[LRUG] Software Craftsmanship

[Eleanor McHugh]

On 11 May 2009, at 14:04, Anthony Green wrote:
>> Software craftsmanship is also described sometimes through "softer  
>> terms" like
>> aesthetics:
>>
>> http://jaoo.dk/presentation/Aesthetic+programming+with+Ruby
>
> I find myself draw not only to the aesthetic notion of beautiful  
> code (has
> anyone else seen Marcel Molina's talk on the subject ?)
>
> ..but other notions we have in Fine Art like apprenticeship, which I  
> see
> expressed in concepts that Andy Hunt discusses in his writing on the  
> Dreyfus
> model

Everything I know about software - which considering I can't remember  
how much I've forgotten could be very little by now - is a result of  
being incredibly passionate and totally wrong. In other words, it's  
the product of experience. If that's not the definition of a craft  
then I don't know what is.

Unfortunately software development also requires strong mathematical  
sensibilities and that leads to this strange belief that it is in fact  
a science, or at least an engineering discipline. It's true you *can*  
build software that way, but the end-product tends to be sterile and  
brittle. Much better I think to develop good instincts and aesthetics,  
a feel for the medium (the machine) and the tools at your command,  
than to slavishly follow method and prescription.

Apparently I'm a romantic :)


Ellie

Eleanor McHugh
Games With Brains
http://slides.games-with-brains.net
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