Software Eats Software Development as Andreessen Invests $10M in App Outsourcer • Hacker News Board

Re: Software Eats Software Development as Andreessen Invests $10M in App Outsourcer

#121

Post by codeshaman » Tue, Dec 08, 2015, 12:18 AM UTC

thewarrior wrote: post #100

codeshaman wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm guessing too.. Still, there is undisputed progress being made in the field of rapid software development and dev tools and AI ... While not there yet, if the progress continues at the same pace, we will be there within a decade.

Could you share any examples ?

First of all there is tooling - lots of smarter and smarter editors, IDEs, mockup creators, programming languages and environments, graphical editors and so on..

Then there's github and software which is built out of 'dependencies' and the programmer only needs to write the glue code between the various components developed and maintained by others.

And then there are the advances in AI - like natural language comprehension, voice recognition, search, vision and so on.

Put the three together and you'll be able to explain what you want created in natural language, while using your fingers to "sculpt" the generated user interface if necessary.

Still not there yet, but it seem quite possible in the not so distant future.

Re: Software Eats Software Development as Andreessen Invests $10M in App Outsourcer

#122

Post by pjmlp » Tue, Dec 08, 2015, 7:00 PM UTC

woah wrote: post #81

pjmlp wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One needs to move up the ladder to architecture, customer management, .... That is my feeling with the current offshoring practices. The way to stay in business in software development in any given country is to move into roles that cannot be easily offshored. There will always be a country where development costs are cheaper, when the software devs in a country start to level up their earnings, companies will move t…

What is "architecture"?

Depends who you ask, as there are different types of "Architects", under "Solution Architect", "Business Architect", "Technical Architect",...

For me, I only care about the technical part of it, meaning:

- Translating requirements into technical specifications

- Designing the application modules and their relationships

- Selecting the languages, libraries and frameworks allowed in the project

- Full stack technical documentation

- Designing and implementation of the continuous deployment infrastructure

- Having an overall picture how all modules come together

- Taking part in the development team as senior coder

Those were just a few examples. Of course, the roles one takes are very dependent on team size and type of customer.

However not all architects are made alike. Meaning while I consider critical that one has a foot in both worlds, architecture and coding, in many enterprise companies that isn't the case.

Moreover usually descriptions like "Solution Architect" and "Business Architect" tend to be alias to roles like "Product Owner" or "Project Manager".

Re: Software Eats Software Development as Andreessen Invests $10M in App Outsourcer

#123

Post by cheez » Tue, Dec 08, 2015, 7:55 PM UTC

simonswords82 wrote: post #105

cheez wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This type of progression in software development is inevitable. Groups of people writing individual lines of code for bespoke apps will one day go the same way looms in factories went after the industrial revolution. > I run a software company, and we've actually moved away from fixed price projects and only provide development on a day rate. Fixed price/scope/timescale projects are incredibly risky, require massiv…

It is of course inevitable that somebody more intelligent than me is going to automate the development of bespoke software. We don't automate software development, we still do it the old fashioned way. As such rather than attempt to tackle the problems associated with fixed price projects, we changed our business model to charge a day rate and reduce risk that way. We took this approach because we don't have millions…

Perhaps. A lot of meatspace architecture has been automated as well so you may be right in your prediction, but I think it will come about more organically through the use of specialized software tools. Eventually developers/engineers will be just like plumbers.