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Your post implies that there is no tool on earth that "sucks" and that it's not the tool, it's the person. It's impossible for EVERY tool to be good. This isn'

Your post implies that there is no tool on earth that "sucks" and that it's not the tool, it's the person. It's impossible for EVERY tool to be good. This isn't reality. There has to be tools that are patently bad to use and people have used these bad tools to build great things. But it doesn't change the fact that a tool can be horrible to use. I would argue that at the time the article was written, Mongo was definitively a bad tool. Things have changed, but not all things.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
at-fates-hands 6y ago
> Your post implies that there is no tool on earth that "sucks" and that it's not the tool, it's the person. I got more of a "stop complaining about tools. Pick one you like, use it and build something with IT instead. I feel the same way. Developers are a fickle bunch. One tool works, but then in order to be "cool" you have to bag on it and then propose some other obscure tool you think is better that nobody has ever heard of. It seriously reminds me of people arguing over music. Its totally uncool to like a mainstream band because everybody else likes that band and its not cool to like them. So then you have all the "cool" people who listen to all the obscure "awesome" bands who Rolling Stone magazine tells you to listen to, so then you go around telling people you listen to the Shithouse Rats. "Oh you've never heard of the Shithouse Rats? Well, they're kind of obscure." and now you're one of the of the cool kids.
- 01acheru 6y ago
  Yeah that was my point, 100%! And by the way I really like you music analogy, and it’s emblematic of something even larger: they read about Shithouse Rats on Rolling Stone, named after a song of Bob Dylan or Muddy Waters or the group itself (don’t know which one) and all of them are quite famous and mainstream. You’ve got to love mankind, we are awesome!
- skrtskrt 6y ago
  I feel there can be a fair reason behind this, which is basically that using a tool no one else uses, even if it’s great for the use case, is likely to be a losing battle. Hard to get using it approved at work, less usage means fewer bugs are caught and features developed, etc. So people evangelize their favorite tools because it benefits them directly to have them adopted more widely.
- Geminidog 6y ago
  Music implies sort of an everything is just an opinion thing so your analogy does not fit. Think of it like horse drawn wagon vs. a car. There might exist a guy who in his humble opinion thinks the wagon is better so he use it to get places instead of a car but is that guy a reasonable guy? No. The analogy I mentioned above is more apt because Mongo was indeed at one point in time more of a wagon rather than an unpopular piece of music.
  - danellis 6y ago
    It's a bit culturally insensitive to suggest that all Amish people are unreasonable.
    - Geminidog 6y ago
      https://www.typeinvestigations.org/investigation/2020/01/14/amish-sexual-abuse-assault/ https://www.typeinvestigations.org/investigation/2020/01/14/... And it's a bit insensitive to suggest that you support incest and child rape. Or am I reading to much into your post? Let's be honest here. You aren't suggesting that you support raping children anymore then I am suggesting the Amish are unreasonable. This cancel culture attitude of constantly calling out and classifying everything as some sort of infraction against a culture or a race has got to stop.
      - danellis 6y ago
        > This cancel culture attitude of constantly calling out and classifying everything as some sort of infraction against a culture or a race has got to stop. I agree. Unfortunately, sarcasm doesn't convey well in text.
- jimbokun 6y ago
  This is usually true. But every once in a while you have a case like WhatsApp, which sold to Facebook at a price of $500 million per engineer, which never could have happened without Erlang.
karmakaze 6y ago
> at the time the article was written, Mongo was definitively a bad tool I concur. Version 3.0 is dated March 3, 2015 that uses the WiredTiger engine which fixes much of the brokenness. I did some workaround work on a MongoDB v2.x app. It did suck and was inconvenient operationally, but it also did scale so had its uses. However the discussion now should be about how it is to be used/not today and not back in 2013. So fair to say it did suck or you shouldn't have used it, but that doesn't have much relevance.
systemvoltage 6y ago
Precisely. It is extremely crucial to discuss shortcomings and criticize tools otherwise how are we going to improve if we all roll along singing the tunes of each other and never questioning anything? This kind of attitude and softness towards criticism - "All tools are great" is not how we need to operate. Professional, well articulated and constructive criticism needs to be on the table. I downvoted the GP for this reason. I advise everyone here to listen to criticisms and write them as well. Don't be afraid of some kind of a backlash, express freely.
- 01acheru 6y ago
  Well I guess we are discussing different angles of this matter, I actually didn't thought that my comment would go to the top since it was supposed to be a random naive statement. I'm not about making things that simple by default, but I don't like those absolutist titles like "Never use MongoDB", also because the years since 2013 actually proved the article to be kind of wrong. "Never do X" is what I tell to children about matters that they wouldn't be able to understand, and making a point like "we used an immature tool that wasn't the best choice for what we were building, and on top of that we used it wrong, so you random guy should never use it for anything, ever" sounds like fearmongering to me and it's not something suitable to my taste. But I get your downvote :+1:
  - systemvoltage 6y ago
    Indeed, never do X is pretty strong and needs equally strong arguments to back it up. But it can be true. There are tools that are superseded by better ones. Equally, it’s important to also tone down “X is nothing but the best” and praises should also require equal and opposite constructivism.
  - jeff-davis 6y ago
    I agree that absolute statements like "never" obscure useful discussion. I would reword your comment as: "If you are building something and excited, then keep going, don't stop because a blog told you 'never'". I think that's what your main point was, and it's a good one.
  - 6y ago
aeturnum 6y ago
> It's impossible for EVERY tool to be good. What does 'good' mean? Gcc is a good C compiler and a bad Java compiler. It's even worse at being a document database. I don't think 01acheru was saying that all tools are equally able to do all tasks. I read them as saying that people have used tools with recognized flaws to make good stuff and that being snobby about whether tools are "good" or "bad" in a general way isn't super useful for anyone. Instead, we should say specific things about specific flaws and let others decide if those flaws matter to them. In particular, this post isn't really saying that MongoDB doesn't work, it's saying that the MongoDB data model isn't useful for what the author was using it for. Even if you are sure that your app was "the perfect use case for MongoDB" all you can really speak about is your use case. The real headline for this article is "we couldn't make MongoDB work and we're skeptical anyone can," which is totally fair, but shys away from the grand claims that 01acheru (and I) are critiquing.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- colonwqbang 6y ago
  Here are some quotes from Mongo's start page > No database makes you more productive > The most popular database for modern apps What we have here is not really something intended for a specialist usecase, as implied by your comment. Mongo is clearly pushed as being the best database, used by most "modern" apps.
  - aeturnum 6y ago
    Could you explain how either snippet you quoted translates, to you, into MongoDB calling themselves "the best database"? For me, they appear to claim to be popular and focused on developer productivity. Those quotes don't seem to show them claiming to be "the best". Like...it's pretty standard "put your best foot forward" sort of high level description and I think it's a bit much to say that they're making some universal claim?
    - colonwqbang 6y ago
worik 6y ago
"There has to be tools that are patently bad to use and people have used these bad tools to build great things." Don't those tools die out and get forgotten?
- pdimitar 6y ago
  No. Sticking to what is known beats innovation most of the time. There is no correlation between something being widely used and it being good at its job.
alexfrydl 6y ago
I hate the logic that because people have successfully used something, it is good. Having used MongoDB extensively, it is absolutely true that MongoDB is powerful and useful. However, it is also true that I would never choose it over something else for a new project. It has likely improved since 2013, but so has everything else. Certainly I could endeavor to build amazing modern software in C, but unless for some reason C is an absolute must, I would rather try any other language first. I doubt this is a controversial statement, and yet someone will always be there to defend the opposite stance.
- daniel-grigg 6y ago
  Now you’re just repeating the same fallacy by assuming all these tools have improved at the same rate.
pc86 6y ago
They never said that every tool is good. They didn't even imply it.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

