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Comment by kragen | Hacker News Reader

when i said 'snake oil' i was quoting dijkstra, who continued to hold that opinion of 'software engineering' (yes, including xp, perhaps especially including xp) until he died in 02002. so the logical implication of what you're saying is that dijkstra was ignorant—compared to you, apparently?

if you think six paragraphs is a 'wall of text' you'd better stay away from libraries; if you ever saw a book you might die of shock

parnas did actual software work. don't insult him by lumping him with boehm

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You might want to rethink how you communicate with people regarding subjects you have no clue about. A little humility goes a long way.

The original discussion started with XP/Agile and Kent Beck where you quite clearly had nothing to defend their achievements against Barry Boehm's whose works you seem to know nothing about. So instead you drag in Djikstra's works which are not under discussion here and somehow think that is valid? Also twisting my words to read non-existent meanings into them is merely a feeble attempt at trying to mask one's ignorance.

you were the one who brought up dijkstra (in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38899417)

i read all these process guys back in the 90s: boehm, yourdon, mills, weinberg, beck. and, like boehm, i worked in dod-funded software projects on cost-plus contracts. i am dismissing boehm's work not just because dijkstra described it as snake oil but because decades of experience have shown most of it to be worthless

> you were the one who brought up dijkstra

Merely to show the group of "the greats" in which i included Boehm. But we are not discussing his works here.

> i read all these process guys back in the 90s: boehm, yourdon, mills, weinberg, beck.

I too have read the works of these folks in the early 90s. Their work is all in different domains and not all of them "Process". Beck most certainly does not belong in this group. FYI, i was introduced to XP in 2000 at the company i worked for in Austin, Texas when they got Kent Beck himself to come in and teach us this new fangled concept called "Extreme Programming". I think i asked him about how he hoped to design and implement something like a OS with this "constant change" methodology; the answer was not satisfactory to say the least. Then of course the totally daft idea of forced "Pair Programming" which anybody who knew anything about Human Psychology/Organizational Behaviour would tell you is not workable unless the concerned people themselves seek it out. Nobody in the company practiced XP thereafter. If anybody is selling snake-oil it is the XP/Agile/Scrum proponents.

> i am dismissing boehm's work ... because decades of experience have shown most of it to be worthless

I am dismissing your dismissal of Boehm's work since through out this chain of comments you have not presented any evidence of any knowledge of Boehm's works. Do you know what is the COCOMO model and where it may/may not be applicable? Do you know what exactly is the Spiral Model and how to use it? I have pointed you to his distinguished career, awards earned and general standing in the industry and yet i have had no proof at all that you have read anything i pointed out. In short, you need to demonstrate competence with his work before anybody can take you at your word.

Finally, you also owe me an apology (though i have little hope that i would be getting one) for misrepresenting with malicious intent what i had said with your comments here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38905726 and here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38905477

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