Approaches to Development: Hacking

Introduction

December 2003

There are many ways in which the development process can be approached - different techniques that have different benefits and drawbacks. Use one in the wrong place and you can buy yourself a whole heap of problems.

This article is the first in a series in which various approaches will be identified and evaluated. The goal is to identify both the good and the bad about each approach, and to work out some heuristics for deciding which approach is best in a given situation.

To begin with, this article looks at a hacking approach to development.

The word Hacker, in the context of this article, is used in it's original (complimentary) sense, not the distorted, darker meaning that has resulted from the misuse of the term by the media and by a certain disreputable, thought technically competent, sector of society.

Solution Hacking

To hack together a system is to take the pieces you already have, and combine them together in a novel or ingenious manner to achieve the desired result.

This is often done by combining applications that are already available with some kind of scripting language that coordinates the actions of each. The typical Unix toolset for the manipulation of text files, and the scriptibility of most shells, is a good example of this.