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Jan 11, 2011 at 23:30 comment added Evan Plaice Joining a pre-existing project is daunting at first. Do a few bug fixes, add a few insignificant improvements... The more of the codebase you need to touch the more you'll understand the whole. It takes some time but it's completely do-able. The point is, you'll never be able to contain everything in your head at once, that's why languages rely on namespaces/classes to break the whole into smaller pieces. The hardest part about creating a program from scratch is realizing the overall structure. Don't expect it all at once, programs are meant to grow organically.
Jan 1, 2011 at 11:03 comment added Josh Smeaton @gablin I agree that perhaps that much might be out of grasp, but my post really was to illustrate the problems or direction that increase code size. That seems to be a part of the problem the OP had. I can leave design and structure to books that the OP has.
Dec 31, 2010 at 10:33 comment added gablin @Josh Smeaton: Haha, yeah, I thought that as well after having submitted my comment. ^^ But I got the impression from the OP that even building a small program like a cache server is unattainable for him/her at the moment, thus the need to start with something even smaller and build from that.
Dec 31, 2010 at 0:39 comment added Josh Smeaton @gablin, good point actually. Except the gui - who needs a gui for a cache server? =P I was attempting to describe the problems that arise that grow the code - not the initial problem of building a small project that the OP seems to already grasp. Usefulness comes with age.
Dec 30, 2010 at 20:51 comment added gablin Excellent example, but if it could have started a little bit smaller it would have been even better. For instance, starting with building a few data structures, then a some code which provides an API for these data structures, then some code which uses this API to implement the cache function, and then finally a GUI on top of this. Voilá, you've written a cache server!
Dec 30, 2010 at 17:06 comment added Zoot So it goes. Kurt Vonnegut meets computer programming
Dec 30, 2010 at 16:37 comment added user131 This describes almost every program that I've written.
Dec 30, 2010 at 14:08 history made wiki Post Made Community Wiki
Dec 30, 2010 at 9:55 comment added Josh Smeaton @Nick, haven't we all had a similar experience with project "X" with features "Y" and "Z"? I've had two similar projects within the last year. Neither of them were Redis =P
Dec 30, 2010 at 4:01 comment added NickAldwin Yes, it's almost like it came from personal experience...
Dec 29, 2010 at 22:48 history migrated from stackoverflow.com (revisions)
Dec 29, 2010 at 21:40 history answered Josh Smeaton CC BY-SA 2.5