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I totally agree. I engraved Angular 2016 in our Tech Stack. Fast forward 7 years now, and we are on Angular 14. Accomplishments so far? Large and stable platfo

I totally agree. I engraved Angular 2016 in our Tech Stack. Fast forward 7 years now, and we are on Angular 14. Accomplishments so far? Large and stable platform as well as a Low Code Editor on top of it. We systematically componenized every useful piece of Frontend there was and evolved from a library into a platform, while other departments jumped ship every now and then (jQuery, React, Vue, etc.). After years of resistance all finally joined out platform, because it is fast, stable, convenient. Moral of the story: consistency is everything. A tool is a tool.

wpietri 4y ago
For sure. I used to be a real tech snob. And I still like experimenting. But I've had to admit that the particular technology used just doesn't make the difference I would like it to. E.g., PHP is a "fractal of bad design" [1], but Facebook seems to be an ok business. Or Javascript was clearly a frightful hack job to start, barely adequate for mouse rollovers and a little form validation, but now you see plenty of companies doing fine using it front end and back. These days I would much rather have a good team and a good culture than my favorite technology. [1] https://eev.ee/blog/2012/04/09/php-a-fractal-of-bad-design/ https://eev.ee/blog/2012/04/09/php-a-fractal-of-bad-design/
- valenterry 4y ago
  Facebook hired dedicated people to invent their own hack-language over PHP to deal with PHPs problems. Sure, a business can succeed with a crappy language. But that doesn't mean the language has no impact, otherwise Facebook would have just sticked to it.
  - wpietri 4y ago
    I don't believe that I said language had no impact. What I said was, "the particular technology used just doesn't make the difference I would like it to".
    - valenterry 4y ago
      I guess I misinterpreted it, sorry for that.
valenterry 4y ago
Sounds more like it was about consistency rather than about boring vs. exciting technology. Because 1.) Angular was still "the hot shit" at the time, 2.) React was already there, so you could have chosen that as well and it is still here.
yCombLinks 4y ago
Agree completely. I prefer react over angular, but when you have everyone working with the same tech stack, and all of your apps look the same, it's very easy to always be productive. How does service x work? Oh, just like the last 3 I worked on. Context switching isn't just expensive in the short term, it's expensive over weeks and months for these kinds of decisions.

wpietri 4y ago

For sure. I used to be a real tech snob. And I still like experimenting. But I've had to admit that the particular technology used just doesn't make the difference I would like it to. E.g., PHP is a "fractal of bad design" [1], but Facebook seems to be an ok business. Or Javascript was clearly a frightful hack job to start, barely adequate for mouse rollovers and a little form validation, but now you see plenty of companies doing fine using it front end and back. These days I would much rather have a good team and a good culture than my favorite technology. [1] https://eev.ee/blog/2012/04/09/php-a-fractal-of-bad-design/ https://eev.ee/blog/2012/04/09/php-a-fractal-of-bad-design/

valenterry 4y ago
Facebook hired dedicated people to invent their own hack-language over PHP to deal with PHPs problems. Sure, a business can succeed with a crappy language. But that doesn't mean the language has no impact, otherwise Facebook would have just sticked to it.
- wpietri 4y ago
  I don't believe that I said language had no impact. What I said was, "the particular technology used just doesn't make the difference I would like it to".
  - valenterry 4y ago
    I guess I misinterpreted it, sorry for that.

valenterry 4y ago

Sounds more like it was about consistency rather than about boring vs. exciting technology. Because 1.) Angular was still "the hot shit" at the time, 2.) React was already there, so you could have chosen that as well and it is still here.

yCombLinks 4y ago

Agree completely. I prefer react over angular, but when you have everyone working with the same tech stack, and all of your apps look the same, it's very easy to always be productive. How does service x work? Oh, just like the last 3 I worked on. Context switching isn't just expensive in the short term, it's expensive over weeks and months for these kinds of decisions.