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The Future of Selling Stuff to Enterprisey Places is Showing Them Slick No Code Interfaces and Persuading Them It Will Allow Ordinary Users To Get Things Done

The Future of Selling Stuff to Enterprisey Places is Showing Them Slick No Code Interfaces and Persuading Them It Will Allow Ordinary Users To Get Things Done (but there will be severe limitations and in practice the users will end up logging calls to IT support)

kpil 8y ago
This is either just very misinformed or selling things to misinformed people. The fundamental problem is the inherent complexity in all but the simplest information systems. The skill set required for managing that complexity is basically the same as for a software developer - and software developers have developed their preferred tools for manage it, and the relevant reason that the tools are not better than they are is that it's hard to build good tools, not that software developers are inept for the task. I'm not saying that the tools can not be improved, but I'm saying that the tools won't be graphical. More intuitive prototyping tools are another thing though - I'm all for it.
- sneak 8y ago
  > This is either just very misinformed or selling things to misinformed people. It's possible that that is an accurate description of all "sales"; if they were properly/fully informed, it would be called "buying", not "selling".
pjmorris 8y ago
That strategy has worked since, at least, COBOL. I don't see the strategy breaking any time soon.
- AnimalMuppet 8y ago
  Indeed, the original design goal of COBOL was to make professional programmers unnecessary. That rather spectacularly failed to work.
  - himom 8y ago
    I think the same can be applied to Cucumber testing: having to write “natural language” tests in one area and then a bunch more code to interpret that dialect. Why not express tests directly in code like everyone else instead of pretending business people will ever write them, understand them or know their limitations? Cuke seems like extra busywork job security rather than GTD.
    - pjmorris 8y ago
      Despite plenty of experience to the contrary, I'm still a believer that there's some way to disentangle what needs to be done from how it needs to be done. I do think the business people have to understand what they're asking for, and how to tell whether they've got it. I don't think many of them are going to learn code to do it. Maybe there are documents out there, somewhere, that unambiguously describe what business people want and whether they've gotten it, but until I see those mythical creatures, I'm willing to cut Cuke some slack.
    - crdoconnor 8y ago
      Cucumber did get one idea right though - enforcing a separation of concerns between a high level non-turing complete specification and turing complete code that executes it. Gherkin just isn't a great language to demonstrate the benefits of that.
Pigo 8y ago
Hey, I remember my boss telling me about the wonders of Lightswitch. Silverlight was going to revolutionize things for "power-users".
- zodPod 8y ago
  Man check out my Geocities site!
- goatlover 8y ago
  I remember my boss telling me that Flash would replace html.
  - Pigo 8y ago
    Oh man, that hurts to read. That's some wishful thinking there. I'm currently helping a division of the Air Force replace a legacy flash application that they've spent years trying to keep going.

kpil 8y ago

This is either just very misinformed or selling things to misinformed people. The fundamental problem is the inherent complexity in all but the simplest information systems. The skill set required for managing that complexity is basically the same as for a software developer - and software developers have developed their preferred tools for manage it, and the relevant reason that the tools are not better than they are is that it's hard to build good tools, not that software developers are inept for the task. I'm not saying that the tools can not be improved, but I'm saying that the tools won't be graphical. More intuitive prototyping tools are another thing though - I'm all for it.

sneak 8y ago
> This is either just very misinformed or selling things to misinformed people. It's possible that that is an accurate description of all "sales"; if they were properly/fully informed, it would be called "buying", not "selling".

pjmorris 8y ago

That strategy has worked since, at least, COBOL. I don't see the strategy breaking any time soon.

AnimalMuppet 8y ago
Indeed, the original design goal of COBOL was to make professional programmers unnecessary. That rather spectacularly failed to work.
- himom 8y ago
  I think the same can be applied to Cucumber testing: having to write “natural language” tests in one area and then a bunch more code to interpret that dialect. Why not express tests directly in code like everyone else instead of pretending business people will ever write them, understand them or know their limitations? Cuke seems like extra busywork job security rather than GTD.
  - pjmorris 8y ago
    Despite plenty of experience to the contrary, I'm still a believer that there's some way to disentangle what needs to be done from how it needs to be done. I do think the business people have to understand what they're asking for, and how to tell whether they've got it. I don't think many of them are going to learn code to do it. Maybe there are documents out there, somewhere, that unambiguously describe what business people want and whether they've gotten it, but until I see those mythical creatures, I'm willing to cut Cuke some slack.
  - crdoconnor 8y ago
    Cucumber did get one idea right though - enforcing a separation of concerns between a high level non-turing complete specification and turing complete code that executes it. Gherkin just isn't a great language to demonstrate the benefits of that.

Pigo 8y ago

Hey, I remember my boss telling me about the wonders of Lightswitch. Silverlight was going to revolutionize things for "power-users".

zodPod 8y ago
Man check out my Geocities site!
goatlover 8y ago
I remember my boss telling me that Flash would replace html.
- Pigo 8y ago
  Oh man, that hurts to read. That's some wishful thinking there. I'm currently helping a division of the Air Force replace a legacy flash application that they've spent years trying to keep going.