> A world where machines could be programmed using something resembling natural language and where anyone could create and share software. This is a silly pipe

> A world where machines could be programmed using something resembling natural language and where anyone could create and share software. This is a silly pipe dream almost as old as computing, which reappears every couple of years in a new guise. When COBOL came out, it was promoted with exactly that promise, and there were people who seriously claimed that within a few years there would be no more professional programmers. More recent incarnations of the pipe dream were "fifth-generation programming languages" and "model-driven development". In reality, what keeps "the creation of software as a privilege of a few" is not a lack of the right tool, but the lack of the mindset of producing unambiguous, complete instructions and developing your requirements to a state where it's possible to give such instructions, and facing the many mistakes you end up making on the way. That is actually something very difficult to do, and which Average Joe will never learn, no matter what tools you give him.