The Software Essays That Shaped Me

Summary

I started reading software blogs before I got my first programming job 20 years ago. At this point, I’ve read thousands of blog posts and essays about software, but only a small handful stuck in my mind and changed the way I think.“The Joel Test: 12 Steps to Better Code” by Joel Spolsky (2000)“Parse, don’t validate” by Alexis King (2019)“No Silver Bullet - Essence and Accident in Software Engineering” by Fred Brooks (1986)“Choices” by Joel Spolsky (2000)“Application compatibility layers are there for the customer, not for the program” by Raymond Chen (2010)“Don’t Put Logic in Tests” by Erik Kuefler (2014)“A little bit of plain Javascript can do a lot” by Julia Evans (2020)“Choose Boring Technology” by Dan McKinley (2015)“I’ve locked myself out of my digital life” by Terence Eden (2022)Bonus: Brad Fitzpatrick on parsing user input (2009)Joel Spolsky is the greatest software blogger of all time. His essays have informed so much of my approach to software that it was hard to pick out just one, but “The Joel Test” is my favorite.The Joel Test is a set of 12 questions that employers can ask themselves to see how well they’re investing in their software team:Do you use source control?Can you make a build in one step?Do you make daily builds?Do you have a bug database?Do you fix bugs before writing new code?Do you have an up-to-date schedule?Do you have a spec?Do programmers have quiet working conditions?Do you use the best tools money can buy?Do you have testers?Do new candidates write code during their interview?Do you do hallway usability testing?Some of the questions are dated, but the point was never the questions themselves but rather the meta-point of the questions.Joel was really asking employers: do you respect developers?The questions all assess whether an employer prioritizes their developers’ time and focus over things like cheap office space and short-term deadlines.Joel published this article at the height of the dot-com boom, when skilled developers were a p...