Scenario 2: Clearly the child that did the research did a better job, since the objective of education is the acquisition of knowledge, including the recursive knowledge of how to go about finding the stuff that you want to learn about (Google, the library).

Scenario 1: A little tougher. Strictly on a code basis, I would favour the first programmer, even it burns me to hear (as it has other respondents here) that someone spent a weekend working up a demo instead of spending time with their friends or family. (Side note: I sure hope the manager who requested the demo on short notice gave Programmer A some time off in lieu. Sometimes business provides opportunities with short time-lines -- that's the way it is, folks.)

On a knowledge basis (that means, could the progarmmer answer a knowledge-based question in a demo), Programmer A is way ahead, having studied the manuals in question and having written code from scratch. I don't think anyone could argue that they would know code that they'd downloaded and studied better than code they'd written themselves.

Again, this is another "It depends" situation, since it could be that a large piece of the demo is covered by a mature CPAN module, and a wrapper is all that's needed.

--t. alex

"Mud, mud, glorious mud. Nothing quite like it for cooling the blood!" --Michael Flanders and Donald Swann

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