Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site spuxll.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxl!houxm!houxz!vax135!floyd!whuxle!spuxll!ech From: ech@spuxll.UUCP (Ned Horvath) Newsgroups: net.lang Subject: Re: The Joys of Batch Message-ID: <494@spuxll.UUCP> Date: Mon, 11-Jun-84 22:12:54 EDT Article-I.D.: spuxll.494 Posted: Mon Jun 11 22:12:54 1984 Date-Received: Tue, 12-Jun-84 07:00:38 EDT References: <3572@fortune.UUCP> Organization: AT&T Information Systems, South Plainfield NJ Lines: 19 Salvation through suffering is not a point of view totally without merit, but suffering without cause doesn't save anything. No amount of planning will prevent a two-hour wait from revealing a typo -- and only a typo. At the other extreme, I have often witnessed students playing "shotgun programming" with the 20-minute batch turnaround: make a dozen random changes, then apply the shotgun to the one that comes closest... Should you also be barred from using word processors until you get out of college because a typewriter will build your typing skills? Or better yet, longhand will improve your penmanship? The lesson is a good one -- "you have failed before you begin because you do not plan." But that lesson, I submit, is only learned the hard way, and is orthogonal to an equally important lesson: If you fail to buy the best tools that you can afford, you are only working hard - not smart. =Ned=