* Eric Cholet <cholet at logilune.com> [2004/02/10 17:27]:Le 10 f?vr. 04, ? 16:16, darren chamberlain a ?crit :
I agree with you, but, if you are already investigating software to handle a task, wouldn't you look at as many alternatives as possible?
I certainly wouldn't. Rather, I would look at as many alternatives
as necessary until I find the module that does what I want with
an API that suits me. More often than not it's been the first candidate.
But how would you know you found the right one if you don't look at all of them? The first might look good, but the second might be even better.
What's "the" right one? "A" right one is one that solves my particular
problem, and doesn't make jump through hoops. Most of the time the module
does one specific thing, and if I can just call methods to do that, then
that's "good enough". There are some external factors, for example when
I was looking for a logging module I looked at Log::Dispatch first because
I have previous satisfaction with its author's work.
There is of course another category of modules that I use, larger systems such
as a templating module, or a date module. For those, I have found that hanging
around mailing lists and forums quickly point me to the better alternatives.
For those the time/budget issue is even more crucial because they take
more effort and time to evaluate.
-- Eric Cholet
