3 ms·

This post reminded me of this quote: "The hope is that the progress in hardware will cure all software ills. However, a critical observer may observe that soft

This post reminded me of this quote: "The hope is that the progress in hardware will cure all software ills. However, a critical observer may observe that software manages to outgrow hardware in size and sluggishness. Other observers had noted this for some time before, indeed the trend was becoming obvious as early as 1987." - Niklaus Wirth

cyberlurker 6y ago
(Somewhat related) Although I’ve been out of the scene a while, it always felt like PC gaming was best when the GPU manufactures hadn’t just introduced a significantly improved architecture AND the consoles were at the end of their life cycle. The worst times were when the newest, super expensive GPU monster would come out and the newest consoles were released. I started to not feel excited for more powerful hardware. The performance ceiling was higher but I felt the quality (gameplay, performance, art style, little details) of games temporarily dropped even though the graphics marginally improved on the highest end.
the-pigeon 6y ago
Yeah this is the way it always will be. Speed is determined by business requirements, not capabilities. I have hundreds of opportunities for optimizations in my apps. I could make them fly. But the business side says the current speed is good enough and to focus on new functionality. So that's what I do.
- Polylactic_acid 6y ago
  This is certainly how I feel. I see so many things that people complain about in my work app like not being able to submit with enter or breaking the back button and it makes me sad because this is not the fault of JS, we could have had all of that working but just didn't have the time to make it work because new features are more important.
ehsankia 6y ago
Yes and no. I think they grow hand in hand. It's similar to how games nowadays still run at ~30-60fps just like games 10 years ago and games 20 years ago. It might sound like a silly example but it showcases what I mean. As long as you're above a certain threshold, most people would rather have better graphics than more framerate. Similarly, both users and developers would rather have access to more stuff than have a website that loads slightly faster. I could try to write a game in pure assembly, and that may run super freaking fast, but that would take me orders of magnitude more time than writing the same game in Unity. Similarly, I could write an app from scratch, or I could make a web app with dozens of powerful frameworks like React, and ship it with Electron, in probably a fraction of the time. As long as the app is usable, then this is the smarter move. I can develop 10 features in the time it takes to develop 1 for my competitor. The industry moves fast, users want features, not a site that loads 100ms faster.

cyberlurker 6y ago

(Somewhat related) Although I’ve been out of the scene a while, it always felt like PC gaming was best when the GPU manufactures hadn’t just introduced a significantly improved architecture AND the consoles were at the end of their life cycle. The worst times were when the newest, super expensive GPU monster would come out and the newest consoles were released. I started to not feel excited for more powerful hardware. The performance ceiling was higher but I felt the quality (gameplay, performance, art style, little details) of games temporarily dropped even though the graphics marginally improved on the highest end.

the-pigeon 6y ago

Yeah this is the way it always will be. Speed is determined by business requirements, not capabilities. I have hundreds of opportunities for optimizations in my apps. I could make them fly. But the business side says the current speed is good enough and to focus on new functionality. So that's what I do.

Polylactic_acid 6y ago
This is certainly how I feel. I see so many things that people complain about in my work app like not being able to submit with enter or breaking the back button and it makes me sad because this is not the fault of JS, we could have had all of that working but just didn't have the time to make it work because new features are more important.

ehsankia 6y ago

Yes and no. I think they grow hand in hand. It's similar to how games nowadays still run at ~30-60fps just like games 10 years ago and games 20 years ago. It might sound like a silly example but it showcases what I mean. As long as you're above a certain threshold, most people would rather have better graphics than more framerate. Similarly, both users and developers would rather have access to more stuff than have a website that loads slightly faster. I could try to write a game in pure assembly, and that may run super freaking fast, but that would take me orders of magnitude more time than writing the same game in Unity. Similarly, I could write an app from scratch, or I could make a web app with dozens of powerful frameworks like React, and ship it with Electron, in probably a fraction of the time. As long as the app is usable, then this is the smarter move. I can develop 10 features in the time it takes to develop 1 for my competitor. The industry moves fast, users want features, not a site that loads 100ms faster.