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Duplication Isn't Always an Anti-Pattern

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52 points birdculture | 1 comments | 02 Dec 25 08:58 UTC | HN request time: 0.294s | source
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ilitirit ◴[07 Dec 25 15:18 UTC] No.46182293[source]▶
I had a lengthy argument about this in our architecture forum. I argued that "re-use" shouldn't be included as an Enterprise (keyword here) Architecture principle because they are clear use-cases where duplication is preferable to alternatives. e.g. deployment and testing decoupling etc etc. I had a lot of resistance, and eventually we just ended up with an EA principle with a ton of needless caveats.

It's unfortunate that so many people end up parroting fanciful ideas without fully appreciating the different contexts around software development.

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1. StellarScience ◴[07 Dec 25 16:04 UTC] No.46182689[source]▶
> It's unfortunate that so many people end up parroting fanciful ideas without fully appreciating the different contexts around software development.

Of course that's true of both sides of this discussion too.

I really value DRY, but of course I have seen cases where a little duplication is preferable. Lately I've seen a steady stream of these "duplication is ok" posts, and I worry that newer programmers will use it to justify copy-paste-modifying 20-30-line blocks of code without even trying to create an appropriate abstraction.

The reality of software is, as you suggest, that there are many good rules of thumb, but also lots of exceptions, and judgment is required in applying them.