Have you ever tried to debug an electronic circuit?

I'd say the "fiddliness" of electronics is orders of magnitude above any high level software development. Turns out you have the wrong resistor? 2 day wait for a new one. One slip of a wire? Chip's blown. 2 day wait for a new one. Weird behaviour? If you don't have an oscilloscope you're completely in the dark. Debugging CSS may be tricky, but there's a suite of tools available which are yours in a few minutes. The power available in free debugging tools is equivalent to a 6 figure rack of electronics equipment.

All of that is true, but it isn't as bad as it once was. You can buy a 100 MHz oscilloscope for ~300 USD now; cheaper than an old used Tek, and better. Resistors are so cheap, buy a kit of them. Since the internet, not only can you get parts cheap, you can get them pretty quickly too; though, I have to admit though, my progress on a weekend project was halted Saturday because I had procrastinated ordering a few parts.

At least for basic electronic circuits, or even simple software projects, the difficulty becomes apparent when you move outside your normal comfort zone. Debugging even simple software is quite vexing to newcomers; I heard someone say it's like a blind person learning to paint portraits (though the one who said it wasn't blind).

>The power available in free debugging tools is equivalent to a 6 figure rack of electronics equipment.

They always charged too much for that crap. Thank goodness for open standards and cheap digital stuff.

I had :(