josem-co-8ssbyq.txt - davideisinger.com

josem-co-8ssbyq.txt (4980B)
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     10 The beauty of finished software
     11 
     12 October 31, 2023
     13 
     14 Let me introduce you to [8]WordStar 4.0, a popular word processor from the
     15 early 80s.
     16 
     17 Wordstar 4.0 WordStar 4.0
     18 
     19 As old as it seems, George R.R. Martin used it to write “A Song of Ice and
     20 Fire”.
     21 
     22 Why would someone use such an old piece of software to write over 5,000 pages?
     23 I love how he puts it:
     24 
     25     It does everything I want a word processing program to do and it doesn't do
     26     anything else. I don't want any help. I hate some of these modern systems
     27     where you type up a lowercase letter and it becomes a capital. I don't want
     28     a capital, if I'd wanted a capital, I would have typed the capital.[9]
     29     George R.R. Martin
     30 
     31 This program embodies the concept of finished software — a software you can use
     32 forever with no unneeded changes.
     33 
     34 Finished software is software that’s not expected to change, and that’s a
     35 feature! You can rely on it to do some real work.
     36 
     37 Once you get used to the software, once the software works for you, you don’t
     38 need to learn anything new; the interface will exactly be the same, and all
     39 your files will stay relevant. No migrations, no new payments, no new changes.
     40 
     41 This kind of software can be created intentionally, with a compromise from the
     42 creators that they won’t bother you with things you don’t need, and only the
     43 absolutely necessary will change, like minor updates to make it compatible with
     44 new operating systems.
     45 
     46 Sometimes, finished software happens accidentally; maybe the company behind it
     47 has disappeared, or the product has been abandoned.
     48 
     49 There are also some great examples in the UNIX world of finished software:
     50 commands like cd(to change the current directory) or ls(to list what’s there)
     51 won’t ever change in a significant way. You can rely on them until the end of
     52 your career.
     53 
     54 The seduction of constant updates
     55 
     56 Our expectations for software are different from other products we use in our
     57 daily lives.
     58 
     59 When we buy a physical product, we accept that it won’t change in its lifetime.
     60 We’ll use it until it wears off, and we replace it. We can rely on that product
     61 not evolving; the gas pedal in my car will always be in the same place.
     62 
     63 However, when it comes to software, we usually have the ingrained expectations
     64 of perpetual updates. We believe that if software doesn’t evolve it’ll be
     65 boring, old and unusable. If we see an app with no updates in the last year, we
     66 think the creator might be dead.
     67 
     68 We also expect new versions of any software will be better than the previous
     69 ones. Once it’s released, most of our problems will be solved! What a deceiving
     70 lie.
     71 
     72 Sometimes, a software upgrade is a step backward: less usable, less stable,
     73 with new bugs. Even if it’s genuinely better, there’s the learning curve. You
     74 were efficient with the old version, but now your most used button is on the
     75 other side of the screen under a hidden menu.
     76 
     77 Finished software is a good reminder
     78 
     79 In a world where constant change is the norm, finished software provides a
     80 breath of fresh air. It’s a reminder that reliability, consistency, and user
     81 satisfaction can coexist in the realm of software development.
     82 
     83 So the next time you find yourself yearning for the latest update, remember
     84 that sometimes, the best software is the one that doesn’t change at all.
     85 
     86 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
     87 
     88 References
     89 
     90 [1] George R.R. Martin in Conan show (2014). [10]https://www.youtube.com/watch?
     91 v=X5REM-3nWHg.
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    108 References:
    109 
    110 [1] https://josem.co/
    111 [2] https://josem.co/
    112 [3] https://josem.co/articles/
    113 [4] https://josem.co/subscribe/
    114 [5] https://josem.co/work/
    115 [6] https://josem.co/about/
    116 [8] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WordStar
    117 [9] https://josem.co/the-beauty-of-finished-software/#rf1
    118 [10] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X5REM-3nWHg
    119 [14] https://josem.co/articles/index.xml
    120 [15] https://www.buymeacoffee.com/josem.co
    121 [16] https://josem.co/
    122 [17] https://mstdn.social/@josem
    123 [18] https://twitter.com/gilgado_
    124 [19] https://josem.co/articles/index.xml
    125 [20] https://www.buymeacoffee.com/josem.co
    126 [21] https://josem.co/the-beauty-of-finished-software/#top
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