[ale] sloppy coding in breath tester

[Geoffrey]

Pete Hardie wrote:
> On Fri, May 15, 2009 at 09:16, tom <tfreeman at intel.digichem.net> wrote:
>> On Fri, 15 May 2009, Jim Kinney wrote:
>> I only scanned the link, so ...
>>
>> There is another possiblity - the authors were never CS trained at all.
>> I'd guess that many of the people writing code for the breathalyzer were
>> originally engineers or scientists with a dominant background in
>> instrumentation. Coding would have been pickup activity which started
>> taking over their lives like kudzu. Hence sloppy code due to a lack of
>> background.
> 
> This is a strong candidate.  I've seen some truly weird working code from
> EEs who moved into coding with just one FORTRAN class as background.

I must concur.  I've seen some terrible code written by non CS folks. 
On the other hand, the worst programmer I've ever worked with graduated 
with a BS in CS and was at the top of his class.  Two of the best I've 
ever worked with, one graduated with a Management degree, the other 
never attended college at all.

-- 
Until later, Geoffrey

Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little
temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.
  - Benjamin Franklin