Re: Overview Of New Intel Core i7(Nehalem) Processor

Martin,

"Martin Brown" <|||newspam|||@nezumi.demon.co.uk> wrote in message
news:zYc_l.27832$IP7.25758@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
The purpose of the automated checkers and other tools is to make sure that
effort is concentrated on the areas of software where bugs are most likely
to be lurking undetected.

I think that everyone agrees that the goal there is admirable. However, the
question is always, for any given programmer, will they produce code with a
given level of correctness faster with or without such tools?

I suspect that in some cases -- perhaps, say, with John -- the answer might be
that he's already found a near-optimal strategy for producing (essentially)
bug-free code, and most tools you might hand him could actually reduce his
overall productivity.

But if some of these tools plug directly into PowerBasic, I'm sure he'd at
least give'em a spin. :-)

As others have mentioned, the interesting thing about software is that there's
easily a 5:1 if not 10:1 difference in productivity between the best
programmers and the worst. Tools and the processes companies institute around
them that are meant to help weaker programmers *sometimes* do so at the
expense of slowing down the more proficient guys (just as it's challenging to
design GUI-based operating systems that are simultaneously expert-friendly
while still being really easy for beginners to use). There's good reason that
many companies support skunkworks groups, after all.

That being said, I always turn up compiler warning levels to their highest and
have used tools such as the Nu-Mega/Compuware BoundsChecker to good effect.
However, while these catch a lot of "dumb" mistakes, they don't really help in
designing the fundamental "architecture" of a large piece of software, and
this is where -- long-term -- your product tends to sink or swim.

---Joel


.

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