Post #1417856

2025-05-19 10:11 UTC

I&#39;m often humbled by how little I know about the problems I&#39;m trying to solve. But &quot;Fixing Without Understanding&quot; by @jessitron has the unintentional consequence of reminding me of how infrequency I use Gerry Sussman&#39;s &quot;programming by poking&quot; approach. Being able to inspect the dryer&#39;s internals before you attempt to fix it makes a tremendous difference. https://jessitron.com/2025/05/18/fixing-without-understanding/

Replies (3)

@jessitron@hachyderm.io 2025-05-19 12:20

@schmudde haha yes if I had been able to x ray the dryer... Or if I had sat down and watched the whole correct video... I would not have attempted this!

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@dan@brvt.telent.net 2025-05-19 12:43

@schmudde @jessitron this reminds me of bleeding hydraulic brakes. There's a reservoir at the top, a bleed valve at the bottom, but the path that the fluid takes between those points (especially inside the caliper) is unknown to me and if there's an air pocket in there I can only deduce its existence from the effect it has when I apply the brake. Its almost literally a black box

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@sakhavi@aoir.social 2025-05-19 16:59

@schmudde @jessitron Coincidentally just reading Peter Naur’s “Programming as Theory Building” rn. “[P]rogramming properly should be regarded as an activity by which the programmers form or achieve a certain kind of insight, a theory, of the matters at hand.”

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