Without having read anything specific yet (why speak from knowledge, when I can speak for the much larger opposing constituency):
The arbitrary functional values and how to process them are not really significant as long as they remain consistent within the timeframe that they are active. But because changes in the processing directly and immediately alter the nature of the program, its not a trivial problem that a data collection test would be drastically different from an actual implementation.
I kind of agree with Brion's criticism in this regard, that having some data doesnt do anything useful and therefore lacks purpose. In that regard, such a thing in and of itself can be dangerous to even test -- if only because it sours the concept in people's minds without actually putting into a functional implementation. Even if vandalism isnt the problem, its still a problem of a proposed major functionality being in actuality only 'free spinning wheels without any traction.'
Its clear that there are some general ideas for how to use the data, but what to do with the data is something that needs to be part of the test implementation; What's the point of taking a car to the test track if its just a shell with suspension, and the engine still back at the shop?
Ie. its not clear that any effort spent now on pushing it uphill wouldnt just end up with it rolling further back down the hill. The first point of any test run is to test the engine -- the other stuff is secondary. Such a 'spinning wheels' test wouldnt even be suitable for simple -- meta maybe -- and would be expected to fail in giving any accurate results which could be applied to a functional model.
Stevertigo
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