4 ms·

It happened 2 months ago, here in France. A kid died in the accident, and it was not a software problem. And there are tons of elevators out of order, on a dail

It happened 2 months ago, here in France. A kid died in the accident, and it was not a software problem. And there are tons of elevators out of order, on a daily basis, and more often for mechanical reasons than for software reasons (now obviously, the software part of an elevator is less complex than its mechanical part, but still).

timr 8y ago
I love how the bar gets lowered as people struggle to make software look reasonable. "Elevators out of order" is not "elevators crashing". Of course mechanical systems wear out and have to be repaired. Elevators, bridges, airliners and other properly engineered systems, are incredibly safe and reliable. You have to go digging to find exceptional events that remotely compare to the daily chaos found in software systems. The point of my story is that elevators themselves (systems we barely think about on a daily basis) start to become chaotic and unreliable when software is introduced. ...which is not to say that it can't be fixed. My contention is that software engineering is possible, it just isn't fun or easy for inexperienced coders to do, and therefore not valued by the current software industry.
- sacado2 8y ago
  You were mentioning elevators crashing in the first place. But anyway elevators are quite frequently out of order, and I don't know how often it's a software vs mechanical vs administrative (ie "security check") problem. I just know that, in all instances of elevator crashes I know of, the problem was a mechanical one, not a software one. > ...which is not to say that it can't be fixed. My contention is that software engineering is possible, it just isn't fun or easy for inexperienced coders to do, and therefore not valued by the current software industry. It's not that it's not fun, but it's incredibly expensive, and usually not worth the cost.

timr 8y ago

I love how the bar gets lowered as people struggle to make software look reasonable. "Elevators out of order" is not "elevators crashing". Of course mechanical systems wear out and have to be repaired. Elevators, bridges, airliners and other properly engineered systems, are incredibly safe and reliable. You have to go digging to find exceptional events that remotely compare to the daily chaos found in software systems. The point of my story is that elevators themselves (systems we barely think about on a daily basis) start to become chaotic and unreliable when software is introduced. ...which is not to say that it can't be fixed. My contention is that software engineering is possible, it just isn't fun or easy for inexperienced coders to do, and therefore not valued by the current software industry.

sacado2 8y ago
You were mentioning elevators crashing in the first place. But anyway elevators are quite frequently out of order, and I don't know how often it's a software vs mechanical vs administrative (ie "security check") problem. I just know that, in all instances of elevator crashes I know of, the problem was a mechanical one, not a software one. > ...which is not to say that it can't be fixed. My contention is that software engineering is possible, it just isn't fun or easy for inexperienced coders to do, and therefore not valued by the current software industry. It's not that it's not fun, but it's incredibly expensive, and usually not worth the cost.