Shoveling Code

Tim Ottinger — Thu, 06 Dec 2007 12:56:00 +0000

I was ill when the first snow fell last weekend, and didn’t get out and scrape the drive and sidewalks. Sadly, neither did I bundle up my kids and send them out with shovels. As a result, the snow melted and refroze. When I left home on sunday morning, clearing the snow was frustrated by the presence of hard, packed ice under the snow.

Now I have to be very careful when moving in the drive or sidewalk because of the black ice in some places and thick lumpy stuff in others. I could choose to leave it that way and just walk carefully and try to avoid the area, but I really don’t want it to be like this all winter.

Instead, I bundled up and spent several painful hours trying to clear not only the six to eight inches of new snow, but the ice under it. Clearing the fresh stuff is tough because the rough and lumpy ice is under it. The ice snags the shovel and hurts my elbows and shoulders. I use the metal edge of the shovel to plane off the ice so that it’s not quite so difficult, and the work gets a little easier.

Smooth, planed ice is not a solution. It is actually going to be more slippery and dangerous when the sun hits it and it melts a little. It will then refreeze to an even smoother and slicker sheen. I can’t ignore the problem, and I can’t smooth it over and leave it at that.

I invested in some complicated salt product to lower the melting point of the ice so I can scrape it away. It wasn’t enough, but now there are some safe areas in my driveway. I continue to scrape it and hope that I can get it all squared away so that my wife and kids have safe passage, though it is tedious and unpleasant work.

Yes, it’s my fault. I should have bundled up my sick self or my children and taken care of this when the first snow fell, back when it was easy.

Then it dawned on me that my driveway is a lot like source code. If I always take care of it when it’s relatively easy and not too polluted, it will remain easier to deal with in the longer term. The more unsafe and ugly it is, the more important it is to clean it up. It won’t do to smooth it out a little or to leave it be. It needs to be safe for me and my team.

And I guess that’s my parable for today.

Object Mentor Blog: Tag parable

Shoveling Code