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Ask HN: Any recommended resources to develop system thinking?

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Re: Ask HN: Any recommended resources to develop system thinking?

#13

Post by bauerd »

notduncansmith wrote: post #4

Rich Hickey has some great talks on YouTube. If you are a software engineer: Build a simple database, a simple interpreter, and a simple web application (backend and frontend). Read about “distributed systems”, “devops”, “Conway’s Game Of Life”, and “fractals”. Read about these technologies/techniques (in whatever order is comfortable), how they work, their pros and cons, why they were created, how they compare to al…

Huh? I currently work with some of the technologies you mention, but fail to see the connection to systems theory. Can you elaborate why e.g. jq or Erlang are relevant here?

Re: Ask HN: Any recommended resources to develop system thinking?

#14

Post by bordercases »

llamaz wrote: post #10
bordercases wrote: post #6

The box-and-arrows paradigm for systems, built in the 50s and enjoying popularity briefly in the 80s, is overrated, and has been outmoded by the likes of complexity theory. This is due to the fact that box-and-arrows systems like those made by Club of Rome to predict civilizational collapse carry strong assumptions as to the nature and structure of underlying variables and as such become very brittle as the size of t…

Very interesting. Can I ask from which background you came to be interested in systems (e.g. biology or electrical engineering)?

Philosophy and Design, I wanted to understand the world in the most general way possible to be flexible enough to adopt to any problem. I also like thinking clearly and being right

Re: Ask HN: Any recommended resources to develop system thinking?

#15

Post by bordercases »

bauerd wrote: post #13
notduncansmith wrote: post #4

Rich Hickey has some great talks on YouTube. If you are a software engineer: Build a simple database, a simple interpreter, and a simple web application (backend and frontend). Read about “distributed systems”, “devops”, “Conway’s Game Of Life”, and “fractals”. Read about these technologies/techniques (in whatever order is comfortable), how they work, their pros and cons, why they were created, how they compare to al…

Huh? I currently work with some of the technologies you mention, but fail to see the connection to systems theory. Can you elaborate why e.g. jq or Erlang are relevant here?

Most of those technologies are known for either how they handle complexity, or the coordination between asynchronous actors with shared resources

Re: Ask HN: Any recommended resources to develop system thinking?

#17

Post by sz4kerto »

Read 'Domain driven design'. Read about product development and talk to non-technical product owners, CEOs, and so on. One of the major challenges in building functional systems is to understand the domain as that's what going to constrain you in the real life.

Re: Ask HN: Any recommended resources to develop system thinking?

#18

Post by ioddly »

notduncansmith wrote: post #4

Rich Hickey has some great talks on YouTube. If you are a software engineer: Build a simple database, a simple interpreter, and a simple web application (backend and frontend). Read about “distributed systems”, “devops”, “Conway’s Game Of Life”, and “fractals”. Read about these technologies/techniques (in whatever order is comfortable), how they work, their pros and cons, why they were created, how they compare to al…

Where does one get started building a simple database?
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