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Why Good Programmers Are Lazy and Dumb
- rw 18y agoSince when does "dumb" mean "open-minded"? The novel parts of the post are flamebait.
- yters 18y agoThe author is using these terms as descriptions, not definitions. He means dumb in the sense of not trying to seem smart and asking simple questions. So, the programmer will look dumb to others. The same applies to his use of the word lazy. He doesn't actually mean the programmer doesn't do anything, the programmer just maximizes his coding on the labor saving programs. Thus, the programmer also looks lazy for not running around like a headless chicken trying to put out all the latest fires.
- thwarted 18y agoYeah, I've maintained there are two kinds of lazy: laziness that leads to procrastination and laziness that leads the least amount of work being done overall. The former is the classic "sin", the latter is what every tech person should strive for. At the end of your life, you should divide the sum of your output by the sum of your total work; the one with the greatest ratio wins the title of "most lazy".
- walterk 18y agoNone of these distinctions would be necessary if people just called efficiency by its proper name. (That would be 'efficiency', by the way.) The use of 'lazy' as a synonym is pure marketing for the slacker/non-conformist programmer (whose idea of non-conformity means wearing a t-shirt to work). And it gets you hits, because OMG someone is saying u should be lazy at ur job! Haha that's so counterintuitive!
- thwarted 18y agoThis breaks down when people think that "being efficient" means "not doing enough work". It looks like you're doing a lot of work when you waste time building a database in a spreadsheet rather than loading the data into an actual database to do analysis and reporting. Often times, efficient means using the right tool for the job, and if that means that someone's going to call me lazy, because I can do in 8 hours what it takes someone else 40 hours to do, they can phone it in to me while I'm on vacation because my work is done.
- kwamenum86 18y agoThis describes either a [Adjective] Programmer, or a Good [Noun], but definitely not a Good Programmer. Maybe an Efficient Programmer or a Good Intern, but definitely not a Good Programmer.
- ojbyrne 18y agoLarry Wall, probably a decade ago: "The three chief virtues of a programmer are: Laziness, Impatience and Hubris."
- markessien 18y agoI get the feeling that the internet is starting to repeat itself. It's been quite a while since I read something on the net that I've not read somewhere else in a somewhat modified form.
- mlLK 18y agoOuroboros; it is the vain of our existence.