Big Ball of Fun
This post has been imported from my previous blog. I did my best to parse XML properly, but it might have some errors.
If you find one, send a Pull Request.
TL; DR How to deal better with legacy code.
Mental
There’s a very useful tool, that everybody uses but only a few recognize in their behavior. This tool is called a mental model. It’s a way of thinking, that could help or harm your ability to deal with a specific situation. For instance, when somebody overtakes your car, you might think that he/she is an idiot, or leave some space for an interpretation saying ‘it must be something urgent’. Depending on your choice, your significant other and your child may learn a new combination of swearwords that never existed before. Just to be clear: I’m not saying that inventing these combinations is useful, but rather the opposite. The most important th ing is to be more aware of your reactions and consciously build models that fit you and help you.
Fun fun fun fun
What’s better, mud or fun? If you were Peppa Pig, then you’d put an equality sign between them. But you aren’t. The mud is dirty and stinky and fun is just … fun. What would you like to approach: fun or mud? I bet the answer is fun. Next time when you need to work on a piece of a legacy, whether it’s a COBOLac or Spaghetti Visualo Basico, try to use this Big Ball of Fun and share this term in your team. This might remove one of the obstacles and turn it into something more approachable. You still might have some others, but one will be gone.
Let’s have some fun!
