bloom­berg.com: Paul Ford: What is Code?   #

paul ford:

We are here be­cau­se the edi­tor of this ma­ga­zi­ne as­ked me, “Can you tell me what code is?”

“No,” I said. “First of all, I’m not good at the math. I’m a pro­gramm­er, yes, but I’m an East Co­ast pro­gramm­er, not one of the­se se­rious plat­form peo­p­le from the Bay Area.”

und dann hat paul ford fast 30tau­send wör­ter auf­ge­schrie­ben, übers pro­gram­mie­ren, über al­go­rith­men, über das, was un­se­re zu­kunft ent­schei­dend mit­ge­stal­ten wird. und so wie es sich auf den ers­ten paar sei­ten liest, ist das al­les bril­li­ant, gut ver­ständ­lich und nach­voll­zieh­bar ge­schrie­ben.

At this stage in the mee­ting, you like to look sup­pli­cants in the eye and say, OK, you’ve gi­ven me a date and a bud­get. But when will it be done? Re­al­ly, tru­ly, top-line-re­ve­nue-re­port­ing fi­nis­hed? Come to con­fes­si­on; un­bur­den your soul.

This time you stop yours­elf. You don’t want your in­quiry to be met by a pa­tro­ni­zing sigh of im­pa­ti­ence or an­o­ther ex­pl­ana­ti­on about ship dates, Agi­le cy­cles, and con­ti­nuous de­li­very. Bet­ter for now to hide your igno­rance. When will it be done? You are lear­ning to ac­cept that the ans­wer for soft­ware pro­jects is never.