The virtues of flying solo
January 27, 2011 - 0 Comments - programming
In the last month, I’ve had ample time for the first time in a long time to really dive into a solo programming project. It was something I had actually been working on for longer than that, but not until this last month have I had the rare chance to work completely uninterrupted on my own. The result is a product launch—that’s right, this thing is shipping, next week! When that happens, I will write a more detailed post about some of the approaches, fairly unique to the Rails world, which I took to a few different problems.
But first, I wanted to write a post reflecting on the merits of working alone as a programmer. There are many articles which talk about the different challenges and advantages of working in teams, but rarely on programming solo. This makes sense, to an extent, as most of us have Actual Paying Jobs™ and work with teams more than we work alone, and there is also all the ongoing buzz about the benefits of pair programming over the last several years. At the same time, though, it’s surprising, since most of the best programmers I’ve met on various teams got their start doing it on their own, as a hobby, as an amateur, a lover of the craft, and only joined com…
