And that pyramid, well, it definitely is the way how a corporate and enterprise Java software has been and still being made. Java itself is an ecosystem for creating coding factories - to parallelize the process of coding (one cannot honestly call this programming) among teams of easily replaceable, uniform (in terms of abilities) cheap workers. Every manager will tell about this ideal.
For programming look at PAIP or the lisp code supplement to AIMA - this is programming. Take a look at Plan9 - this is programming. People who have created Erlang were engaged in programming. Code that runs Google's AI is programming. This is an art, same as writing poetry, composition of music, writing symphonies or complex novels.
But there are very few slots available, because demand for programming is very low - it is still difficult and very expensive. Conveyor belt coding, on the other hand, is indeed fits the Kay's pyramid metaphor. And the result of such process is crap - everyone have seen "enterprise code" made by such sweat shops..
The crucial difference between an art and merely piling up more crap is that art means an attempts to approach an ideal, an optimum, perfection - it is, ideally, a reduction process with eventually converges to the closest possible approximation to an ideal. Something like this:
[] ++ ys = ys
(x:xs) ++ ys = x : xs ++ ys
While in the in the second case is just a process of production. Not in the sense of Japanese perfection of every move and detail, but in the sense a hipster produces yet another narcissistic blog post.
> And that pyramid, well, it definitely is the way how a corporate and enterprise Java software has been and still being made. Java itself is an ecosystem for creating coding factories - to parallelize the process of coding (one cannot honestly call this programming) among teams of easily replaceable, uniform (in terms of abilities) cheap workers. Every manager will tell about this ideal.
So is the web today, its bloat eclipsing even Enterprise Java. The idea you described is the idea all businesses pursue, because it's the one of reducing costs and increasing profits.
> The crucial difference between an art and merely piling up more crap is that art means an attempts to approach an ideal, an optimum, perfection - it is, ideally, a reduction process with eventually converges to the closest possible approximation to an ideal.
Unfortunately you can rarely get paid for this.
In a way, I'm happy markets are not efficient. A lot of good, important, useful and/or beautiful stuff would never be done if the market was perfectly efficient.
Pyramids are nothing. Judging how things are going, I'm sure in a far distant future on the most advanced spaceships in the galaxy there will still be a Windows XP workstation running some critical machinery.
And they'll have a couple cryogenically frozen 20th century sysadmins in case the thing breaks.
Not really. Most pyramids are throwaway. The web is 99% throwaway code. Businesses themselves are throwaway too, so a lot of software made by them and for them goes to bin after few years.
What remains? Projects that are so useful that dominate their niche. Windows, Linux. Office. Photoshop. CAD tools. I suspect VLC will remain, 7zip may too. Some of those tools are pyramids, some others aggregation of small artpieces. I don't think survival depends on whether or not the software is a pyramid or a thatch hut.
Personally, I'm evidence for it, since I spend my days building pyramids, and program only on the side.
But the entire thing does not add-up. The artful activity is so much more productive that I can not stop believing that in any market you are able to create a slot doing it, you will outcompete all the pyramid builders. (Yet this pyramid pays me too well to just abandon it.)
could you, please, elaborate on this meme?
And that pyramid, well, it definitely is the way how a corporate and enterprise Java software has been and still being made. Java itself is an ecosystem for creating coding factories - to parallelize the process of coding (one cannot honestly call this programming) among teams of easily replaceable, uniform (in terms of abilities) cheap workers. Every manager will tell about this ideal.
For programming look at PAIP or the lisp code supplement to AIMA - this is programming. Take a look at Plan9 - this is programming. People who have created Erlang were engaged in programming. Code that runs Google's AI is programming. This is an art, same as writing poetry, composition of music, writing symphonies or complex novels.
But there are very few slots available, because demand for programming is very low - it is still difficult and very expensive. Conveyor belt coding, on the other hand, is indeed fits the Kay's pyramid metaphor. And the result of such process is crap - everyone have seen "enterprise code" made by such sweat shops..
The crucial difference between an art and merely piling up more crap is that art means an attempts to approach an ideal, an optimum, perfection - it is, ideally, a reduction process with eventually converges to the closest possible approximation to an ideal. Something like this:
While in the in the second case is just a process of production. Not in the sense of Japanese perfection of every move and detail, but in the sense a hipster produces yet another narcissistic blog post.BTW, Asperger is this. And it is not that bad.)