Re:Ask HN: Maybe I kind of suck as a programmer – how do I s...
by fornever on Friday December 09, 2016 @09:06PM
(#13143581)
I wouldn't say that programming is primarily creative, at least not as an industry activity. Development overall can be creative, but the code itself is to a large extent utilitarian. I don't think the difference, as stated by the poster, is creativity, but workmanship. In that sense programming is more like a craft.
Re:Ask HN: Maybe I kind of suck as a programmer – how do I s...
by GuiA on Friday December 09, 2016 @11:09PM
(#13143967)
The plan drawing and model making in architecture is to a large extent utilitarian; would you say that architecture isn't creative?
Have you seen a sculptor at work? There is nothing inherently creative about the hundreds of hours spent chipping away little bits of rock.
What you describe is true in any art - the macroscopic creative vision is supported by the microscopic repetitive work.
Re:Ask HN: Maybe I kind of suck as a programmer – how do I s...
by itamarst on Saturday December 10, 2016 @08:43PM
(#13149108)
To put it more succinctly: there will always be someone better you.
But there's a good side that - if there's someone better than you that means you have someone to learn from. So when you encounter good code take the time to learn from it (and from the mistakes its authors made when they were less experienced: https://codewithoutrules.com/2016/03/22/language-evolution/).
Writers realize that there are other people who can write an extremely well-structured, gripping novel in a matter of months. Artists see their colleagues do live drawing and suddenly understand that something that is painful and difficult for them comes easy for these other people. (I don't have musical talent, but I expect something similar happens there.)
Are they geniuses? Probably some are, but mostly they have just worked very hard and built a set of habits that lets them approach creative problems with that seeming ease.
Making software is really primarily a creative pursuit like these others -- it just has a bit more math and a bunch more high-tolerance engineering thrown in.
Personally I think of programming as a cross between architecture and writing: I'm making something that has a visual presence and which end users can "live in" or "visit" (very much like a building), but it's also a story because the interactive medium necessarily imposes a narrative. This way of thinking helps me figure out the elements that go into software products... But probably everybody must find their own metaphors to make sense of what they want to do in this field.