Re:Why software sucks?
by icebraining on Sunday March 18, 2012 @02:25PM
(#3720373)
In my experience, if programmers always had a complete design specification before starting, and if we always "tore up" the old mess (down to something unquestionably stable) before making any improvements, our software would be much, much better. It'd probably also cost more.
And by the time the software was done, it'd be useless. A house doesn't get obsolete in ten years, but software - which is much more complex than a house - can be obsolete in ten months.
Not to mention that I'd rather not be reinventing the wheel every six months.
Re:Why software sucks?
by 4as198sGxV on Sunday March 18, 2012 @02:49PM
(#3720482)
I often hear that but it is no true in my experience. Maybe your run-of-the-mill flavour-of-the-month hipster web 2.0 app has a limited shelf life but most enterprise apps stay deployed for years.
Re:Why software sucks?
by icebraining on Sunday March 18, 2012 @03:02PM
(#3720539)
But is it because the needs haven't changed a bit, or because it's good enough and it'd cost too much to replace it? Because if software was always tored out, that would only accentuate the latter problem.
a: "We always tear out everything, down to the rafters." b: "That sounds expensive." a: "It can be, especially if you find out the wiring or something isn't up to code." b: "What if someone wants only---" a: "No, there's no 'only'."
In my experience, if programmers always had a complete design specification before starting, and if we always "tore up" the old mess (down to something unquestionably stable) before making any improvements, our software would be much, much better. It'd probably also cost more.
The biggest cause of this that I see is that the people paying for it are not the people using it. In the consumer market we are starting to see that good design does sell (I think it was Gropius who predicted that the cost of design is amortized). But with enterprise software, the people paying for it are rarely the ones using it, so they're perfectly willing to buy a lousy program if it means saving cash in the short term.