Writing good software is not easy. Clear methods, solid classes, well designed services, and successful applications have something in common: they were hard to write. The opposite is also true – complex software is easy to write. This is known as spaghetti code. In this talk we’ll uncover some tips and techniques to improve your software quality and help you identify and articulate when it’s worth investing time into simplicity so that you can grow your applications into something incredible!

1. Simple
is
Hard

2. Jim Siegienski
Architect

3. Simple: easily
understood; presenting no
difficulty.

4. Complex: hard to
understand or deal with.

8. Easy: requiring no great
labor or effort.

9. Hard: difficult to do or
accomplish; fatiguing;
troublesome.

13. Postulate: logic - as a set
of instructions - is easy for
developers.

15. Postulate: structure - as a
disparate organization of logic
- is hard for developers.

17. Creation -> Hard
Comprehension & Use -> Easy

18. "Our goal is to try to bring a calm
and simplicity to what are
incredibly complex problems so that
you're not aware really of the
solution, you're not aware of how
hard the problem was that was
eventually solved."
-Jonathan Ive

19. E = mc^2
quod erat demonstrandum
E Pluribus Unum
a^2 + b^2 = c^2
circumference / diameter = pi

20. Whatever is predicated universally
for a given class is predicated for
anything within that class.

23. Syllogism

25. If all A are B
and C is in A
then C is B

26. A B
C B
C
A

27. If all Getters only get records
and GetPerson is a getter
GetPerson only gets a record!

29. "Systems break
down when
assumptions are
invalidated."
-Jimski

30. Why Structure?
• One big file?
• What is a Helper?
• What is a Utils?

31. Structure is a
byproduct of
naming and
classification.

36. • Logical • Random
• Analytical • Synthesizing
• Parts • Holistic

39. Readability
Reusability
Refactorability

40. Readability
• Clarity
• Purpose
• Code Wants to be Stoopid

41. Naming
• Cohesion
• One Job
• Consistency

42. Naming Tips
• The more local the smaller the
variable name
• Consistent idioms
• Magic numbers are not logical -
proprietary knowledge that's not
transferrable

43. Reusability
• Abstract
• Useful
• Named Appropriately

46. "I don't like bad Abstractions!"
-anonymous

47. "I don't like bad Abstractions!"
-anonymous

48. Refactorability
• Insulate change
• "if it's ugly put it in a box."
• Name, Name, Name

52. E.g.
• CMS
• Rules Engine
• Database

55. E.g.
• Differentiator
• High Reuse
• Critical

56. Logical
Hard
Work + Naming & =
Structure
Simple Elegance

57. "We choose to go to the moon. We choose
to go to the moon in this decade and do
the other things, not because they are
easy, but because they are hard"
-John F. Kennedy, September 12, 1962

59. Resources:
http://www.infoq.com/presentations/Simple-Made-Easy
Rich Hickey - Author of Clojure
http://www.carlopescio.com/2010/11/notes-on-software-design-chapter-12.html
Carlo Pescio - Entanglement
http://www.carlopescio.com/2011/04/your-coding-conventions-are-hurting-you.html
Carlos Pescio - Naming
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/apple/9283706/Jonathan-Ive-interview-simplicity-isnt-simple.html
Jonathan Ive - Simplicity isn't Simple
Books:
Elements of Logic - Richard Whately (1826)
The Practice of Programming - Brian Kernighan, Rob Pike
Refactoring - Martin Fowler

60. Comments for CodeFaire 2012:
https://joind.in/6720
Jim Siegienski:
jim.siegienski@gmail.com
@JimSiegienski
http://www.linkedin.com/in/jimsiegienski
http://www.slideshare.net/jimsiegienski