Why premature optimization is the root of all evil. In the management language

April 8, 2006 by Artem Marchenko

The program optimization is performed in order to reduce the execution time, memory usage, bandwidth or some other resource. Optimization essentially means sacrificing the clear, simple and understandable code architecture. As a result the level of complexity increases, debugging and restructuring becomes more time-consuming and more expensive.

It is simply a lot cheaper to get a clear working and testing code before the start of the optimization. As a side effect, a set of unit tests (if you practice them) will protect you from the potential regression coming from the optimization actions.

"If you haven't achieved quality in your product development process, it makes zero sense to start optimizing it". (Linda Hayes, Worksoft, Inc ). It costs too much. Tell it your boss. He might not understand the programmer "feelings", but gets the money language very well.

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