at-fates-hands 6y ago

> Your post implies that there is no tool on earth that "sucks" and that it's not the tool, it's the person. I got more of a "stop complaining about tools. Pick one you like, use it and build something with IT instead. I feel the same way. Developers are a fickle bunch. One tool works, but then in order to be "cool" you have to bag on it and then propose some other obscure tool you think is better that nobody has ever heard of. It seriously reminds me of people arguing over music. Its totally uncool to like a mainstream band because everybody else likes that band and its not cool to like them. So then you have all the "cool" people who listen to all the obscure "awesome" bands who Rolling Stone magazine tells you to listen to, so then you go around telling people you listen to the Shithouse Rats. "Oh you've never heard of the Shithouse Rats? Well, they're kind of obscure." and now you're one of the of the cool kids.

01acheru 6y ago
Yeah that was my point, 100%! And by the way I really like you music analogy, and it’s emblematic of something even larger: they read about Shithouse Rats on Rolling Stone, named after a song of Bob Dylan or Muddy Waters or the group itself (don’t know which one) and all of them are quite famous and mainstream. You’ve got to love mankind, we are awesome!
skrtskrt 6y ago
I feel there can be a fair reason behind this, which is basically that using a tool no one else uses, even if it’s great for the use case, is likely to be a losing battle. Hard to get using it approved at work, less usage means fewer bugs are caught and features developed, etc. So people evangelize their favorite tools because it benefits them directly to have them adopted more widely.
Geminidog 6y ago
Music implies sort of an everything is just an opinion thing so your analogy does not fit. Think of it like horse drawn wagon vs. a car. There might exist a guy who in his humble opinion thinks the wagon is better so he use it to get places instead of a car but is that guy a reasonable guy? No. The analogy I mentioned above is more apt because Mongo was indeed at one point in time more of a wagon rather than an unpopular piece of music.
- danellis 6y ago
  It's a bit culturally insensitive to suggest that all Amish people are unreasonable.
  - Geminidog 6y ago
    https://www.typeinvestigations.org/investigation/2020/01/14/amish-sexual-abuse-assault/ https://www.typeinvestigations.org/investigation/2020/01/14/... And it's a bit insensitive to suggest that you support incest and child rape. Or am I reading to much into your post? Let's be honest here. You aren't suggesting that you support raping children anymore then I am suggesting the Amish are unreasonable. This cancel culture attitude of constantly calling out and classifying everything as some sort of infraction against a culture or a race has got to stop.
    - danellis 6y ago
      > This cancel culture attitude of constantly calling out and classifying everything as some sort of infraction against a culture or a race has got to stop. I agree. Unfortunately, sarcasm doesn't convey well in text.
jimbokun 6y ago
This is usually true. But every once in a while you have a case like WhatsApp, which sold to Facebook at a price of $500 million per engineer, which never could have happened without Erlang.

