Working Compassionately with Legacy Code, RubyConf 2015

Your code is your partner. It struggles against you, but also alongside you. Your code comes to you as it is, not as you wish it were. Like a real-life partner, it has a history that you’ll never fully know; like a real-life child, it bears your imprint, but it is wild, unruly, and fiercely self-sovereign. You’ll never stop working with code that’s hard to figure out or difficult to change. But this code, this stubborn creature, is entrusted to you. Let go of your anger at the developer who wrote it. Let go of the terror of being blamed for its unforeseeable regressions. Let go--and find joy.

Transcript

1. Working Compassionately with Legacy Code @amar47shah
3. Avalokiteśvara by Wonderlane Flickr CC BY-NC 2.0
4. Meditation Banyan by Christine Boose Flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
6. hippie dog by istolethetv Flickr CC BY 2.0
7. hippie dog by istolethetv Flickr CC BY 2.0 / text added
8. LEARNING
9. Brant Bjork by Ben Keeler Young Men’s Nation
13. rail climb Beth Jusino Flickr CC BY-NC 2.0
14. Forgotten by Matthew Hester Flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
15. NASA
16. The whirling disc of NGC 4526 by Stuart Rankin Flickr CC BY 2.0
17. developers as second-class citizens users as a despised and outcast underclass
18. “Kill it and start over.”
19. Blueprints by Sam Howzit Flickr CC BY 2.0
21. Smashville car by WBUR Boston Flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
22. Out Of Order by David Mach by duncan c Flickr CC BY-NC 2.0
23. If you see something, say nothing by pedrik Flickr CC BY 2.0
24. • no automated tests • end-of-life Rails and Ruby versions • 1500-line models, 300-line methods • vulnerable to SQL injection • authorization loopholes
25. “pretty solid”
26. New Flame sinking off Gibraltar by amateur_photo_bore Flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
27. Self portrait - Flamethrowers, facepaint and fantoms by MattysFlicks Flickr CC BY 2.0
28. Reject. by Lucas Moratelli Flickr CC BY-NC 2.0
29. * d51a256 - asdf * 56b5cfa - asdf * c12135f - adsf * 253e4ee - asdf * af9120b - asdf * 6b4a7b3 - asdf * a0b93d5 - asdf * ecb1fa5 - asdf * 4b19cda - asdf * 58cc3f7 - adsf * 7ffd540 - asdf * 6942f4f - adf * 8823caf - adsf * 9843c03 - adf * 3695f76 - adf * 4cb1131 - adf * 182430f - asdf * f2e9bd4 - adsf * ef5c68d - adsf * d386229 - adsf * 357b445 - adf git commit -am asdf
33. index show new edit create update destroy
34. $ ls app/services groan_stifler.rb mirage_spotter.rb sand_from_eyes_wiper.rb Desert by Moyan Brenn Flickr CC BY 2.0
37. code is my boyfriend Coding by the fire by tux0racer Flickr CC BY 2.0
38. IMG_4876 by Aaron Goodman Flickr CC BY-ND 2.0
39. Dark by Transformer18 Flickr CC BY 2.0
40. Control
41. Trust
42. Chemical Tanker, Aug 11 by Louis Vest Flickr CC BY-NC 2.0
43. Have You Ever Seen A Sadder Looking Dog? by Stewart Black Flickr CC BY 2.0
44. Albert Einstein - Caricature by DonkeyHotey Flickr CC BY 2.0
45. mural of the man inside Fatlace - japantown, san francisco by eric molina CC BY 2.0
46. Pomodoro Kitchen Timer for Action Logging by Andy Roberts Flickr CC BY 2.0 TDD Hat by George Dinwiddie blog.gdinwiddie.com CC BY-SA 3.0 Productivity: Getting Personal Kanban to Done by Dennis Hamilton Flickr CC BY 2.0
47. Cognitive Restructuring 1. Identify automatic thoughts 2. Isolate cognitive distortions 3. Apply reason 4. Develop rebuttal
48. rm -rf / by Zakwitnij!pl Ejdzej & Iric Flickr CC BY-SA 2.0 Self portrait - Flamethrowers, facepaint and fantoms by MattysFlicks Flickr CC BY 2.0
49. Darlin Do You Gamble by Thomas Hawk Flickr CC BY-NC 2.0 Reject. by Lucas Moratelli Flickr CC BY-NC 2.0
51. –Jan Dudulski
 http://codetunes.com/2014/fixing-legacy-code/ “code is person-agnostic”
52. Healthy homemade school lunches by Jennifer Chait Flickr CC BY-SA 2.0
53. Boring by Cheryl Colan Flickr CC BY-NC 2.0
54. Boring by Strevo Flickr CC BY-SA 2.0
55. Onaturligt by Marcus Linder Flickr CC BY-NC 2.0
56. Planking Arnhem by Marco Derksen Flickr CC BY-NC 2.0
57. You need to know all of this —> (sorry you can’t read it) Rails Competencies Poster by Code Fellows, LLC CC BY-NC-SA 3.0
58. 120621-O-ZZ999-005 by U.S. Pacific Fleet Flickr CC BY-NC 2.0
59. Stopwatch by William Warby Flickr CC BY 2.0
60. Wet Pipin by Mattieu Guionnet Flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
61. Onaturligt by Marcus Linder Flickr CC BY-NC 2.0
62. Potter in Bangalore, India by Muhammad Mahdi Karim Wikimedia Commons Free Art License
63. mandala - making & destroying Vernon Hyde Flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
64. Chevron's Toxic Legacy in Ecuador's Amazon by Rainforest Action Network Flickr CC BY-NC 2.0
65. Larry Powers (Ugly Americans) by Jim H. Flickr CC BY-SA 2.0
66. what can i change?
67. how much will i tolerate?
68. Zhuzha - Spy Cat by Mark Vegas Flickr CC BY-SA 2.0
69. Meditation Banyan by Christine Boose Flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
70. MINSWAN
71. MINSWAN
72. letters by Beth Cortez-Neavel Flickr CC BY 2.0