4 ms·

It seems like what Paul is describing, is the niche filled by libraries/frameworks. When you have a website to build, you reach for an existing web framework,

It seems like what Paul is describing, is the niche filled by libraries/frameworks. When you have a website to build, you reach for an existing web framework, because it has already done the bottom-up steps for you. The same could be said of choosing a language, OS, hardware, etc. Existing technologies allow for increased productivity, at the cost of it becoming increasingly difficult to understand the bigger picture. The 'bottom-up' part at this point, is choosing which Ruby/Java/Python/etc libraries to use. The productivity bar has been set high, leaving little time for bottom-up decision making or education. Hence MongoDB and the never-ending tales of mediocre solutions gaining adoption due to marketing hype. Curiously enough - academia isn't able to solve this problem well, because they're encouraged to produce 'novelty', rather than sit down and digest the mess we're in, to help clarify matters a little. They're in the same rat-race, of getting things done on a 6-12 month schedule. There's a quote that I really like - "Prolific programmers contribute to certain disaster." [0] Ah well :) [0] https://youtu.be/-I_jE0l7sYQ?t=21m55s https://youtu.be/-I_jE0l7sYQ?t=21m55s

forkerenok 9y ago
> When you have a website to build, you reach for an existing web framework, because it has already done the bottom-up steps for you. As I see it, it is from bottom to a greatest common denominator though. The tools you choose are not likely to have everything up to your "up", you still have to build your domain specific (but still abstract) "primitives".
- alexashka 9y ago
  I agree with you, the frameworks/libraries have done the bottom-up for you, to say, 70-80%. The other 20%, you need to work out on your own. The final 20-30% are really marrying the exact business needs, with the underlying libraries/frameworks you're using. The smaller the % of work needed to marry the business needs with the libraries, the more it starts to look like an application, like Photoshop, and less like programming.
- wvenable 9y ago
  Almost everyone should build their own framework on top of existing frameworks for their own domain. At work, we have a common look and feel for all our applications so that's build into the framework. We have specific domain specific data types -- those would never go into someone else's generic framework but they are in ours. I find this idea of building your own framework to be pretty rare -- I do it because I've actually had to build frameworks for platforms that didn't have them -- but most programmers are content to use what they're given but never think of extending it.
marcosdumay 9y ago
> they're encouraged to produce 'novelty', rather than sit down and digest the mess we're in How to live efficiently on the mess we are in is a perfectly good research area, one of the kind that severely improves the career of the researchers.
narag 9y ago
Frameworks are known to impose a top-down and previsible style.

forkerenok 9y ago

> When you have a website to build, you reach for an existing web framework, because it has already done the bottom-up steps for you. As I see it, it is from bottom to a greatest common denominator though. The tools you choose are not likely to have everything up to your "up", you still have to build your domain specific (but still abstract) "primitives".

alexashka 9y ago
I agree with you, the frameworks/libraries have done the bottom-up for you, to say, 70-80%. The other 20%, you need to work out on your own. The final 20-30% are really marrying the exact business needs, with the underlying libraries/frameworks you're using. The smaller the % of work needed to marry the business needs with the libraries, the more it starts to look like an application, like Photoshop, and less like programming.
wvenable 9y ago
Almost everyone should build their own framework on top of existing frameworks for their own domain. At work, we have a common look and feel for all our applications so that's build into the framework. We have specific domain specific data types -- those would never go into someone else's generic framework but they are in ours. I find this idea of building your own framework to be pretty rare -- I do it because I've actually had to build frameworks for platforms that didn't have them -- but most programmers are content to use what they're given but never think of extending it.

marcosdumay 9y ago

> they're encouraged to produce 'novelty', rather than sit down and digest the mess we're in How to live efficiently on the mess we are in is a perfectly good research area, one of the kind that severely improves the career of the researchers.

narag 9y ago

Frameworks are known to impose a top-down and previsible style.