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You Can't Buy Integration

martinfowler.com

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Re: You Can't Buy Integration

#61

Post by 88913527 »

sdevonoes wrote: post #33
keyle wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I got bounced off a front-end job once, for not being good enough at React. Mind you I've been building SPA's since they weren't "a thing" and today I mostly use Vue. But for that role, they didn't like my lack of .env variables in the front-end (such as for things that end up in the HTML), after a 3 hours coding test, and a couple of minor React-y tid bits they couldn't even clarify. Basically, not "idiomatic". Mean…

> Meanwhile, none of them could tell me how React actually works, beyond throwing jargon vomit. They couldn't write a web application without React. The recruiter, which we had to go through, basically had no empathy and saw me as a failed resume. I felt pretty helpless, even though I've said many times to both parties that I wasn't a "React developer". But they don't make money by knowing "how React works". They mak…

I don't think React hooks will be outdated in 1-2 years. Between Svelte and Vue I don't see a path for a formidable challenger. You get the complete ecosystem around it. There's tools like Stencil, and I like those tools, but giving people whole-cloth access to make anything, with no 'base' design system, tends to lead to the creation of inaccessible UIs. And it's quite simple to introduce a11y issues. The front end stack isn't moving at the speed it did in the early 2010's, of which I am personally appreciative of.

Re: You Can't Buy Integration

#62

Post by AtlasBarfed »

keyle wrote: post #7
jefflombardjr wrote: post #3

Really great read. Long but worth it. This is a good critique of low-code/no-code in general. The root problem I see of "Unfortunately, when we frame the problem space that way, we have allowed our tools to think for us." is that in reality there are just not enough qualified software engineers out there.

I got bounced off a front-end job once, for not being good enough at React. Mind you I've been building SPA's since they weren't "a thing" and today I mostly use Vue. But for that role, they didn't like my lack of .env variables in the front-end (such as for things that end up in the HTML), after a 3 hours coding test, and a couple of minor React-y tid bits they couldn't even clarify. Basically, not "idiomatic". Mean…

if you are that good, then why are you wasting your time with front ends? Go into databases. You're apparently already starting to age out of the young and dumb and works overtime flotsam.

Re: You Can't Buy Integration

#63

Post by pqyzwbq »

Yes, Best programmers can win against any integration tools. But in real world, it rare to find enough "good programmers", so they can not abstract good components and good layers. So, at this case, the business integration tools will win. Those tools mainly sell best practices and well-tested components, so, although you are limited to what those tools provided, but will solve those tricky small things without your worry.

In the meantime, the business integration tools can learn more concepts from general programming languages, like: version control, unit test, external variables, integrate sub-components into another combined component, shared macros, etc.

Re: You Can't Buy Integration

#64

Post by oldsecondhand »

keyle wrote: post #53
gitfan86 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I did computer engineering in school 20 years ago, and have always enjoyed understanding technology. So I know what is happening from the gate in the cpu all the way up to the pixel in the monitor. The downside is that I'm spread pretty thin. I can't pass leetcode exams in the 30 minutes of allotted time, ops people can't understand why I don't use containers, and my knowledge is probably useless in making a modern C…

This resonates with me. I'm actually thinking that at some point, no one will be building custom software. Everything will be available off the shelf, as some product, running on some cloud within a few clicks. So "custom software" developers are a dying breed. For example, when Jira is down, a Jira "specialist" will tinker and bring it back and look like some guru walking down the mountain of knowledge. Arguably, th…

Custom software won't be dead because you can't buy integration off the shelf. And JIRA specialists and similar roles will just eat up more of the potential workforce that could be employed as software developers, so software developers will stay a valuable scarce resource.

Re: You Can't Buy Integration

#65

Post by lowercased »

gitfan86 wrote: post #37
debaserab2 wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It does make you wonder what is going to get missed though, doesn't it? Each generation gets to work on a level of abstraction higher than the one before it. I think about that often when I think about all the things I don't understand about hardware and EE.

I did computer engineering in school 20 years ago, and have always enjoyed understanding technology. So I know what is happening from the gate in the cpu all the way up to the pixel in the monitor. The downside is that I'm spread pretty thin. I can't pass leetcode exams in the 30 minutes of allotted time, ops people can't understand why I don't use containers, and my knowledge is probably useless in making a modern C…

At some point, you may have to look beyond traditional employment situations to best make use of your technical knowledge and experience. However, it might mean moving to consulting and possibly 'selling' yourself on a more regular/periodic basis.

I have soldered chips to boards .... close to 40 years ago, and plugged enough cards/cables together to last a lifetime. (I really don't like hardware stuff!). I've done basic Z80 and 6502 assembly up to ... web stuff today, and loads in between. I can passably describe the innards of some layer of various SQL engines, have compiled linux kernels and various packages from scratch, configured mail gateways, debugged DNS, setup/managed firewalls and intrusion detection systems, can often diagnose various application performance issues from description of symptoms alone, and can do many other things 'tech' related. (not trying to brag - loads of people here can likely do all of this, and more, and better, than me).

