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Chess TDD 10: A Knight’s Tale

Okay, I promise, no more of these titles after this edition.  But, to make up for it, this time I actually wrote the code and did the audio in the same day, so I remember very well what I was talking about.

Here’s what I accomplish in this clip:

  • Move Queen into it’s own class.
  • Implement Knight with GetMovesFrom()

Here are some lessons to take away:

  • It’s okay to be obtuse for a while in your TDD, if doing so helps your understanding. I started with a hard-coded thing to get the first test pass and then did another for the second. Both tests would need to continue passing, and I was feeling my way through what to do. As long as you get going at some point, this is okay. Whatever helps.
  • Try to avoid getting into a routine. By getting a fresh look, I was able to define a method that I thought improved readability and aided code use. I’d written a number of things like this before, but I always try to think of new ways to approach problems, rather than settling into a routine of semi-mindless work.
  • If you’re not careful, you can get a little ahead of yourself. I was on auto-pilot and didn’t realize I wasn’t compiling for a while before I corrected myself.
  • Get it working first, and then worry about cleanup later. You can always make things more elegant later, when it’s working (at least when you do TDD).

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[…] Chess TDD 10: A Knight’s Tale – Erik Dietrich continues his series looking at the implementation of a chess game using Test Driven Development practices, mostly exploring the implementation of the Knight piece. […]

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