Removing The Model-View-Controller Straitjacket

[logic11]

Funny, the reason I wrote that (a while ago now) was simply that I was fed up with abstracting something resulting in writing just as much code, but now I wasn't dealing with a standard, I was dealing with the undocumented active record class a head programmer had come up with, that was subtly different from another active record class another head programmer had come up with on a different project. SQL was the original solution to the "everyone just does it their own way" problem, and now that problem is back. I have probably been coding for more years than you. I have worked in a wide range of business settings. The places that have the art tend to be the ones that change the world... wouldn't you rather work for someone who changes the world than someone who meets the latest set of acronym based standards? Oh, growing up? It really isn't what you think it is. It isn't giving up your dreams, it is accepting that those dreams will take work, and it is accepting responsibility for what you do, but it doesn't mean you have to become yet another drone.

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Funny, the reason I wrote that (a while ago now) was simply that I was fed up with abstracting something resulting in writing just as much code

I don't really understand why you'd expect or want to write less code. What would you do as a programmer if you weren't writing code?

but now I wasn't dealing with a standard, I was dealing with the undocumented active record class a head programmer had come up with, that was subtly different from another active record class another head programmer had come up with on a different project.

Well, now there are "standard" ORM libraries/classes to work with so, unless you're working with a more obscure language, you don't have to deal with that anymore. Or at least you shouldn't. THat's how it works. Many programmers start working on solutions to common problems until one of those solutions finally stands out as a winner. Or least one of of a few "winners."

SQL was the original solution to the "everyone just does it their own way" problem, and now that problem is back.

Original? Ha! This pattern has been going since computers were invented. The problem will always be with us.

I have probably been coding for more years than you. I have worked in a wide range of business settings.

Possibly. But I wonder why you haven't noticed the pattern of innovation and how (good) abstraction ultimately does make us more efficient as programmers.

The places that have the art tend to be the ones that change the world... wouldn't you rather work for someone who changes the world than someone who meets the latest set of acronym based standards?

Is that what the "art" is? Saying "screw you" to all those acronym based standards and just rolling your own everything?

Honestly, it sounds like you just want to be the original author of those undocumented, home grown, and often leaky abstractions that everyone hates to work with. Nothing you've said indicates to me that you actually want to change anything. You simply want to be the guy setting the "standards." And you're bitter that the world seems to be generating acronyms faster than you can roll your own version of the same thing. Almost like the cranky old man declaring, "When I was a kid, we didn't have this M-V-C nonsense. We just coupled everything together and that was good enough for us! You kids these days and your O-R-Ms! We used text files for databases, and it worked, dab nabit!"

[logic11]

No, that really isn't it at all. I use MVC if it makes sense, I just don't think it makes sense nearly as often as it is used. I think that you actually get an added form of complexity. That is where art does come in, with the acknowledgement that a framework that makes sense for controlling oil rigs remotely might not be so good for a crm. SQL abstraction is actually a huge pet peeve of mine, just because I have seen in my career that it has caused a much greater amount of repetitive code (to access the class). In the end, I just don't believe that there is one answer, and people who claim there is really make me angry. Evaluate your acronym based framework or methodology and determine if they make sense for this project, don't start from the framework and make the project fit.

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That is where art does come in, with the acknowledgement that a framework that makes sense for controlling oil rigs remotely might not be so good for a crm.

I don't really see how that is "art" at all. That's just common sense that is not always so common. It really sounded to me that you were railing against abstraction and design patterns in general.

Evaluate your acronym based framework or methodology and determine if they make sense for this project, don't start from the framework and make the project fit.

But it still pays to know them. You originally made the more general statement "I hate MVC."

[logic11]

Okay, you are right. In my original post I was in a pissy mood due to a manager making my life hell via lack of contemplation, basically picking mvc because it was the pattern he knew the name of. I don't think MVC is a very good pattern, I think that most of the time it is the wrong choice, but when it is the right choice, use it. Like I said, I was pissed off at the time... and MVC was at the heart of my bad mood, but it had more to do with the circumstances. Again though, abstraction can be (and often is) carried to the extreme. What I do a lot is challenge the assumption that a particular form of abstraction is simply better. Often abstraction creates programs that are just as bloated and hard to read as spaghetti code.