Question

When coding, what in your experience is a better approach?

1. Break the problem down into small enough pieces and then implement each piece.
2. Break the problem down, but then implement using a top-down approach.
3. Any other?

Answer 1

Here’s what I do:

Understand the domain first. Understand the problem to be solved. Make sure you and the customer (even if that customer is you!) are on the same page as to what problem is to be solved.

Then a high level solution is proposed to the problem and from that, the design will turn into bubbles or bullets on a page or whatever, but the point is that it will shake out into components that can be designed.

At that point, I write tests for the yet-to-be written classes and then flesh out the classes to pass those tests.

I use a test-first approach and build working, tested components. That is what works for me. When the component interfaces are known and the ‘rules’ are known for how they talk to each other and provide services to each other, then it becomes generally a straightforward ‘hook everything together’ exercise.

That’s how I do it, and it has worked well for me.