I think you might use “favorite” the way I mean “fun” (if I say fun at work, it’s because we are having none)
A lot of my opinions on code and the human brain started in college. My roommate was washing out and didn’t know it yet. The rules about helping other people were very clear, I was a boy scout but also grade-a bargainer and rationalized so I created a protocol for helping him without getting us expelled. Other kids in the lab started using me the same way.
There were so many people who couldn’t grasp that your code can have three bugs at once, and fixing one won’t make your code behave. Some of those must have washed out too.
But applying the scientific method as you say above is something that I came to later and it’s how I mentor people. If all of your assumptions say the answer should be 3 but it’s 4, or “4” or “Spain”, one of your assumptions is wrong and you need to test them. Odds of being the flaw / difficulty of rechecking. Prioritize and work the problem.
(Hidden variable: how embarrassed you’ll be if this turns out to be the problem)
A lot of my opinions on code and the human brain started in college. My roommate was washing out and didn’t know it yet. The rules about helping other people were very clear, I was a boy scout but also grade-a bargainer and rationalized so I created a protocol for helping him without getting us expelled. Other kids in the lab started using me the same way.
There were so many people who couldn’t grasp that your code can have three bugs at once, and fixing one won’t make your code behave. Some of those must have washed out too.
But applying the scientific method as you say above is something that I came to later and it’s how I mentor people. If all of your assumptions say the answer should be 3 but it’s 4, or “4” or “Spain”, one of your assumptions is wrong and you need to test them. Odds of being the flaw / difficulty of rechecking. Prioritize and work the problem.
(Hidden variable: how embarrassed you’ll be if this turns out to be the problem)