Comment on Don't Shave That Yak (2005)parentComments−taneq6yIf it's not necessary to complete the task then it's not yak shaving, it's just procrastination.−kthejoker26yWell, sure, procrastination is a subset of yak shaving ... but it's also a matter of degree.Consider my example of evaluating ORMs.Option 1: Blindly choose first ORM from a Google search.Option 2: spend 2 hours reading reviews, blogs, etc. to compare the 3 most popular ORMs.Option 3: spend a day spinning up containers for each ORM, testing out a CRUD prototype for each, evaluating some basic cases.Option 4: spend a week down the deep rabbit hole of ORM internals, query rolling, edge cases at scales your app will never see ...And everything in between. None of it's necessary - even the ORM itself - but it's not all wasted effort either.
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If it's not necessary to complete the task then it's not yak shaving, it's just procrastination.
Well, sure, procrastination is a subset of yak shaving ... but it's also a matter of degree.
Consider my example of evaluating ORMs.
Option 1: Blindly choose first ORM from a Google search.
Option 2: spend 2 hours reading reviews, blogs, etc. to compare the 3 most popular ORMs.
Option 3: spend a day spinning up containers for each ORM, testing out a CRUD prototype for each, evaluating some basic cases.
Option 4: spend a week down the deep rabbit hole of ORM internals, query rolling, edge cases at scales your app will never see ...
And everything in between. None of it's necessary - even the ORM itself - but it's not all wasted effort either.