Good software knows when to stop • Hacker News Board

Re: Good software knows when to stop

#61

Post by ryandrake » Thu, Mar 05, 2026, 5:04 PM UTC

wenbin wrote: post #47

We should normalize "finished" software products that stop feature creep and focus strictly on bug fixes and security updates. It takes real courage for a builder to say, "It’s good enough. It’s complete. It serves the core use cases well." If people want more features? Great, make it a separate product under a new brand. Evernote and Dropbox were perfect in 2012. Adding more features just to chase new user growth of…

This is one of the biggest issues in software development: So few projects are willing to admit that they are finished. I can probably count on one hand how many software products I use every day that actually get better (or stay the same) on update. The vast majority of them peaked somewhere around v1.0, and are just getting worse every time the developer touches them.

Re: Good software knows when to stop

#62

Post by lemagedurage » Thu, Mar 05, 2026, 5:08 PM UTC

thewebguyd wrote: post #23

john_strinlai wrote: post #12

> Ignore feature requests — don't build what users ask for; understand the underlying problem instead not quite in the same area, but this advice reminds me of blizzard and world of warcraft. for years and years, people requested a "classic" WoW (for non-players, the classic version is an almost bug-for-bug copy of the original 2004-2005 version of the game). for years and years, the reply from blizzard was "you thin…

To be fair on the Blizzard example, I think Blizzard could have also made the player base just as happy by, doing as your quote said, understanding the underlying problem. It wasn't only a "we want WoW classic bug for bug," it was "the modern game has become so unrecognizable that it's basically WoW 2.0, you ruined it with the modern systems" Blizzard could have rolled back LFR/LFG, class homogenization, brought back…

We shouldn't discount nostalgia. Sometimes an otherwise objectively worse product is better because it reminds people of the past.

Re: Good software knows when to stop

#63

Post by river_otter » Thu, Mar 05, 2026, 5:08 PM UTC

It's the wonderful part about OSS and 'mission-driven' projects. If the mission is not to make money, then a project is free to reject addons/etc that might be lucrative but not add value to the core of the product

Re: Good software knows when to stop

#64

Post by bob1029 » Thu, Mar 05, 2026, 5:10 PM UTC

I think notepad.exe is the strongest example of this right now.

The amount of hacking required to even be allowed to re-associate text files with that particular exe on Win11 was shocking to me. I get that windows is extremely hostile to its users as a general policy, but this one felt extra special.

Re: Good software knows when to stop

#65

Post by john_strinlai » Thu, Mar 05, 2026, 5:11 PM UTC

sfink wrote: post #58

john_strinlai wrote: post #12

> Ignore feature requests — don't build what users ask for; understand the underlying problem instead not quite in the same area, but this advice reminds me of blizzard and world of warcraft. for years and years, people requested a "classic" WoW (for non-players, the classic version is an almost bug-for-bug copy of the original 2004-2005 version of the game). for years and years, the reply from blizzard was "you thin…

Users usually don't know what they really want. But neither do developers or product managers. The "understand the underlying problem" part is hard , and easy to convince yourself of incorrectly. There are also shallow wants and deeper wants. I don't have the experience to know, but my guess is that classic WoW was more of a shallow want, where people were very happy to get it, but the deeper want was more about a st…

>I don't have the experience to know, but my guess is that classic WoW was more of a shallow want, where people were very happy to get it, but the deeper want was more about a style and feel of gameplay. The players would be happier with new stuff that kept the magic of the classic game, [...]

>In a perfect world, some designer would come along and incorporate carefully selected bits and pieces of the new version, probably with some novel changes to balance it out, and end up with something superior to both classic and new WoW.

this is exactly what they put a lot of effort into for 5-10 years or so. years! blizzard convinced themselves that the players asking for classic didn't really want classic, they just wanted some of the feeling of classic bolted on to the current game.

but players actually, really, 100% truthfully, no exaggeration, wanted classic WoW. not retail WoW with some classic-feeling bits. they wanted (basically) bug-for-bug classic.

and it worked out great in the end! classic is thriving. retail is thriving. no balancing act between the two player bases needed.

Re: Good software knows when to stop

#66

Post by latexr » Thu, Mar 05, 2026, 5:14 PM UTC

tambourine_man wrote: post #57

ssenssei wrote: post #11

I built a spotify music extractor called harmoni that helps you download your playlists and I feel I'm done. It does its job and it caters to both non-technicals and technical people alike.

Spotify is a moving target, however. It may change its API, remove it completely, etc. I think you can only be truly done if you don’t rely on a third party.

> I think you can only be truly done if you don’t rely on a third party.

On a third-party that changes. Making software for a specific hardware like a game console or a specific e-reader may still technically rely on a third-party but doesn’t carry the same risk and you can definitely say you’re done.

Re: Good software knows when to stop

#67

Post by dpcx » Thu, Mar 05, 2026, 5:14 PM UTC

I notice at this time there are no comments about systemd. I figured there would be at least one comment about it and "it does not try to do everything".

Re: Good software knows when to stop

#68

Post by patcon » Thu, Mar 05, 2026, 5:15 PM UTC

Maybe good software is like a living thing?

It grows and grows and eventually slows or grows too much and dies (cancer), but kinda sheds its top-heavy structure as its regrown anew from the best parts that survived the balanced cancer of growth?

Just forks and forks and restarts. It's not the individual piece of softwares job (or its community's) to manage growing in the larger sense, just to eventually leave and pass on its best parts to the next thing

Re: Good software knows when to stop

#69

Post by smm11 » Thu, Mar 05, 2026, 5:18 PM UTC

grishka wrote: post #29

xg15 wrote: post #27

Good software doesn't get you VC funding.

As if VC funding is a good thing. Good software is made by individual people, nonprofits, or privately-owned entities.

And AI.

Re: Good software knows when to stop

#70

Post by latexr » Thu, Mar 05, 2026, 5:18 PM UTC

jasonlotito wrote: post #32

grishka wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As if VC funding is a good thing. Good software is made by individual people, nonprofits, or privately-owned entities.

VC funding gets you paid, which is a good thing. Not getting paid is less good.

> VC funding gets you paid

So does robbing a bank. But it’s far from the only option. Plenty of indie developers thrive without any VC funding, and I thank every one of them for it. VC funding is essentially a guarantee that if the software isn’t shit now, it’ll be in the future, and that the creators care more about the money than doing something good. Case in point, the deterioration of 1Password.