The maturity of a developer is very similar to that of a kid going through their childhood years. (NOTE: The following is more of a disclaimer for all my current and future entries than it is an anecdote.)
When you are a kid, you view the world as black and white. Some of this is based on the values instilled in you by your parents. For instance, the classic, "Don't talk to strangers" or "Never take candy (or anything) from strangers". Ok, so these are very basic concepts, but you get the idea. And then as you gain some real world experiences, you realize that principles you believed in aren't always applicable. There are exceptions and you begin to be flexible in your views. Kind of like the evolution of software, from an out-of-the-box experience to a customizable world. The customizable world caters to the specific needs dictated by the customer/environment. I digress. So, we'll call this the grey area.
As you mature as a developer, there is also this tendency towards grey areas. When you are a young developer, your head is a plethora of ideas and concepts you've read about and automatically, you start having rules to abide by. But much like the maturity of a human being, your experiences in the software industry force you to become more flexible and you begin to see more of this grey area. Use the right tool for the right job as they say. Or, implement with the context of your system in mind. Hence, this is a disclaimer for my entries, present (remote debug, custom errors, file layout) and in the future, or blog entries of others. There are not always hard and fast rules you should follow. Not in real life and not in software development. So when we come across an article or blog entry with cool facts or neat tricks, I would recommend placing it in that grey area and determining if it is truly applicable to your circumstance. Even though I love listening to people's experiences, you always keep new advice as part of your logic bank. Better yet, try it out. Unlike some life experiences (i.e. taking candy from a stranger), the negative consequences of testing out your thoughts are not as great.
LINK OF THE DAY
Dependency Walker
http://www.dependencywalker.com/
- This is an invaluable tool when you are trying to track down which assembly or assemblies failed to load. The .NET exception stacks thrown for these are not always the most user friendly.