karmakaze 6y ago

> at the time the article was written, Mongo was definitively a bad tool I concur. Version 3.0 is dated March 3, 2015 that uses the WiredTiger engine which fixes much of the brokenness. I did some workaround work on a MongoDB v2.x app. It did suck and was inconvenient operationally, but it also did scale so had its uses. However the discussion now should be about how it is to be used/not today and not back in 2013. So fair to say it did suck or you shouldn't have used it, but that doesn't have much relevance.

systemvoltage 6y ago

Precisely. It is extremely crucial to discuss shortcomings and criticize tools otherwise how are we going to improve if we all roll along singing the tunes of each other and never questioning anything? This kind of attitude and softness towards criticism - "All tools are great" is not how we need to operate. Professional, well articulated and constructive criticism needs to be on the table. I downvoted the GP for this reason. I advise everyone here to listen to criticisms and write them as well. Don't be afraid of some kind of a backlash, express freely.

01acheru 6y ago
Well I guess we are discussing different angles of this matter, I actually didn't thought that my comment would go to the top since it was supposed to be a random naive statement. I'm not about making things that simple by default, but I don't like those absolutist titles like "Never use MongoDB", also because the years since 2013 actually proved the article to be kind of wrong. "Never do X" is what I tell to children about matters that they wouldn't be able to understand, and making a point like "we used an immature tool that wasn't the best choice for what we were building, and on top of that we used it wrong, so you random guy should never use it for anything, ever" sounds like fearmongering to me and it's not something suitable to my taste. But I get your downvote :+1:
- systemvoltage 6y ago
  Indeed, never do X is pretty strong and needs equally strong arguments to back it up. But it can be true. There are tools that are superseded by better ones. Equally, it’s important to also tone down “X is nothing but the best” and praises should also require equal and opposite constructivism.
- jeff-davis 6y ago
  I agree that absolute statements like "never" obscure useful discussion. I would reword your comment as: "If you are building something and excited, then keep going, don't stop because a blog told you 'never'". I think that's what your main point was, and it's a good one.
- 6y ago

aeturnum 6y ago

> It's impossible for EVERY tool to be good. What does 'good' mean? Gcc is a good C compiler and a bad Java compiler. It's even worse at being a document database. I don't think 01acheru was saying that all tools are equally able to do all tasks. I read them as saying that people have used tools with recognized flaws to make good stuff and that being snobby about whether tools are "good" or "bad" in a general way isn't super useful for anyone. Instead, we should say specific things about specific flaws and let others decide if those flaws matter to them. In particular, this post isn't really saying that MongoDB doesn't work, it's saying that the MongoDB data model isn't useful for what the author was using it for. Even if you are sure that your app was "the perfect use case for MongoDB" all you can really speak about is your use case. The real headline for this article is "we couldn't make MongoDB work and we're skeptical anyone can," which is totally fair, but shys away from the grand claims that 01acheru (and I) are critiquing.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
colonwqbang 6y ago
Here are some quotes from Mongo's start page > No database makes you more productive > The most popular database for modern apps What we have here is not really something intended for a specialist usecase, as implied by your comment. Mongo is clearly pushed as being the best database, used by most "modern" apps.
- aeturnum 6y ago
  Could you explain how either snippet you quoted translates, to you, into MongoDB calling themselves "the best database"? For me, they appear to claim to be popular and focused on developer productivity. Those quotes don't seem to show them claiming to be "the best". Like...it's pretty standard "put your best foot forward" sort of high level description and I think it's a bit much to say that they're making some universal claim?
  - colonwqbang 6y ago

worik 6y ago

"There has to be tools that are patently bad to use and people have used these bad tools to build great things." Don't those tools die out and get forgotten?

pdimitar 6y ago
No. Sticking to what is known beats innovation most of the time. There is no correlation between something being widely used and it being good at its job.

alexfrydl 6y ago

I hate the logic that because people have successfully used something, it is good. Having used MongoDB extensively, it is absolutely true that MongoDB is powerful and useful. However, it is also true that I would never choose it over something else for a new project. It has likely improved since 2013, but so has everything else. Certainly I could endeavor to build amazing modern software in C, but unless for some reason C is an absolute must, I would rather try any other language first. I doubt this is a controversial statement, and yet someone will always be there to defend the opposite stance.

daniel-grigg 6y ago
Now you’re just repeating the same fallacy by assuming all these tools have improved at the same rate.

pc86 6y ago

They never said that every tool is good. They didn't even imply it.