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Fast Software, the Best Software (2019)

craigmod.com

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Re: Fast Software, the Best Software (2019)

#61

Post by roncesvalles »

On this note, (from a web dev perspective) I think we've overdone making the static build as lean as possible and pushing everything into the backend. E.g., if a 2MB dataset will make a search/select bar return results instantly instead of having to roundtrip an API, just send up the whole dataset with your initial load. After gzip it's nowhere close to 2MB anyway.

Also, I think suspense is an anti-pattern now. We've all been conditioned to groan every time we see suspense animations because it means the website must be slow. It's better to just have a little circling loader or just freeze.

Re: Fast Software, the Best Software (2019)

#62

Post by BoingBoomTschak »

marginalia_nu wrote: post #30
ungreased0675 wrote: post #16

I run headless Alpine Linux (a minimal distro) in my homelab and it’s fast AF. The lag in Windows Explorer is sad when something like cd folder/folder is instant in Linux.

I really don't understand how you can even create software that feels as bad to use as Windows Explorer. It's like it's barely attached to reality. There's this weird floaty delay in everything. You copy a file, or did you? You're not sure. It hasn't updated yet. Oh, now the copy dialog appears with this progress bar that isn't showing progress. The dialog just sits there. Is something happening? I don't know. Many s…

Wild theory for fun: this is on purpose to condition people in order to seamlessly switch to OneDrive as whole data drive.

At least your description matches some the pain I get using NFS + lf.

Re: Fast Software, the Best Software (2019)

#63

Post by marginalia_nu »

BoingBoomTschak wrote: post #62
marginalia_nu wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really don't understand how you can even create software that feels as bad to use as Windows Explorer. It's like it's barely attached to reality. There's this weird floaty delay in everything. You copy a file, or did you? You're not sure. It hasn't updated yet. Oh, now the copy dialog appears with this progress bar that isn't showing progress. The dialog just sits there. Is something happening? I don't know. Many s…

Wild theory for fun: this is on purpose to condition people in order to seamlessly switch to OneDrive as whole data drive. At least your description matches some the pain I get using NFS + lf.

Well yeah, it kinda feels like you're using NFS, and the server you're connecting to is in orbit around mars and is using a pringles cantenna to get its wifi signal back to earth.

Like the vanilla file explorer experience is way worse than anything I've come to expect with stuff like CIFS and SMB.

Re: Fast Software, the Best Software (2019)

#64

Post by mikebs1 »

kazinator wrote: post #53

If the software is fast as a byproduct of being simple, that tends to align with correctness. If it is fast because it is optimized, then that does not align with correctness, because optimizing something that works only adds risk.

In production operations this plays out concretely. The systems that hold up under incident pressure are almost always the simple ones. Clever optimizations are the first things to behave unexpectedly at 2am.

Re: Fast Software, the Best Software (2019)

#66

Post by jimbokun »

Sesse__ wrote: post #44
rossant wrote: post #10

I fully agree. I loathe slow software. I hate bloat. I love fast software. As a developer, I'm completely, even irrationally, obsessed with speed, performance optimization, and profiling. I wish more developers felt the same way.

The sad part is that most employers don't care particularly about performance optimization skills (the economics don't work out, they can often just fix the problem cheaper with more hardware—and even if they can't, they mostly don't bear the cost themselves). The fun part is that when your employer _does_ care about software optimization, few people are actually good at it and your skills are more exclusive :-)

This is true until they see the AWS bill after moving all their infrastructure there in a difficult to undo manner.

Suddenly they are very aware of the costs of inefficient software.

Re: Fast Software, the Best Software (2019)

#68

Post by jimbokun »

jdw64 wrote: post #13

Fast and efficient software varies depending on the local context, but for me, I think I'd be fine with something slower as long as it's convenient enough. After all, once it passes a certain threshold, I can barely even notice the speed difference anyway. I wonder what OP's thinks of IDEs like VSCode. Would they see it as heavy and not great because it's Electron-based? But I find IDEs convenient.

Didn’t ask me but I’ve been enjoying Zed and finding it a big improvement over using VS Code.

Re: Fast Software, the Best Software (2019)

#69

Post by NateEag »

dmurray wrote: post #57
rurban wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. It's their route function which sucks compared to Google maps. Their data is better and newer.

Isn't OSM the data layer, and people are free to build apps on top of it? "The data is better than Google maps, it just needs a better routing algorithm" should be catnip to a certain class of OS dev. If it's really true, I'll take a crack at it myself!

It's not true.

At least, not exactly.

At its best, the OSM data puts Google to _shame_. Super-fine resolution and details, nuances of street layout precisely correct, mountains of meticulously-maintained metadata that makes manifold niche geospatial apps possible.

Alas, in any given area, OSM is only as good as the union of the publicly-provided street data and the obsessiveness of the area's mappers.

Most towns in central PA, for example, have no street address listed for hundreds of buildings.

I've made many small contributions to help, and really enjoy doing so, but someone looking for driving directions needs to be able to whip out their phone and slap in an address / business name and have it Just Work.

You can't reliably count on OSM for that.

I wind up falling back from OsmAnd to Gmaps probably every fifth drive.

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