Quotes About Responsibility

A stitch in time saves nine. The early bird catches the worm. Don't put off until tomorrow what you can do today.

The fact that the task to write perfect software is virtually impossible does not mean you aren't responsible for the imperfection.

Robert C. Martin

As an engineer, you have a depth of knowledge about your systems and projects that no managers can possibly have. With that knowledge comes the responsibility to act.

SRP: The Single Responsibility Principle An active corollary to Conway's law: The best structure for a software system is heavily influenced by the social structure of the organization that uses it so that each software module has one, and only one, reason to change.

Il campo @author di un Javadoc ci dice chi siamo. Siamo gli autori. E una caratteristica degli autori è che hanno dei lettori. In effetti, è responsabilità degli autori riuscire a comunicare bene coi loro lettori. La prossima volta che scriverete una riga di codice, ricordatevi che voi ne siete gli autori, e che scrivete a dei lettori che vi giudicheranno per quello che avrete scritto.

This is the Single Responsibility Principle restated for components. Just as the SRP says that a class should not contain multiples reasons to change, so the Common Closure Principle (CCP) says that a component should not have multiple reasons to change.

The diagram in Figure 14.5 shows X, which is a stable component. Three components depend on X, so it has three good reasons not to change. We say that X is responsible to those three components. Conversely, X depends on nothing, so it has no external influence to make it change. We say it is independent.

Working overtime is not a way to show your dedication to your employer. What it shows is that you are a bad planner, that you agree to deadlines to which you shouldn't agree, that you make promises you shouldn't make, that you are a manipulable laborer and not a professional.

Figure 14.6 shows Y, which is a very unstable component. No other components depend on Y, so we say that it is irresponsible. Y also has three components that it depends on, so changes may come from three external sources. We say that Y is dependent.

Every software system provides two different values to the stakeholders: behavior and structure. Software developers are responsible for ensuring that both those values remain high. Unfortunately, they often focus on one to the exclusion of the other.

When the I metric is 1, it means that no other component depends on this component (Ca = 0), and this component does depend on other components (Ce > 0). This is as instable as a component can get; it is irresponsible and dependent. Its lack of dependents gives it no reason not to change, and the components that it depends on may give it ample reason to change.

The dilemma for software developers is that business managers are not equipped to evaluate the importance of architecture. That's what software developers were hired to do. Therefore it is the responsibility of the software development team to assert the importance of architecture over the urgency of features.

Remember, as a software developer, you are a stakeholder. You have a stake in the software that you need to safeguard. That's part of your role, and part of your duty. And it's a big part of why you were hired.

We've all looked at the mess we've just made and then have chosen to leave it for another day. We've all felt the relief of seeing our messy program work and deciding that a working mess is better than nothing. We've all said we'd go back and clean it up later. Of course, in those days we didn't know LeBlanc's law: Later equals never.

Leave the campground cleaner than you found it.

Professionals are often heroes, but not because they try to be. Professionals become heroes when they get a job done well, on time, and on budget.

Slaves are not allowed to say no. Laborers may be hesitant to say no. But professionals are expected to say no. Indeed, good managers crave someone who has the guts to say no. It's the only way you can really get anything done.

What would happen if you allowed a bug to slip through a module, and it cost your company $10,000? The nonprofessional would shrug his shoulders, say "stuff happens," and start writing the next module. The professional would write the company a check for $10,000!

The thoroughly guilty man has an advantage over all of us; he cannot be found more guilty of anything, since he has already found himself guilty of everything. This may sound like an absurdity - causing oneself extreme pain in order not to feel any number of little pains of lesser guilts and shames, but it has its own logic. A man more easily adapts to what he inflicts upon himself; as to his own judgement, he is already committed to it and willing to live with it.

The implication, in the minds of some, was that it certainly appeared that Fletcher wanted to be sure someone else was in change when the fatal blow struck his task force.

The Japanese were aware that there was a tendency among these young men to close their eyes just before the crash, a very human reaction to the situation. They were repeatedly exhorted to keep their eyes open and to continue aiming their aircraft to the last moment. It is impossible to forget that these were very young men on both sides of this story.

My dad was rubbish at all other aspects of his financial life, but he's pretty good at paying the rent.

Every president has to live with the result of what Lyndon Johnson did with Vietnam, when he lost the trust of the American people in the presidency.