Going through things one by one
Or, a coding exercise
One of my flaws is that as soon as I’m familiar with something, I assume it must be common knowledge. I love tutoring and mentoring people, but I’m bad at pitching exactly where their level might be, and in working out what they might not have come across before. Particularly, in my career, software development is one of those skills where beyond a certain base level nearly all your knowledge is picked up through osmosis and experience, rather than through formal training. Sometimes, when I’m reviewing my team’s code I come across things that surprise me a little. That’s where this post comes from, really: a few months back I spotted something in a review and realised it wouldn’t work.