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Bit rot is such a crappy metaphor.

• cjbgkagh 4y ago
  Pretty sure it’s a metaphor. Edit: parent comment was edited.
  • birdyrooster 4y ago
    A bad one
    • cratermoon 4y ago
      Why is it bad? What's a better one? What would a better one look like?
      • tyingq 4y ago
        "context rot" is more aligned with what they are describing, though that's not a metaphor. I can see bitrot being a bad fit, as it's decay of the actual thing rather than the surrounding context.
        • cratermoon 4y ago
          Except that implies the context has rotted, when in fact the context is fresher than the system within it. While the context may have degraded in some way, the reality is that it's changed according to forces that have acted on it since the code within it was written and deployed. What's rotted is the ability of the system to meaningfully and correctly interact with the context.
• bentobean 4y ago
  In this context, I'm using "bit rot" as a metaphor in the same way that the author does: > The first is that it’s a partial explanation for bitrot, the phenomenon where working software seems to deteriorate even when the code is untouched.
  • birdyrooster 4y ago
    [flagged]
    • DiggyJohnson 4y ago
      Why? I'm not even saying you're wrong, necessarily...
      • jacobsenscott 4y ago
        I would call it developer rot. The code hasn't changed - and runs just as well (or badly) as the day it was written. It is the developers who somehow lose the ability (I don't know how - just read the code) to work with that code.
    • icedchai 4y ago
      It's not 100% accurate, but what metaphor is? I worked at an organization that had gone years without any updates: 10 year old dependencies that had never been updated, actively developed Python 2 code base in 2022, servers with 1000+ day uptimes and hadn't been updated since before the pandemic, on and on. It made it difficult to get anything done because you had to wade through a dumpster fire to make the smallest change. It certainly felt like bit rot to me.
      • kortilla 4y ago
        It felt like “bit rot” to you because that’s how you defined “rot”, but it’s not how real rot works, which has nothing to do with changing. It’s something that just breaks down without any changes in use case. If a wooden bridge rots away, nobody means that they were unable to add extra lanes. They mean it ceased to do what it previously did. “Code calcification” is likely a better approximation of what you’re trying to convey. “Bit rot” would be better fitting to actual storage loss, but this industry chose poorly.
        • capitalsigma 4y ago
• feoren 4y ago
  What do you suggest instead?
  • nycticorax 4y ago
    "Software subsidence"? "Digital subsidence"? The problem is that over time, the foundations upon which software is built decay, or need to be replaced...
    • feoren 4y ago
      I've worked with geologists and geological data and I had to look up "subsidence". I kinda had a feeling for what it meant, but it certainly didn't bring up any salient imagery nor help me understand the concept, which is kinda the point of a metaphor.
      • nycticorax 4y ago
        If you want some salient imagery, take a look at the first image on the Wikipedia page for "Subsidence": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subsidence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subsidence