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Programming by and large is NOT creative. As a software engineer, I don't understand where this idea comes from. Sure if you're coming up with cutting edge mac

Programming by and large is NOT creative. As a software engineer, I don't understand where this idea comes from. Sure if you're coming up with cutting edge machine algorithms or coming up with the product features or designs that you're then going to implement, there might be a great deal of creativity involved. But most programmers are simply solving technical problems assigned to them by a product manager. There is nothing "creative" about fixing a bug, adding a new feature to a website (that you didn't design yourself), streamlining your deployment process, or reducing the latency on your server. As a software engineer, the one thing I dislike about my job is the lack of creativity, which is why I find myself pursuing arts in my free time (eg. video game design, music).

nstart 11y ago
> But most programmers are simply solving technical problems assigned to them by a product manager. Solving technical problems is a creative process. No technical problem that I have ever come across requires the exact same solution for it. You have to think about how you want to express the solution to a given problem. How complex or verbose do you want it to be? Sure there are patterns, but what design patterns can you use to solve this? How do you modify a design pattern to really suit the given problem. Programming IS a creative process. It's a process where you cannot ever document how something must be done in a step by step manner which is applicable in every given situation that the document refers to. If one's job feels like a job dependent on rote, then that's an issue with the job. The software industry does not encourage creative process in many ways, and that holds true even for the design industry. It's why so many people break away to become independent designers or developers. It's why there are so many sites and comics dedicated to highlighting the absurdities of clients. The discipline of programming or design both require creativity. We are however surrounded by corporations and people that believes that developers and designers should be moved to a factory line type process whereby any creativity you can express is effectively reduced to nil. I totally get this. My day to day programming at work doesn't get me feeling like I'm truly exercising my brains. It's mostly handling instructions handed down to me. But when I get home and fire up my editor. Ah. It feels like I've just donned a superhero's cape and I'm embarking on an adventure. A superhero who can look at a problem, and with some lines in a text file can hopefully connect with another person in making their life better. If that isn't art, I don't know what it is. PS - If someone wants to make a comic around superhero devs, do make a husband and wife one. "Dev Dave and Dev Dana: Adventures in 4D"
ploxiln 11y ago
You could add one more line of crappy code to work around another line of crappy code, when explicitly asked to by your product manager, but that's a pretty bad way to do it. Even if a lot of people out there are doing it to make a living. It does take creativity to come up with a better way to arrange the code, to balance robustness, performance, and simplicity. Elegance (and even simplicity) is subjective. There are different styles that can work, but you kind of have to have good taste to end up with a good result. It's an art.
gaius 11y ago
Well, being creative by and large is NOT creative either. Take the musician who spends days practicing their scales or playing sheet music, for every minute of original composition they do.

nstart 11y ago

> But most programmers are simply solving technical problems assigned to them by a product manager. Solving technical problems is a creative process. No technical problem that I have ever come across requires the exact same solution for it. You have to think about how you want to express the solution to a given problem. How complex or verbose do you want it to be? Sure there are patterns, but what design patterns can you use to solve this? How do you modify a design pattern to really suit the given problem. Programming IS a creative process. It's a process where you cannot ever document how something must be done in a step by step manner which is applicable in every given situation that the document refers to. If one's job feels like a job dependent on rote, then that's an issue with the job. The software industry does not encourage creative process in many ways, and that holds true even for the design industry. It's why so many people break away to become independent designers or developers. It's why there are so many sites and comics dedicated to highlighting the absurdities of clients. The discipline of programming or design both require creativity. We are however surrounded by corporations and people that believes that developers and designers should be moved to a factory line type process whereby any creativity you can express is effectively reduced to nil. I totally get this. My day to day programming at work doesn't get me feeling like I'm truly exercising my brains. It's mostly handling instructions handed down to me. But when I get home and fire up my editor. Ah. It feels like I've just donned a superhero's cape and I'm embarking on an adventure. A superhero who can look at a problem, and with some lines in a text file can hopefully connect with another person in making their life better. If that isn't art, I don't know what it is. PS - If someone wants to make a comic around superhero devs, do make a husband and wife one. "Dev Dave and Dev Dana: Adventures in 4D"

ploxiln 11y ago

You could add one more line of crappy code to work around another line of crappy code, when explicitly asked to by your product manager, but that's a pretty bad way to do it. Even if a lot of people out there are doing it to make a living. It does take creativity to come up with a better way to arrange the code, to balance robustness, performance, and simplicity. Elegance (and even simplicity) is subjective. There are different styles that can work, but you kind of have to have good taste to end up with a good result. It's an art.

gaius 11y ago

Well, being creative by and large is NOT creative either. Take the musician who spends days practicing their scales or playing sheet music, for every minute of original composition they do.