The coding culture at M$
Posted on February 20, 2008
Filed Under Software Eng |
Why are the Microsoft Office file formats so complicated? (And some workarounds) - Joel on Software
A normal programmer would conclude that Office’s binary file formats:
- are deliberately obfuscated
- are the product of a demented Borg mind
- were created by insanely bad programmers
- and are impossible to read or create correctly.
You’d be wrong on all four counts.
The one true statement that is missing from above is the culture of development that lead to such a complicated spec: are not designed following software engineering principles.
The details provided in Joel’s post expose the lack of disciple to age old software principles (that for the most part are still unknown to many in the field) Low cohesion, high coupling, poorly defined interfaces, and (most importantly) little information hiding led to the mess that is the Office binary file formats.
If that is the software culture that designed the Office specs, is it any wonder Windows works so well.
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