I first got interested in programming in the early 90's. By the mid 90's I was writing fairly complex software using C and Pascal on an old mac that I bought with weekend job money.
I remember compiling programs with full graphical interfaces and 2d sprite games etc into binaries of only a few hundred kilobytes.
A few months ago I helped an acquaintance write a battleships game for windows console in C++ using visual studio. Compiled binary was 2.something megabytes!! For a fucking text based console game!
Could have made the exact same thing 30 years ago in dos and it would have been single digit kilobytes compiled. What the fuck is in there??
That's the code that stops the program from running unless the user has the right version of Microsoft Visual C++ Redistributable installed, so that you never know whether your Win32 applications will run on machines other than the one you compiled on. It's a feature!
Well, to be fair, might there have been debug symbols and the like in the binary? I also believe there typically are various compiler flags that can be used to decrease the size of the produced binary.
I want to see progress. I want change. I want state-of-the-art in software engineering to improve, not just stand still. I don’t want to reinvent the same stuff over and over, less performant and more bloated each time. I want something to believe in, a worthy end goal, a future better than what we have today, and I want a community of engineers who share that vision.
You are not alone, I am daily fighting the the goal to make programming great again.
I hate this SCRUM! I hate it because developers that like it becomes losers. People that used to be good developers became stuck in the losers mindset and nowadays they even don't bother to ship something that is good. It is frustrating to have a struggle to make good software because in their losers mindset they are pre-programmed that it can't be done. Their mindset is stuck to this silly believe that you need a complete SCRUM team to do the job of one good developer.
However not everything is doom and gloom. The best developers have already moved on to a world where there is a steeper learning curve: Building their own hardware from scratch. Design PCB's, solder the electronics, build their hardware, program their hardware, build their own hardware tools like 3D printers and laser cutters. The bad developers can't reach that level anymore.
I do think that kernel developers in Linux, now that Linux has turned full SJW with their stupid CoC, will find new ground away from these forced social PC. These kernel developers probably will start to create their own hardware.
I never understood why developers have this stupid need to work together to build a giant project together where complete idiots can destroy your code and you are called a bully. Working together means that you are a beta. real developers take charge and becomes the alpha.
Working alone will always be slower and way more inefficient than working with other people, as long as those other people know what they're doing, the codebase is modular, and the purposes of different modules are well defined.
Bad people creep in for a number of different reasons:
Collaboration requires a network of trust (if you're constantly checking people, you may as well just do their job), and vetting people is hard. As the network grows, decay is practically inevitable.
Determining what is actually BAD and what's a difference of opinion that could be a valuable addition to the project is a very hard problem
Men don't like telling women they suck, so that filter tends to be much weaker
This problem is inevitable. Attempted takeovers by people who optimized to take things over (not build) will happen in any new project that becomes valuable. The more time you spend fending off those people, the less time you spend contributing and the worse the code gets. The more time you spend contributing, the more likely it is the incompetents will take over.
The only solution is shield your network with a very high bar of entry and to sacrifice a fair amount of development time to vetting people. Keeping that up indefinitely is very, very difficult.
Look at the big picture.. at one time, kids in bedrooms developed popular games. Building a PC was for the truly tech savvy. Then it became an appliance. Who is to blame? The consumer. They ask for no more than they get. They put up with vulgar amounts of spy and bloat ware. When I try to GIVE Linux machines to people, on completely configured machines that are ready to go, they winge and moan and eventually fine the hole.. "Well, if I cannot do my 1040EZ on Trubo Tax, I cannot use it. Thanks though."
And yes, the profession has changed over the years. It is now fully operated by the fortune 500. When have you seen the big companies innovate while having fun? If you no longer like the environment, it is time to get out. Are you afraid to leave the Friday paycheck? If you have to have that check and bennies at the end of the week, well, buck up and do another worthless project meeting.
At the end of the day, though, you must CHOOSE.
Text editors! What can be simpler? On each keystroke, all you have to do is update tiny rectangular region and modern text editors can’t do that in 16ms.
This guy is clueless as fuck. It takes someone with very, very little understanding of software to make this statement.
There's many different classes of software. The comment about the Python script he quotes is actually pretty reasonable if it's just some disposable script you run only a few times. It only becomes unreasonable when thousands or millions of CPUs are running it over and over that it becomes worth rewriting for efficiency.
Observing that 90% of developers are worthless trash is pretty trite. Sturgeons law applies as much to software as anything else.
Most software is not on the same level as building construction or aircraft design. Not even close. People who do that employ pros, not soy drinking JavaScript faggots.
Lets see -- most hardware is backdoored, open source software communities are being divided with "codes of conduct" (read: leverage to viciously attack innocent people). Oh, and 99% of computers sold these days are marketed exclusively towards gamer fags.
TLDR: when developers hand over their hard work on a silver platter to capitalism, corruption, and brainwashed trannies with various mental illnesses, what the fuck did they expect to happen? Hate to say it, but most men are fucking emasculated pussies these days. The need to grow a pair a learn to take responsibility for the future of their shit instead of cashing out to psychopaths.
This is a good read but at the same time you have to realize that the companies paying the programmers don't care about 99% of what he wrote about. I have been juggling 6-8 projects by myself for multiple years at this point. I don't have time to continually optimize. My manager sure as shit isn't gonna want me spending time doing that either.
13 comments
0 u/auto_turret [OP] 26 Sep 2018 08:52
I especially appreciate this quote from the essay:
0 u/lobust 26 Sep 2018 11:47
I first got interested in programming in the early 90's. By the mid 90's I was writing fairly complex software using C and Pascal on an old mac that I bought with weekend job money.
