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And your example is why we have the "lol javascript trash amirite" chorus, because as you've noted these problems were solved decades ago. Yet for some reason,

And your example is why we have the "lol javascript trash amirite" chorus, because as you've noted these problems were solved decades ago. Yet for some reason, the JS and npm ecosystems always seem to have some dependency dustup once or twice a year.

throwanem 7y ago
Yes, that's largely my point. I'm not sure why it is surprising to see an ecosystem, twenty-five or so years younger than the one I compared it to, have the same problems as that one did twenty-five years or so ago.
- rsj_hn 7y ago
  That line of reasoning suggests progress isn't being made and we are just reliving the past.
  - throwanem 7y ago
    It's also not a surprise to see a similar process of stabilization play out at a higher layer of the stack, as it previously did at a lower one. Neither is it cause for regret; this is how lasting foundations get built, especially in so young a field of endeavor as ours. "History doesn't repeat itself, but it often rhymes."
  - _jal 7y ago
    There are multiple reasons for this failure mode, only some of them subject to social learning. Part of the problem is a learning process, and indeed, I think the Javascript world should have learned some lessons - a lot of the mess was predictable, and predicted. Maybe next time. But part of the problem is that we pick winners through competition. If we had a functional magic 8-ball, we'd know which [ecosystem/language/distro/OS/anything else] to back and save all the time, money and effort wasted on marketplace sorting. But unless you prefer a command economy, this is how something wins. "We" "picked" Linux this way, and it took a while.
- Hokusai 7y ago
  In one of Robert "Uncle Bob" Martin presentation you may find the answer. The number of developers duplicates each 5 years. That means that any point in time half of the developers have less than 5 years of experience. Add to that realization the fact that inexperienced developers are learning from other inexperienced developers and you get the answer on why we repeat the same mistakes again and again. I guess that is a matter of time that the reality changes, we will not duplicate the number of developers indefinitely and experience and good practices will accumulate. Taking into account the circumstances, we are not doing so badly.
  - dgellow 7y ago
    Do you have the source? Sounds like an interesting talk.
    - Hokusai 7y ago
      I found it! :) I has a lot of content and insights. "Uncle" Bob Martin - "The Future of Programming" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ecIWPzGEbFc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ecIWPzGEbFc
      - hota_mazi 7y ago
        That's not the source, it's the claim. There is zero evidence for his claim that the number of developers double every five years.
        ulisesrmzroche 7y ago
        Off the top of my head, coding boot camps
  - hota_mazi 7y ago
    > The number of developers duplicates each 5 years You probably mean "double" here, but the bottom line is that there is zero data to back up that claim. He literally made up that number out of thin air to make his talk look more important.
- rhizome 7y ago
  NIH Syndrome is a double-edged sword that persists regardless of innovations.
- prox 7y ago
  25 years is roughly one generation. A new generation grows up, has no memory of the old problems? Same with Covid, is roughly 20 years ago and people forgot there was SARS.
- ajxs 7y ago
  Pardon me if I've misunderstood you. I feel that this line of reasoning that excuses modern Javascript's mistakes on the basis of it being a young language to be spurious. We don't need to engineer new languages that recreate the mistakes of previous ones, or even worse, commit entirely new sins of their own. It's not like no-one saw the problems of the Node/JS ecosystem, or the problems of untyped languages, coming from a distance. Still, Node.js was created anyway. I would argue that it, along with many of its kindred technologies, has actually contributed a net deficit to the web ecosystem.
  - throwanem 7y ago
    Okay, then, argue it.
- yellowapple 7y ago
  It ain't surprising, but rather just disappointing, that an ecosystem can't or won't learn from the trials and tribulations of other ecosystems. EDIT: also, Node's more than a decade old at this point, so it is at least a little bit surprising that the ecosystem is still experiencing these sorts of issues.
  - kristopolous 7y ago
    Is it really though? Node is infamous for attracting large groups of people with notoriously misguided engineering practices whose egos far surpass their experience and knowledge. I've been stuck using it for about 4 years and it makes me literally hate computers and programming. Everything is so outrageously bad and wrapped in smarmy self congratulating bullshit. It's just so staggeringly terrible... So these kind of catastrophes every few months for bullshit reasons seem kind of obvious and expected, doesn't it?

