Reading06

ESR describes a cathedral a ‘carefully crafted by individual wizards … with no beta to be released before its time.’ He then mentions how the Linux community, ‘resemble[s] a great babbling bazaar or differing agendas and approaches.’ The Linux community was able to use this bazaar style and by a miracle produce Linux. In the cathedral model things seem to just be very put together. Like you know what the outcome will look like and what needs to go into this in order to have a successful output. The bazaar model just seems like a hodgepodge of things trying to come together to have a successful output.

As I’m thinking about these different coding styles I also think about an actual cathedral and a bazaar. Although, I have never been in a market in a Middle Eastern country, I have in Latin America and it is wild but amazing at the same time. When one walks into a cathedral there is a sense of reverence or stillness and silence. This is very different than a market where people are selling things, there’s talking, bargaining, and things from all over, etc. So now, going back to using that as a model of software development I can see how a bazaar would work way better. For the most part one know the requested outcome, but does not know the path to get to the outcome which is makes it hard to see the cathedral approach as realistic.

If for some reason the cathedral model would be more realistic, I could see how it could be the superior model. I just don’t see how it could be played out in most software development teams. Like I would hate my job if I couldn’t test and see what the customer actually wants but produce something that’s perfect. Maybe I just have the wrong idea of the cathedral model.

Anywho, a principle that he enumerates that I believe rings true is number one, “Every good work of software starts by scratching a developer’s personal itch.’ I feel like usually the things that are good have resulted from a programmers desire to look into an issue and solve it. This is not necessarily the case for everything, but I definitely think it is a starting point for most solutions. It’s also think that the phrasing is interesting because usually that itch is an annoyance of having to do it all. the. time.

The future of software development I think is going to stay how it is now until people find a different way to make a profit other than keeping their code sealed. Unfortunately because the bigger companies feel like being open-source is not the best way they will continue keeping their code from the world. I definitely think that people contributing in different ways somehow creates a more structured code (because others need to be able to read it) or someone goes in to make sense of it and document it. This also allows for different ideas to flow and progress to be made! I definitely can see things being open-source in the far future but unfortunately I don’t think it’ll happen anytime soon.

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Reading05

The success of modern hackers such as Paul Graham says that our present society and its future is people will hope to get rich by creating the ‘next big thing’. By doing so, it seems that many young adults will work extremely hard during their twenties and then when everyone is in their thirties they’ll party and eventually settle down in their forties. It seems that if people get rich now then that pushes off all of the work that had to be done over thirty years and they’ll just have more time to do all of the things (travel, SLEEP, hobbies, not work on projects, or homework assignments, or study for tests, etc.).

I don’t think our society and culture should encourage risk taking and starting businesses because I think it could lead to a tremendous amount of people taking risk after risk and failing. Like I get that people will create start ups and become rich, but I don’t think it should be as encouraged as a way to be successful. I also am going in a really different way of life where money is not a ‘goal’ for me at the moment so it’s really hard for me to see that as a motivation. Like if someone gave me a million dollars I would pay my loans and donate most of it… Yeah. I would rather start a non-profit and help the world in a different way. I am not saying that people who are rich / start businesses don’t help the world, but I think it would be really difficult for me to do so in that way!!

Also, Paul Graham’s justification of income inequality is interesting. I feel like first, the rich are just average people so why does it have to be bad that that’s how these people want to live. I feel like now many people have learned to value experiences which is something that was not necessarily an opportunity available a hundred years ago. Like I would rather travel and learn about various cultures than have servants or material items. So, although rich people may seem like they live like an ‘average’ person it could be that they enjoy spending their money on different things than people a hundred years ago.

I think the next big thing is something with education, so I’m assuming web or an app. I think by providing education to people or even helping the education system is what people will want to invest in. I feel like this could go two ways: really well and help developing countries, or take a turn and increase the competitiveness in having our children excel at a young age. I definitely think this could be of use for people with disabilities. I met a little girl who loved learning with a program that was specific for children with dyslexia because that allowed her to learn and move forward. I also just reread this paragraph and realized I have so much hope for our society…

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