I remember compiling programs with full graphical interfaces and 2d sprite games etc into binaries of only a few hundred kilobytes.
A few months ago I helped an acquaintance write a battleships game for windows console in C++ using visual studio. Compiled binary was 2.something megabytes!! For a fucking text based console game!
Could have made the exact same thing 30 years ago in dos and it would have been single digit kilobytes compiled. What the fuck is in there??
0 u/DukeofAnarchy 26 Sep 2018 12:33
That's the code that stops the program from running unless the user has the right version of Microsoft Visual C++ Redistributable installed, so that you never know whether your Win32 applications will run on machines other than the one you compiled on. It's a feature!
0 u/siener 26 Sep 2018 12:58
yeah its the same here on linux. I think its just shitty compilers.
0 u/notenoughstuff 26 Sep 2018 18:03
Well, to be fair, might there have been debug symbols and the like in the binary? I also believe there typically are various compiler flags that can be used to decrease the size of the produced binary.
0 u/roznak 26 Sep 2018 22:39
You are not alone, I am daily fighting the the goal to make programming great again.
I hate this SCRUM! I hate it because developers that like it becomes losers. People that used to be good developers became stuck in the losers mindset and nowadays they even don't bother to ship something that is good. It is frustrating to have a struggle to make good software because in their losers mindset they are pre-programmed that it can't be done. Their mindset is stuck to this silly believe that you need a complete SCRUM team to do the job of one good developer.
However not everything is doom and gloom. The best developers have already moved on to a world where there is a steeper learning curve: Building their own hardware from scratch. Design PCB's, solder the electronics, build their hardware, program their hardware, build their own hardware tools like 3D printers and laser cutters. The bad developers can't reach that level anymore.
I do think that kernel developers in Linux, now that Linux has turned full SJW with their stupid CoC, will find new ground away from these forced social PC. These kernel developers probably will start to create their own hardware.
I never understood why developers have this stupid need to work together to build a giant project together where complete idiots can destroy your code and you are called a bully. Working together means that you are a beta. real developers take charge and becomes the alpha.
0 u/Dupinstein 29 Sep 2018 17:28
Working alone will always be slower and way more inefficient than working with other people, as long as those other people know what they're doing, the codebase is modular, and the purposes of different modules are well defined.
Bad people creep in for a number of different reasons:
This problem is inevitable. Attempted takeovers by people who optimized to take things over (not build) will happen in any new project that becomes valuable. The more time you spend fending off those people, the less time you spend contributing and the worse the code gets. The more time you spend contributing, the more likely it is the incompetents will take over.
The only solution is shield your network with a very high bar of entry and to sacrifice a fair amount of development time to vetting people. Keeping that up indefinitely is very, very difficult.
0 u/Patriot-1-nerd 27 Sep 2018 18:30
Look at the big picture.. at one time, kids in bedrooms developed popular games. Building a PC was for the truly tech savvy. Then it became an appliance. Who is to blame? The consumer. They ask for no more than they get. They put up with vulgar amounts of spy and bloat ware. When I try to GIVE Linux machines to people, on completely configured machines that are ready to go, they winge and moan and eventually fine the hole.. "Well, if I cannot do my 1040EZ on Trubo Tax, I cannot use it. Thanks though." And yes, the profession has changed over the years. It is now fully operated by the fortune 500. When have you seen the big companies innovate while having fun? If you no longer like the environment, it is time to get out. Are you afraid to leave the Friday paycheck? If you have to have that check and bennies at the end of the week, well, buck up and do another worthless project meeting. At the end of the day, though, you must CHOOSE.
0 u/KikesDidJFK 01 Oct 2018 00:34
Not really. Building has PC has always been childs play. It's barely any more complicated than lego.
0 u/KikesDidJFK 01 Oct 2018 00:25
This guy is clueless as fuck. It takes someone with very, very little understanding of software to make this statement.
There's many different classes of software. The comment about the Python script he quotes is actually pretty reasonable if it's just some disposable script you run only a few times. It only becomes unreasonable when thousands or millions of CPUs are running it over and over that it becomes worth rewriting for efficiency.
Observing that 90% of developers are worthless trash is pretty trite. Sturgeons law applies as much to software as anything else.
Most software is not on the same level as building construction or aircraft design. Not even close. People who do that employ pros, not soy drinking JavaScript faggots.
0 u/blargh55 03 Oct 2018 22:42
I work in software. I loved software.
Each passing day I am starting to dislike it more and more. Software and computers just kind of suck ass overall. sigh
Probably a mid life crisis
0 u/insanitea 08 Oct 2018 23:55
Lets see -- most hardware is backdoored, open source software communities are being divided with "codes of conduct" (read: leverage to viciously attack innocent people). Oh, and 99% of computers sold these days are marketed exclusively towards gamer fags.
TLDR: when developers hand over their hard work on a silver platter to capitalism, corruption, and brainwashed trannies with various mental illnesses, what the fuck did they expect to happen? Hate to say it, but most men are fucking emasculated pussies these days. The need to grow a pair a learn to take responsibility for the future of their shit instead of cashing out to psychopaths.
0 u/aCuriousYahnz 13 Oct 2018 01:03
This is a good read but at the same time you have to realize that the companies paying the programmers don't care about 99% of what he wrote about. I have been juggling 6-8 projects by myself for multiple years at this point. I don't have time to continually optimize. My manager sure as shit isn't gonna want me spending time doing that either.