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Though I must say the software industry is particularly guilty of stealing and corrupting terms from other fields. One particularly irksome example for me (as a

Though I must say the software industry is particularly guilty of stealing and corrupting terms from other fields. One particularly irksome example for me (as a former architect) is the word 'design'. When a software engineer says design he means css essentially, making it visually pretty. Whereas in architecture / engineering / industrial design etc. 'Design' means.. everything, the overall design or plan of your entire system. Thats just one small example that gets my goat up, there are tonnes more! I might agree with some of your other examples, but not this one so much. Software engineers, i.e. computer programmers who actually write design documents before they write code, have never used the word design for visually pretty. The word design has a separate and equally legitimate history coming from graphic design and world of commercial art and drafting. There's a not-insignificant intersection between that world and the world of front-end web programming where the word design is used to describe the a site's visual appeal and not the overall plan of the system.

everyone 11y ago
"Software engineers, i.e. computer programmers who actually write design documents before they write code, have never used the word design for visually pretty." Agreed thats the way it should be but I have rarely seen that to be the case in my experience, though that is anecdotal. "The word design has a separate and equally legitimate history coming from graphic design and world of commercial art and drafting." I think your stumbling there logically a bit. Graphic designers also use the word design, so do fashion designers and so on, but similarly to architects and engineers they also use the word design to denote the overarching scheme of their entire project, not just the aesthetic aspect of it (as these programmers I am referring to do). Typographers had a lot of other technical factors to worry about in their design apart from just the visual appeal and clarity, similarly fashion designers must design their clothes to accomodate a certain 3d shape and withstand all sorts of structural stresses and deformations.
- CountSessine 11y ago
  I think your stumbling there logically a bit. 0_o Graphic designers also use the word design, so do fashion designers and so on, but similarly to architects and engineers they also use the word design to denote the overarching scheme of their entire project, not just the aesthetic aspect of it (as these programmers I am referring to do). Typographers had a lot of other technical factors to worry about in their design apart from just the visual appeal and clarity, similarly fashion designers must design their clothes to accomodate a certain 3d shape and withstand all sorts of structural stresses and deformations. You're reaching. And the only thing sillier than us arguing about this is you being upset that someone is using the word design as it appears in the dictionary: 1. a plan or drawing produced to show the look and function or workings of a building, garment, or other object before it is built or made 2. an arrangement of lines or shapes created to form a pattern or decoration The article is about the very real problem with the confusion between hard real-time vs soft real-time systems, which is about the suitability of a tool to a set of requirements. Your complaint about the word design doesn't seem to apply.
  - everyone 11y ago
    I totally agree that this issue is far far less clearly delineated than 'real-time' and its a relatively muddy issue of semantics, though it is worthy of debate imo. I stand by my assertions. When an artist talks about their design they mean the entire creation. The dictionary definitions you presented are two homonyms. #1 is sort of what we are discussing though a better definition would be the verb form. "verb (used with object) To plan and fashion artistically or skillfully." #2 is another meaning which could be used in the sentence "The birthday card had a pretty little design in the corner" You will not find many artists referring to their work as #2. Of course there are people whose job it is to design the pretty designs for the corners of birthday cards. What they produce is designs #2 but what they do is design #1

everyone 11y ago

"Software engineers, i.e. computer programmers who actually write design documents before they write code, have never used the word design for visually pretty." Agreed thats the way it should be but I have rarely seen that to be the case in my experience, though that is anecdotal. "The word design has a separate and equally legitimate history coming from graphic design and world of commercial art and drafting." I think your stumbling there logically a bit. Graphic designers also use the word design, so do fashion designers and so on, but similarly to architects and engineers they also use the word design to denote the overarching scheme of their entire project, not just the aesthetic aspect of it (as these programmers I am referring to do). Typographers had a lot of other technical factors to worry about in their design apart from just the visual appeal and clarity, similarly fashion designers must design their clothes to accomodate a certain 3d shape and withstand all sorts of structural stresses and deformations.

CountSessine 11y ago
I think your stumbling there logically a bit. 0_o Graphic designers also use the word design, so do fashion designers and so on, but similarly to architects and engineers they also use the word design to denote the overarching scheme of their entire project, not just the aesthetic aspect of it (as these programmers I am referring to do). Typographers had a lot of other technical factors to worry about in their design apart from just the visual appeal and clarity, similarly fashion designers must design their clothes to accomodate a certain 3d shape and withstand all sorts of structural stresses and deformations. You're reaching. And the only thing sillier than us arguing about this is you being upset that someone is using the word design as it appears in the dictionary: 1. a plan or drawing produced to show the look and function or workings of a building, garment, or other object before it is built or made 2. an arrangement of lines or shapes created to form a pattern or decoration The article is about the very real problem with the confusion between hard real-time vs soft real-time systems, which is about the suitability of a tool to a set of requirements. Your complaint about the word design doesn't seem to apply.
- everyone 11y ago
  I totally agree that this issue is far far less clearly delineated than 'real-time' and its a relatively muddy issue of semantics, though it is worthy of debate imo. I stand by my assertions. When an artist talks about their design they mean the entire creation. The dictionary definitions you presented are two homonyms. #1 is sort of what we are discussing though a better definition would be the verb form. "verb (used with object) To plan and fashion artistically or skillfully." #2 is another meaning which could be used in the sentence "The birthday card had a pretty little design in the corner" You will not find many artists referring to their work as #2. Of course there are people whose job it is to design the pretty designs for the corners of birthday cards. What they produce is designs #2 but what they do is design #1