About general solutions.

In this post I would like to discuss an interesting problem all software developers periodically face. Question is whether to implement general solution to solve specific problem or not. How to choose ? Unfortunately, many developers use following approach: “If I can implement general solution quickly then I’ll do it”. Just yesterday I have an argument with one programmer who told these very words.  It is wrong because General solution is not always better than specific one. Truth is that decisions like this have nothing to do with Code Quality, Readability, Design patterns and other things developers used to work with, it is manager’s decision. If you really were trusted to make such decisions, look at problem from manager’s point view. Think about cost of development, cost of failure, cost of maintenance, cost of testing, risk management, estimate everything and only then make a decision.