in reply to Re: The Law of Inconsistent Assumptions
in thread The Law of Inconsistent Assumptions

This is actually what I have been doing in my real programming life, and it has been proved to be very efficient.

When I discuss with one person, or a group of people, for each key point, I always rephrase what I heard (obviously I interpreted it already), and ask the person to confirm.

At the end of discussion, I will again recap all what I got in my own words, and ask everybody in the room to agree or disagree.

By doing this, you largely reduce the chance of misunderstanding.

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Re^3: The Law of Inconsistent Assumptions
by DrHyde (Prior) on Oct 20, 2004 at 09:01 UTC
    I even go a little further. Often when I get a written spec from a client, I rewrite it in my own words, and get them to sign off on it. It catches some quite nasty errors in interpretation.