I make those. And yes, it’s 90% boring in terms of tech. The exciting part is to make something that my users like to use, that fits them like a glove. And polish. Polish is hard and endless, there is always a tension between pragmatism and perfectionism.

Those two parts demand the most seamless and direct expression, and continuous feedback. It’s not quick, it’s deliberate and diligent. That’s what I value and aspire to.

There's always challenges.

Let's say we needs some forms. Nothing to fancy. Consider 2 options: React+JS+Redox+formLib+... and Elm.

It just some banal forms, I agree. But having to come back to it may months/years later I much rather see back the Elm situation.

Typing helps a lot here. Small scope project too.

Now it seems this "build in minutes" uses JS and PHP. Sorry, but both are terrible choices for long term maintainability.

In my experience, 99% of every app is CRUD. Then there's the 1% that is your differentiation that takes six months to build.

To the instrument analogy it's like Beethoven's 5th. Almost anyone can play the beginning on the piano with a few minutes of fooling around (dun dun dun da....). But to actually play the entire thing well will take years of practice because it's the other parts that are hard to get right and must be correct to work.

The vast, vast majority of playing an instrument well is about deep technical skill, not creativity. That's what we're discussing here.