 GMT

it's always a laugh reading this entry and the various comments. I've bookmarked it so i can come back every few months.

cheers :+)

re: Why Edit & Continue is a bad thing

Frans Bouma — Sat, 19 Jun 2004 08:05:00 GMT

"E&C is an invaluable part of programming. "
Proof it. This is just a claim.

"Both as an educational tool, and for debugging in the sense you refer to it. "
Educational tool perhaps but if you want a good educational tool, you need a tool especially made for education. For debugging as I refer to it, I don't see it as an invaluable tool as I state that the cases in where you CAN USE E&C are pretty slim.

"E&C was on of the major contributing factors in VB/C++ success, as it enabled non-experts such as yourself, rapidly develop applications."
Proof it, again a claim.
C++ success was not based on E&C, ever used it in C++? In a regular application with a few thousand lines and a couple of subprojects?

Oh and I'm not a non-expert, Eric.

"It sounds like you're a pretty hard core .NET'er"
Well, after my CS graduation I have now done 10 years of professional software development.

"so surely you're a stanger how rapid development work in the real world. "
Perhaps you should open your eyes and read about what I do for 'rapid development work' before again, claiming something.

"I've found .NET's (CLR) inabilty to E&C the major limiting factor in enterprise usage uptake... "
Based on what? Java is the no.1 platform in enterprise computing. AFAIK it doesn't have E&C, never had, never will.

"to think that it's only use is to enable lesser programmers to debug by trial and error is a purely elitest perspective. and for stating, you've made an ass out of yourself. "
Oh really? Perhaps I try to tell people how they REALLY should debug their software so they are more productive and know more knowledge. I already know a lot of that through years of experience. Others don't. That you see it as an elitist perspective is your problem, not mine. Btw, you think I'm a non-expert, a retart, a stranger to how it goes in the real world... and *I* am the elitist here? :D.

"As Ron (Above) noted, if the code is that same in the end, and it takes less time, then it's better."
IF it takes less time, then yes. No-one has proved it will take less time with E&C.

re: Why Edit & Continue is a bad thing

Eric Schleicher — Fri, 18 Jun 2004 23:00:00 GMT

As a long time business application developer (read not academic programmer) E&C is an invaluable part of programming. Both as an educational tool, and for debugging in the sense you refer to it. E&C was on of the major contributing factors in VB/C++ success, as it enabled non-experts such as yourself, rapidly develop applications. It sounds like you're a pretty hard core .NET'er... so surely you're a stanger how rapid development work in the real world. I've found .NET's (CLR) inabilty to E&C the major limiting factor in enterprise usage uptake...

to think that it's only use is to enable lesser programmers to debug by trial and error is a purely elitest perspective. and for stating, you've made an ass out of yourself.

As Ron (Above) noted, if the code is that same in the end, and it takes less time, then it's better.

what a 'tard!

re: Why Edit & Continue is a bad thing

Ron Barone — Tue, 11 May 2004 20:38:00 GMT

Here's the deal. Back in the early part of the 1960, 70's and 80's processing power was scheduled for things like compiling etc. This is where edit and continue woudlnt work, and wouldnt be nearly as efficient. The code SHOULD be thought out before even attempting a compile, becuase when there was an error a day was spent and time was wasted on a 'stupid' typo.

I have been coding for quite some time, and consider myself a good engineer. There are times when E&C shouldnt be used, but you put me up against another coder with the same exp. not using E&C I will develop it faster.

Everyone has to remember that opinions about not using E&C ARE OPINIONS. They dont apply to everyone, but they do apply to you.

In the end if the code is the same, and it took less time using E&C (which it will if used correctly), E&C should be used. That's not an opinion that's a fact.

re: Why Edit & Continue is a bad thing

Benjol — Wed, 24 Mar 2004 11:08:00 GMT

I'm afraid I would side with RichB on this one, the issue here is not so much to do with E&C as with the time it takes for VS.Net to pick itself up off the floor when you stop the debugger. This is why E&C is useful, but only for the typos, I agree - but these are precisely the 'easy' bugs that you want to waste the least possible time on, so that you can get on to the 'real' bugs.

re: Why Edit & Continue is a bad thing

Stephen Johnston — Thu, 18 Mar 2004 17:29:00 GMT

Currently I write test harnesses for a lot of my code. I wouldn't mind using edit and continue to unit test the code, before even writing the test harness to allow a tester to test it more thoroughly. In this way, I can focus on the two task seperately. Less confusion, better code, etc.

If you guys are all writing such well planned out code, that you never use any "trial and error" methods.... do you even test your code?

re: Why Edit & Continue is a bad thing

Frans Bouma — Tue, 10 Feb 2004 21:19:00 GMT

You completely missed my argument what debugging is all about. You can jump up and down all day long that E&C is a great thing, but in the end it will blind you for teh real issues about debugging. People who think for 20 seconds, then start debugging can outperform any 'E&C' using person in any occasion.

The only argument I see recurring is that it helps you fix silly typo's. oh, well, I can fix them when I stop the debugger as well and then I know they're corrected. If you do not know if they bug is then fixed, you are using trial and error, and proving my points.

re: Why Edit & Continue is a bad thing

Marco A. Perez — Tue, 10 Feb 2004 21:14:00 GMT

Hey George, you missed one little thing: Edit & Continue IS ALSO PRESENT IN VISUAL C++. While you are debugging, you can modify code, then press ALT+F10 to compile in a flash, then you continue debugging.

In my opinion, E&C is just an extension of the facilities of the debugger. If you shouldn't modify the code while you are debugging, you also shouldn't change the current executing statement, or the values of variables, to mention just a couple of cases that you CAN do with C#. If we take this reasoning to its extreme, then we should not debug at all: if the program crashes, we should just sit down and scratch our brains to figure out where the error is without incurring in the heresy of running it step by step... shouldn't we?

It's a matter of programmer judgement up to what point the E&C feature is used. It is great for those cases where you mistyped a ">" for a "<". That is a stupid error that do not merit that you stop the program, mostly if it has taken you a long time to get there.

Mostly, if VB.NET is going to have E&C and C# is not, this will certainly give the VB fans and argument against C# which is IMHO a superior language.

In a nutshell: E&C won't make a bad programmer out of a good one, but will save lots of time to everybody. Let each one decide instead of forcing everybody not to use it.

Marco

re: Why Edit & Continue is a bad thing

george — Sun, 21 Dec 2003 18:43:00 GMT

Edit and continue save so much time when fixing trivial errors that it is a shame it hasn't been implemented yet - whenever I read the ENC comments form C# people, it's just typical of their "my way of the highway" mentality that keeps progress in the 19th century. Get over it C# people, there are some nice features in VB that put the IDE ahead of the C world you are accustomed to and it's time you opened your mind and stop acting like bunch of geeks. Just because you are C people doesn't really make you better programmers - it just proves you like to suffer more than the rest of us.

George