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"Trying to improve software quality by increasing the amount of testing is like try[ing] to lose weight by weighing yourself more often." Click it. You know you want to... cliiiiiiiick iiiiiit!
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Amen.
What irritates me when working with my coworker is when something on my end (the client side) fails to get the expected response from his end (the server), the very first thing I always hear is "all my unit tests pass." Not "ok, let's figure this out", but noooo, this defensive BS "my tests are all green."
Now, granted, at least half the time the problem is on my end (though to be truthful, it's on my end because he never documents, or has incomplete, or even worse, inaccurate documentation for his end because it's either wrong from the get-go or never got updated when he made a change) and the rest of the time the response is "oh, I didn't write a test for that function" or "oh, I didn't cover that scenario." 
Marc
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The article is critical of TDD, not unit testing. They are NOT the same thing. Unit testing is a fundamental part of TDD, but you can implement unit tests without TDD. In fact, this is exactly how I develop my own unit tests. I don't use TDD but I do have unit tests that exercise my code.
"There are two ways of constructing a software design: One way is to make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies, and the other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies. The first method is far more difficult." - C.A.R. Hoare
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That was so good. Thanks 
Now I feel like I'm not alone anymore.
I never finish anyth
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Yeah, it is. The problem is that programmers don't know how to test and the tests they write don't cover every situation they should. They usually end up writing certain tests to satisfy specific "success" cases of a piece of code. Doe they cover the edge cases? Nope. Do they cover situations where code should throw an exception? Nope. Do they test various points in a range of values and data that should work? Nope. One test case and it's good.
Another problem with tests is that you can end up writing a sh*t-ton more code for the tests than the code your writing and time is money.
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Politicians shouldn't vote for their own pay increases,
Athletes shouldn't schedule their own drug tests,
Scientists shouldn't review their own experiments,
Developers shouldn't write their own unit tests.
(This doesn't mean tests shouldn't be written but that independence is quite important)
Anyway - you know what - most weight loss programs are based around weighing yourself more often. It seems that doing so alters our behaviour? Maybe there's a lesson for software development in that?
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I can't wait until this industry grows up like its counter parts. For example, cars, buildings, airplanes don't need stinking tests. It just works! (sarcasm)
As a side note, sounds like he's been through the gutter. My team does TDD and I've seen of the best, most beautiful, well written code. I've also seen "unit tests" in previous jobs that just make me sad.
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That is my experience too. I've seen test suites that break when whitespace in generated SQL changes - meaning almost any change broke 20 or more tests.
However, I've also seen TDD used to intelligently check that software fulfils expectations, and provide a basis for regression tests.
As usual, bad programmers write bad code, good programmers write good code. TDD simply helps good programmers produce better quality, its of no help for the latter.
"If you don't fail at least 90 percent of the time, you're not aiming high enough."
Alan Kay.
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Quote: [UPDATE Nov 2015:
Before today, I thought there was, broadly, only a single kind of TDD. By reconstructing from the comments, however, I surmise that there are at least two--and that the kind with which I am familiar and am attacking is (fortunately) already rare.
I attribute much of the . . . contention this article has generated to this fundamental difference. On the one hand, I suspect it is those who have experienced the TDD I am attacking that are supporting me. On the other, I suspect the rest are annoyed at being included in my little tirade.
(And to the latter, all your hatemail email has been awe-inspiring in its professionalism. I assure you, it truly makes me want to listen.)
Therefore, I wish to clarify: THIS ARTICLE IS SPECIFICALLY TARGETTED AGAINST THIS FIRST KIND OF TDD.
Holy mother of copouts. By completely ignoring any mention of what the "second, good, kind of TDD" is; he seems to be trying to get everyone who's flaming him to think he doesn't object to how they do their work. 
Did you ever see history portrayed as an old man with a wise brow and pulseless heart, waging all things in the balance of reason?
Is not rather the genius of history like an eternal, imploring maiden, full of fire, with a burning heart and flaming soul, humanly warm and humanly beautiful?
--Zachris Topelius
Training a telescope on one’s own belly button will only reveal lint. You like that? You go right on staring at it. I prefer looking at galaxies.
-- Sarah Hoyt
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I consider myself a DevOps evangelist, but the community behind this movement to bring together the efforts of developers and IT operations needs to be more anchored in reality. "If there's a buzzing-noise, somebody's making a buzzing-noise, and the only reason for making a buzzing-noise that I know of is because you're a bee."
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Kent Sharkey wrote: evangelist
When anyone consider himself/herself "evangelist", "guru", <insert fancy title here> I automatically discard him/her as a hot air balloon and whatever he/she is trying to sell a scam.
GCS d--- s-/++ a- C++++ U+++ P- L- E-- W++ N++ o+ K- w+++ O? M-- V? PS+ PE- Y+ PGP t++ 5? X R++ tv-- b+ DI+++ D++ G e++>+++ h--- ++>+++ y+++* Weapons extension: ma- k++ F+2 X
If you think 'goto' is evil, try writing an Assembly program without JMP. -- TNCaver
"When you have eliminated the JavaScript, whatever remains must be an empty page." -- Mike Hankey
"just eat it, eat it"."They're out to mold, better eat while you can" -- HobbyProggy
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The Node.js community has built itself an operating system. Known as NodeOS, this Linux kernel-based distribution layers a 100% JavaScript world on top of the traditional OS foundation. This layer is backed by the Node Package Manager (NPM), which allows all of the JavaScript applications to be downloaded and installed easily.
The quest to find the holy grail!
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Jason Cardoza wrote: The quest to find the holy grail!
I think when they asked the question "what ails thee?" they didn't hear the answer.
"JAVASCRIPT"
Marc
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'Tis but a flesh wound.
This space for rent
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Two things immediately strike me:
i) How can a Linux-based O/S be described as "100% JavaScript".
ii) Why the frick would anyone want to do such a thing?
We need to enable alternatives to JS in the browser, not extend JS down to the O/S.
"If you don't fail at least 90 percent of the time, you're not aiming high enough."
Alan Kay.
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Making proclamations of fact or strongly stating opinions tends to put people in a defensive posture. Asking questions, even leading ones, doesn’t get people’s hackles up as much. "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity."
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If Bob is an adult then the tone of those questions are going to be every bit as confrontational as the strong starting opinions they are meant to replace. Some transactional analysis wouldn't go amiss
This is why I let the metrics make the opinions - i.e. "if the two of us share the load in trying to get these methods under the (blame it on management) quality metric"... same effect, different conversation?
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Duncan Edwards Jones wrote: If Bob is an adult then the tone of those questions are going to be every bit as
confrontational
Confrontational; is that when someone yells "WTE, who wrote this crap"? 
Bastard Programmer from Hell 
If you can't read my code, try converting it here[^]
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That is confrontational but also cathartic - it nets out.
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A court in California has declined Oracle's bid to disqualify an expert in its copyright dispute with Google over the use of Java code in the Android mobile operating system. How long before Google rewrites Android in Go?
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The flight of Blue Origin's New Shepard vehicle reached an altitude of 100.5 kilometers and landed back at its West Texas launch site. Next step for Amazon: rocket delivery?
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Everyone who is anyone has a rocket these days.
*I rode mine to work this morning.
Kind of boring news, you know?
*Well, I had to. I live on the moon. It's nice and quiet there.
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Past studies suggest that messing with your natural circadian sleep rhythm can have adverse affects on your health. A new study, however, suggests that greatly altering your sleeping schedule on the weekend can have a similar effect. I'll give you my pillow when you take it from my cold, dead hands
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