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UML was, in some sense, an expression of a certain kind of politics: ------------- "And there is an explicitly political idea that drove OOP to its peak in th

UML was, in some sense, an expression of a certain kind of politics: ------------- "And there is an explicitly political idea that drove OOP to its peak in the 1990s: the idea of outsourcing. The idea of outsourcing software development rested on some assumptions about how software development should work, in particular the idea of the “genius” architect, backed by an army of morons who act as secretaries, taking dictation. OOP was the software equivalent of a trend that became common in manufacturing during the 1980s: design should stay in the USA while actual production should be sent to a 3rd World country. Working with UML diagrams, writing code could be reduced to mere grunt work, whereas the design of software could be handled by visionaries, possessed with epic imaginations, who could specify an OO hierarchy which could then be sent to India for a vast team to actually type out. And the teams in India (or Vietnam, or Romania, etc) were never trusted, they were assumed to be idiots, and so, for a moment, there was a strong market demand for a language that treated programmers like idiots, and so the stage was set for the emergence of Java. " http://www.smashcompany.com/technology/object-oriented-programming-is-an-expensive-disaster-which-must-end http://www.smashcompany.com/technology/object-oriented-progr...

sgt101 10y ago
I was there until Java... the truth is that C++ in 1997 was a nightmare wrapped in a barbed wire horror story IF YOU WERE WRITING ENTERPRISE SOFTWARE java was a god send. Ok, it's wordy, ok it doesn't have a REPL but if you were living the life 20 years ago it was a godsend. The downside was that it took about £300 a day out of the market for contractors in 3 years.
kpil 10y ago
I think everything you say is true except the jab at java, which is also true, but not all the truth... Besides, during the 90s the idea seemed to be that that the next step after the outsourcing was actually no programmers at all. UML and 4gl systems would handle all the complexities and laymen domain experts could just define all bread and butter administrative systems they like - no expensive and socially awkward nerds in the basement necessary...
- csixty4 10y ago
  > during the 90s the idea seemed to be that that the next step after the outsourcing was actually no programmers at all Lest someone think this is an exaggeration, no, this was literally the conversation at the highest levels of some companies. A relative told me to reconsider going after a comp sci degree in 1995 because within ten years the computers would be programming themselves. There were presentations at their workplace about it. My first "real" job was programming customizations hacked on top of a 4gl tool - injecting JavaScript into pages through an improperly sanitized <label> widget! After the whole application was rewritten in the 4gl tool, it never lived up to its promise.
  - kpil 10y ago
    Fred Brooks where spot on in his thoughs regarding essential (as in inherent) complexity. I think that BPEL thankfully died just a couple of years ago, but not thanks to some globally aquired insight but rather because a new batch of developers isn't quite there yet so they are busy learning and reinventing basic stuff, but now at 'internet scale'

sgt101 10y ago

I was there until Java... the truth is that C++ in 1997 was a nightmare wrapped in a barbed wire horror story IF YOU WERE WRITING ENTERPRISE SOFTWARE java was a god send. Ok, it's wordy, ok it doesn't have a REPL but if you were living the life 20 years ago it was a godsend. The downside was that it took about £300 a day out of the market for contractors in 3 years.

kpil 10y ago

I think everything you say is true except the jab at java, which is also true, but not all the truth... Besides, during the 90s the idea seemed to be that that the next step after the outsourcing was actually no programmers at all. UML and 4gl systems would handle all the complexities and laymen domain experts could just define all bread and butter administrative systems they like - no expensive and socially awkward nerds in the basement necessary...

csixty4 10y ago
> during the 90s the idea seemed to be that that the next step after the outsourcing was actually no programmers at all Lest someone think this is an exaggeration, no, this was literally the conversation at the highest levels of some companies. A relative told me to reconsider going after a comp sci degree in 1995 because within ten years the computers would be programming themselves. There were presentations at their workplace about it. My first "real" job was programming customizations hacked on top of a 4gl tool - injecting JavaScript into pages through an improperly sanitized <label> widget! After the whole application was rewritten in the 4gl tool, it never lived up to its promise.
- kpil 10y ago
  Fred Brooks where spot on in his thoughs regarding essential (as in inherent) complexity. I think that BPEL thankfully died just a couple of years ago, but not thanks to some globally aquired insight but rather because a new batch of developers isn't quite there yet so they are busy learning and reinventing basic stuff, but now at 'internet scale'