The State of the Art is Terrible

Corpses write no code. shrugs

> If it was just one company that consistently produced crap software, it would be easy to say that there's probably something broken at that company.

Anything below the top, say, 2-5% of software is guaranteed to be shit because all the programmers below the top 2-5% are shit. There is no grand movement or methodology to be had here.

It's a people problem.

>For example, I might be writing a Jooma migration tool right now to fix the stupid 1.5->1.7 issues, and I'd be happy to release it and even support it for as long as people need it, but first I have to figure out what the hell is wrong with the wireless drivers in Linux on the new laptop...

This is why I use Linux for workstations where it seems more comfortable, and my Mac for my mobile machine as it's more tolerant of network/display disruption. I'm not trying to troll or be a Mac fanboy here, I prefer working in Linux as I am simply more productive and it's my production OS. But, a laptop that is on the move plays to the strengths of OS X sufficiently that I am travelling right now and using my Mac instead of my Linux laptop.

You're going to have to accept that if you use the wrong software for the wrong problems, you're going to keep getting poked in the eye. You're using bad hammers and complaining about how bad hammers are.

There's a distinction to be made, an important one.

>Now, here's the other half of it: support people are not your janitors.

Open source projects don't have "support people", they have contributors and devs that volunteer their time. I worked for a MOTU and volunteered in the #ubuntu channel on FreeNode for years. I've done thousands of man-hours of support. I know exactly how bad software is, and how bad the situation is.

I'm on your side here, but until you start solving the problems one at a time, nothing changes.

My apartment gets cleaned one trash bag at a time.

>The harder my job gets, the less likely I am to contribute.

Something's gotta give. Stuff like Joomla registers as shitware in the circles I go in.

Complaining about things like Joomla, PHP, Drupal, Outlook, etc. doesn't really register with me.

Might as well buy a Kia and complain about how terrible the state of automobiles are. The author had much stronger points than you have. You work with some terrible stuff, period.

Disagree. I don't think 95-98% of programmers are idiots. However, a lot of programmers (even some very smart ones) are terrible architects and have no sense of the big picture. Moreover, a lot of projects start out well but turn to shit through neglect and departure from the original architecture.

95-98% of software architecture is deplorable, but that's not because our industry is has 20+ idiots for every decently smart person. It's a lot more subtle than that. A big part of the problem is that most of professional programming is so disconnected and often alienating that a lot of programmers never learn architecture and its importance; the only way to really learn it is to support your own creation and experience first-hand the consequences of your original decisions. A lot of programmers never have that experience.

In sum, I think the general shittiness of the software industry and of architecture has a lot more to do with the fact that few programmers never have the experiences that will make them any good, than it does with a lack of talent. It takes 10,000 hours of deliberate practice to become good at something, but most of what most programmers do for work is not "deliberate practice"; it's repetitive drudge work that they often don't have the creative control to automate.

I didn't say that.

> It takes 10,000 hours of deliberate practice to become good at something,

People need to stop re-hashing this. 10,000 hours of deliberate practice is likely but not necessarily going to make you an excellent programmer. I know plenty of programmers in their 40s and older who have that much time in or more that are frankly, garbage.

Investing time is necessary, but insufficient, and there is no one grand unified number that defines all professions for what is necessary to become excellent for every individual.

I know a 60-something whose code output terrifies me and he has a great deal more than 10,000 hours invested in programming.

OTOH, one of the programmers I most deeply respect is a 50-year old woman.

It's hit or miss. In my experience, passion counts more than anything.

>but that's not because our industry is has 20+ idiots for every decently smart person.

Work at a major insurance/something-not-directly-related-to-software company. That's an optimistic ratio.