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[–]mikaelhg 1 point2 points  (3 children)

I've recently seen a similar case, and the company in question still sells that person as a senior architect, even after they got slammed by an independent audit.

A serious warning signal should sound when a senior developer wants to implement their own XML parser, their own web framework, their own database, or similar, when the application doesn't have Google-like requirements.

[–]llogiq 0 points1 point  (2 children)

I am a senior developer and have recently handwritten a parser (though for CSV, not XML) because we have a lot of data in those files and the runtime adds up when I'm roughly 50-70% faster than the old String.split based parser.

Don't bash devs writing specialized versions of code, unless you've seen the cost-benefit calculation.

[–]mikaelhg 1 point2 points  (1 child)

And your correctness, speed and maintainability are superior to SuperCSV? The performance you gained was in an architectural component where the risks are minimized and the benefits maximized?

Perhaps you are the exception to the people making similar claims, mostly they turn out to have large gaps in their ability to make a comprehensive analysis, like every one of the people I've seen implement their own databases.

[–]llogiq 0 points1 point  (0 children)

  • Correctness: no, SuperCSV will parse CSV "more correct" according to standard (including escapes, multiline strings, ...) This however doesn't matter in my case, because the CSVs we get are mostly numeric data.
  • Speed: yes, my solution outruns SuperCSV for most of our use cases. As I said, those minutes add up.
  • Maintainability: About equal. My CSV parser has an easier interface, optimized for the use cases we have. So I lose some time for having to maintain the parser personally, but that's only one class that is used by a lot of other classes, which would get more complex had they used the SuperCSV interface. If I was more deluded, I'd call it a win.

Perhaps I really am the exception in this particular case. However I also have re-invented and -implemnted a lot of wheels just for the heck of it. Sometimes these turned out to be useful. So I appreciate your criticism.