4 ms·

I actually don’t like these lists. All abstractions are falsehoods at some level, however, if you chase rabbit holes, you will never accomplish anything. Even

I actually don’t like these lists. All abstractions are falsehoods at some level, however, if you chase rabbit holes, you will never accomplish anything. Even the macro world is a falsehood/abstraction of the underlying quantum subatomic works (I think). What matters is if your abstraction is good enough for what you goals are. For most of the lists I have seen, you can make valuable software that people will pay you for while still believing half the “lies”.

maweki 4y ago
But it's very important to know what things you abstract over. At least as a rough outline. For example, if you have the abstraction of all days being 24 hours which is fine. You should know though how far you may be off with that abstraction. If your day suddenly is more than 4% longer or shorter, you might wonder about increased or decreased traffic for that day. You should know that there are cases where your abstraction is off and what the possible results of that are, even if you're not chasing that particular rabbit hole.
- brookst 4y ago
  This is true, but again, within reason. I am 100% comfortable not knowing or understanding what design errors I have made that will cause my software to fail if used on a spaceship orbiting a black hole.
- dragonwriter 4y ago
  > If your day suddenly is more than 4% longer or shorter, you might wonder about increased or decreased traffic for that day. I can confidently state that if there is a sudden change in the length of the day of 4% or greater, questions about traffic statistics tied to that on any website I am involved with be very low on my list of priorities.
GuB-42 4y ago
I am not fond of the presentation either because of the negative framing, but it is still good information. So that not taking account of 61 second minutes and 19 day months can be a deliberate decision and not something that catch you by surprise. As it is often the case, you can get away with believing half of the lies as long as it is the right half, but without context, there is no way to know which one is the right half.

maweki 4y ago

But it's very important to know what things you abstract over. At least as a rough outline. For example, if you have the abstraction of all days being 24 hours which is fine. You should know though how far you may be off with that abstraction. If your day suddenly is more than 4% longer or shorter, you might wonder about increased or decreased traffic for that day. You should know that there are cases where your abstraction is off and what the possible results of that are, even if you're not chasing that particular rabbit hole.

brookst 4y ago
This is true, but again, within reason. I am 100% comfortable not knowing or understanding what design errors I have made that will cause my software to fail if used on a spaceship orbiting a black hole.
dragonwriter 4y ago
> If your day suddenly is more than 4% longer or shorter, you might wonder about increased or decreased traffic for that day. I can confidently state that if there is a sudden change in the length of the day of 4% or greater, questions about traffic statistics tied to that on any website I am involved with be very low on my list of priorities.

GuB-42 4y ago

I am not fond of the presentation either because of the negative framing, but it is still good information. So that not taking account of 61 second minutes and 19 day months can be a deliberate decision and not something that catch you by surprise. As it is often the case, you can get away with believing half of the lies as long as it is the right half, but without context, there is no way to know which one is the right half.