You are confusing scopes here. The parent almost surely meant those approaches applied to a single task (meaning a few hours to a day of work), not to building an application.
Being pedantic - the parent was commenting on the article, not on a comment here dealing with a single task or one small piece worth a day's work. I see no indication on how you could make a statement saying "...almost surely meant..." Based on the information available, either of our premises could be true.
The authors main complain was that it takes two minutes to start the emulator. And I agree that it is a Pita. But as a mental exercise or fun experience, you should 1) Picture it in your head 2) Make a plan 3) Write it down 4) Read through it and fix errors 5) Test it on the emulator.
You could start with a small ten minute fix, then work your way up. The feeling when it compiles and just works on the first try is amazing.