throwanem 7y ago

Yes, that's largely my point. I'm not sure why it is surprising to see an ecosystem, twenty-five or so years younger than the one I compared it to, have the same problems as that one did twenty-five years or so ago.

rsj_hn 7y ago
That line of reasoning suggests progress isn't being made and we are just reliving the past.
- throwanem 7y ago
  It's also not a surprise to see a similar process of stabilization play out at a higher layer of the stack, as it previously did at a lower one. Neither is it cause for regret; this is how lasting foundations get built, especially in so young a field of endeavor as ours. "History doesn't repeat itself, but it often rhymes."
- _jal 7y ago
  There are multiple reasons for this failure mode, only some of them subject to social learning. Part of the problem is a learning process, and indeed, I think the Javascript world should have learned some lessons - a lot of the mess was predictable, and predicted. Maybe next time. But part of the problem is that we pick winners through competition. If we had a functional magic 8-ball, we'd know which [ecosystem/language/distro/OS/anything else] to back and save all the time, money and effort wasted on marketplace sorting. But unless you prefer a command economy, this is how something wins. "We" "picked" Linux this way, and it took a while.
Hokusai 7y ago
In one of Robert "Uncle Bob" Martin presentation you may find the answer. The number of developers duplicates each 5 years. That means that any point in time half of the developers have less than 5 years of experience. Add to that realization the fact that inexperienced developers are learning from other inexperienced developers and you get the answer on why we repeat the same mistakes again and again. I guess that is a matter of time that the reality changes, we will not duplicate the number of developers indefinitely and experience and good practices will accumulate. Taking into account the circumstances, we are not doing so badly.
- dgellow 7y ago
  Do you have the source? Sounds like an interesting talk.
  - Hokusai 7y ago
    I found it! :) I has a lot of content and insights. "Uncle" Bob Martin - "The Future of Programming" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ecIWPzGEbFc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ecIWPzGEbFc
    - hota_mazi 7y ago
      That's not the source, it's the claim. There is zero evidence for his claim that the number of developers double every five years.
      - ulisesrmzroche 7y ago
        Off the top of my head, coding boot camps
- hota_mazi 7y ago
  > The number of developers duplicates each 5 years You probably mean "double" here, but the bottom line is that there is zero data to back up that claim. He literally made up that number out of thin air to make his talk look more important.
rhizome 7y ago
NIH Syndrome is a double-edged sword that persists regardless of innovations.
prox 7y ago
25 years is roughly one generation. A new generation grows up, has no memory of the old problems? Same with Covid, is roughly 20 years ago and people forgot there was SARS.
ajxs 7y ago
Pardon me if I've misunderstood you. I feel that this line of reasoning that excuses modern Javascript's mistakes on the basis of it being a young language to be spurious. We don't need to engineer new languages that recreate the mistakes of previous ones, or even worse, commit entirely new sins of their own. It's not like no-one saw the problems of the Node/JS ecosystem, or the problems of untyped languages, coming from a distance. Still, Node.js was created anyway. I would argue that it, along with many of its kindred technologies, has actually contributed a net deficit to the web ecosystem.
- throwanem 7y ago
  Okay, then, argue it.
yellowapple 7y ago
It ain't surprising, but rather just disappointing, that an ecosystem can't or won't learn from the trials and tribulations of other ecosystems. EDIT: also, Node's more than a decade old at this point, so it is at least a little bit surprising that the ecosystem is still experiencing these sorts of issues.
- kristopolous 7y ago
  Is it really though? Node is infamous for attracting large groups of people with notoriously misguided engineering practices whose egos far surpass their experience and knowledge. I've been stuck using it for about 4 years and it makes me literally hate computers and programming. Everything is so outrageously bad and wrapped in smarmy self congratulating bullshit. It's just so staggeringly terrible... So these kind of catastrophes every few months for bullshit reasons seem kind of obvious and expected, doesn't it?