I saw a link here on HN a short while ago (though I can't remember where exactly) to a Ribbon Farm post talking about Legibility, or the idea that people genera

I saw a link here on HN a short while ago (though I can't remember where exactly) to a Ribbon Farm post talking about Legibility, or the idea that people generally like things that can be understood and categorised. https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2010/07/26/a-big-little-idea-called-legibility/ https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2010/07/26/a-big-little-idea-call... It seems to capture the idea of The Grand Rewrite fairly well. From the post: - Look at a complex and confusing reality, such as the social dynamics of an old city - Fail to understand all the subtleties of how the complex reality works - Attribute that failure to the irrationality of what you are looking at, rather than your own limitations - Come up with an idealized blank-slate vision of what that reality ought to look like - Argue that the relative simplicity and platonic orderliness of the vision represents rationality - Use authoritarian power to impose that vision, by demolishing the old reality if necessary - Watch your rational Utopia fail horribly There are often good technical reasons for a rewrite or major refactoring, but more than once in my career the urge was definitely based on the fact that if we rewrite it then we will know it inside out and we will only have what we need, nothing more. Full control and understanding.