
What does the word "Quality" mean? - cawel
http://weblog.raganwald.com/2008/07/what-does-word-quality-mean.html
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Xichekolas
Been reading Zen and the Art lately Raganwald?

Pretty sure Pirsig decided in the end that 'quality' could not be defined
analytically.

I'm sure Webster begs to differ, but I'll stick with Phaedrus on this one. I
think quality, like art, is in the eye of the beholder. To some, it might mean
robust code, to others, 'beautiful' code, to others, bug free, etc. If it was
objective, then everyone could have agreed on it long ago.

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LogicHoleFlaw
'eye of the beholder' is a cop-out argument. In both art and code, there are
objective differences between high-quality and poor-quality products. Leaving
the definition of quality as merely a personal taste sidesteps the difficult
yet rewarding issue of determining what those differences are.

The old line was that "Jazz can't be taught, but somehow you have to learn
it." Modern musical teaching and theory amply demonstrates that Jazz _can_ be
taught. It just took time for the pedagogical techniques to catch up with the
modern practice.

We may not yet have a complete definition of what makes Quality code, but that
does not imply that no such definition can exist.

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Goronmon
_In both art and code, there are objective differences between high-quality
and poor-quality products._

The hard part isn't finding the differences between good and bad code. The
hard part is finding differences between good code and average code.

There is also a big difference between pointing out examples of quality code
and being able to establish guidelines that lead to quality code.

In other words, I do think that much of what determines "quality" code comes
down to what aspects the person viewing the code believes are the most
important.

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tjr
Reminds me of:

 _We are sponsoring an ongoing Quality Contest. The purpose is to
constructively combine two facts of modern life: One, we are all expected to
spend our working hours immersed in quality; and two, if you keep your boss
immersed in quality, you will be free to finish your work.

We therefore announce a technical essay contest. Each month, or whenever we
feel like it, we will have a new contest. This month's challenge: define a
technical specification for a database to inventory, manipulate, and analyze
large quantities of quality. Entries are limited to a maximum of 100 words._

...from: <http://www.byte.com/art/9704/sec16/art1.htm>

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cawel
The same piece of code will have a different value from one owner to the
other. Thus, since the definition of quality depends on the context, doesn't
it make quality inherently subjective?

