Comments on: What Makes a Programmer Great?

By: douglasgresham.co.uk » Blog Archive » Cross post: What makes a programmer great

Mon, 10 Jan 2011 23:58:15 +0000

[...] (at uni and in the working world) spawned an experimental jointly-written post, which you can find here. It’s worth it just to see the slightly disturbing contrast between the pictures chosen for [...]

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By: Accidentally in Code » Programming Toolboxes and Functional Hats

Accidentally in Code » Programming Toolboxes and Functional Hats — Thu, 22 Jul 2010 12:03:41 +0000

[...] have some ideas about becoming a competent programmer. I aim to know something of: an Object-Orientated language (Java), a scripting language (Python), a [...]

By: kittenthebad

kittenthebad — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 23:53:25 +0000

Yes, for sure. Stopping “debugging” and instead writing test cases was really helpful for me. Something similar that made a big difference for me was getting to the point where I'll hack and prototype to get the idea, and then be willing to start again and take what I've learned and do it right.

By: kittenthebad

kittenthebad — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 23:51:18 +0000

Thanks for your input, Sherif – I agree with everything you're saying esp on which programming language it better!

By: kittenthebad

kittenthebad — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 19:53:25 +0000

By: kittenthebad

kittenthebad — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 19:51:18 +0000

Thanks for your input, Sherif – I agree with everything you're saying esp on which programming language it better!

By: Tweets that mention Accidentally in Code » What Makes a Programmer Great? -- Topsy.com

Thu, 25 Mar 2010 09:40:06 +0000

[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Cate Huston, Daniel Wagner-Hall. Daniel Wagner-Hall said: "What makes a programmer great?" http://catehuston.com/blog/2010/03/24/what-makes-a-programmer-great/ [...]

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By: Igor Sales

Igor Sales — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 16:01:36 +0000

I find the key is “Iterations”.

I never get it all right the first time. The art of programming is like gardening. You have to nourish your code (with all kinds of test cases), care for it (reviewing it and the test cases) from a little seed (one file) until it becomes a strong tree (of code).

By: Sherif Koussa

Sherif Koussa — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 15:16:23 +0000

Great post Cate, here are some other factors that I found during my career that makes great programmers
1- Open minded: I almost always walked away from the Java vs C++ vs .NET conversations that focused on which is better, they are all can be best depending on what they are being used for…If you know them all or atleast having an open mind to find out what's the best context and situation to use a specific language
2- Do code reviews: code reviews in my opinion had the best impact on my programming skills when I was a programmer, of course assuming it is done in a proper manner
3- Learn skills that cross-domains: a programmer who has done a bit of QA is almost always better than the one who didn't, the programmer who has done a bit of client facing is almost always better than the one who didn't, the programmer who knows how to write (thus have proper and meaningful comments for his code) is better than the one who does not.