BUT... this set of skills often doesn't fit well within a traditional 'job' role. Finding situations where people can get/extract value from a wide variety of your skills is difficult (but can be rewarding when it's done).

I also can't do leetcode stuff, struggle with some 'point/click' things that others seem to find natural, and it can take me longer to 'produce' compared to others (although, I've often found myself cleaning up after others' projects when they leave).

I hope you have found (or can find) some situations that make the most of your skills, experience and perspectives!

Re: You Can't Buy Integration

#66

Post by tomnipotent »

kayodelycaon wrote: post #47
NikolaNovak wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All ERPs are fundamentally like that. At the end of the day you are purchasing a COTS product specifically to gain efficiency of industry best practices already coded for you. If you take a COTS product and then try to rewrite it to fit your "unique" business processes, we'll, that's why half of them fail. Implementation of erp is incorrectly and disastrously viewed as an IT project. It is first and foremost a busine…

This is why my company has custom applications that talk to the ERP for certain departments. Inventory control in the ERP isn’t going to work with reality. The data modeling is good enough but the interface is not. Rather than train everyone we hire to use horrifically bad and expensive barcode readers, we purchased cheap smart phones, put them in cases, and locked them down to run an app that uses the camera to scan…

> This is why my company has custom applications that talk to the ERP for certain departments.

This is the best approach. Inventory is a great example of something that is both very important to an ERP and needs to be modeled impeccably if you want accurate costs (think license plate numbers tracked back to manufacturing), but at the same time you sure as hell don't want your ERP to be the "system of record" for operational systems.

It was a very humbling experience working with accounting and finance to close the books and update forecasts.

Re: You Can't Buy Integration

#67

Post by tshaddox »

thewarrior wrote: post #29
gorgoiler wrote: post #21

Business logic happens line by line between interfaces. Coding may be all ifs and for loops, but when it comes to implementing a new feature, having chosen carefully where to draw the line between, say, your model and your view can be the difference between a 10 line patch and a complete rewrite . If you don’t have a culture of code review then maybe the rewrite will fly, bugs and all, through to production. If howev…

The line “coding is just if statements” really annoys me. I used to think this earlier in my career. It’s technically true but it means that you haven’t really grasped what makes programming hard. The real challenge of programming is how you organize a million if statements in a way that the system can be understood and evolved predictably and cheaply over time. And any tool that takes away the control of how you org…

> It’s technically true but it means that you haven’t really grasped what makes programming hard.

It’s roughly as useful as pointing out that constructing a skyscraper is really just applying forces to masses.

Re: You Can't Buy Integration

#68

Post by codebje »

randomdata wrote: post #39
thewarrior wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The line “coding is just if statements” really annoys me. I used to think this earlier in my career. It’s technically true but it means that you haven’t really grasped what makes programming hard. The real challenge of programming is how you organize a million if statements in a way that the system can be understood and evolved predictably and cheaply over time. And any tool that takes away the control of how you org…

Coding is just if statements, more or less. Programming and coding are different words with different meanings, though. What is the reason to conflate them?

Because 'coding' is just slang for 'programming'.

Re: You Can't Buy Integration

#69

Post by keyle »

AtlasBarfed wrote: post #62
keyle wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I got bounced off a front-end job once, for not being good enough at React. Mind you I've been building SPA's since they weren't "a thing" and today I mostly use Vue. But for that role, they didn't like my lack of .env variables in the front-end (such as for things that end up in the HTML), after a 3 hours coding test, and a couple of minor React-y tid bits they couldn't even clarify. Basically, not "idiomatic". Mean…

if you are that good, then why are you wasting your time with front ends? Go into databases. You're apparently already starting to age out of the young and dumb and works overtime flotsam.

I work at pretty much all levels of the pie, but my passion is with what the user interacts with, which is why I tend to gravitate towards the front-end.

Being "good" has nothing to do with being a back-end programmer, imho. One could even argue that the front-end of today is far more complex than most back-ends!

Re: You Can't Buy Integration

#70

Post by zmmmmm »

q-big wrote: post #60
csours wrote: post #4

You Can't Buy Understanding of Your Problems You Can't Buy Someone Else Caring about Your Problems It seems like you can hire experts to understand and consultants to care about your problems, but someone has to bring the intent and to close the loop.

> You Can't Buy Someone Else Caring about Your Problems This is easy: when you give people a huge amount of money to care about your problem, they will. This, of course, does not imply that they will be able to solve them. > You Can't Buy Understanding of Your Problems This is less easy, but also possible: spend sufficient money so that highly intelligent people (think graduated mathematicians or theoretical physicis…

> This is easy: when you give people a huge amount of money to care about your problem, they will

You can pay them enough to care as far as they get their last payment. How do you get them to care what happens after that?

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