3 ms·

Not at all a sales person, but... I think that a lot of the problems that general wisdom thinks are implicit to no/low code are so prevalent precisely because

Not at all a sales person, but... I think that a lot of the problems that general wisdom thinks are implicit to no/low code are so prevalent precisely because the barrier to entry is so low. You get a lot of people who have never programmed anything who can basically put together something that almost works by tweaking tutorials and googling around. But where they get stuck is lacking the programmer's mentality - of being able to puzzle around restraints (which all programming languages have) and then imagine all the worst case scenarios and test against them. Down thread, somebody even makes the claim that low code doesn't permit for maintenance but of course this isn't true - again, it's just inexperienced users thinking that once something works once it will work forever. And the amount of professional developers who would be willing to come in and untangle a low code mess as opposed to suggesting a "real" solution (coincidentally using their favoured stack) probably reinforces the idea that the last 20% is impossible with low code. It's not about agendas or people being stubborn, it's just about people playing to their strengths and having their perspective coloured by experience

namaria 3y ago
Yeah code is not a bad thing. It constrains us and make the hard things about designing and building non trivial systems up front. It may seem like a good idea to postpone such considerations. And it might even be in some situations. But complexity will still bite you in the ass even if you sweep it under the carpet and tell people not to worry about it (for now). But if people say you can't replace a railroad consist that necessitates engineers and designs with wheel barrels that anyone can push and you say "you totally can, you just need enough wheel barrels" you're being disingenuous about the realities of the two approaches.
- cookie_monsta 3y ago
  > Yeah code is not a bad thing I think code is a great thing, just that the "everything looks like a nail" argument goes both ways
  - namaria 3y ago
    This whole hammer metaphor gets too stretched in the context of software. Code is not a single thing, it's a whole approach to programming computers. It's hard won territory, seeing people had to use machine code and op code tables to program for a good chunk of history. And the allergy some people feel about it is unjustified in my opinion. The strengths of coding tooling are well worth the investment and trying to avoid code as if it ware a deterrent to "getting things done" is failing to understand what is hard about programming. Not learning how to code (and properly, with version control, code reviews etc which are surprisingly shunned by some professional programmers). The hard things about programming non trivial computer systems are made easier by the scaffolding of programming languages. Not harder.
  - sfn42 3y ago
    Low code is great if you don't know programming. For more complex systems you want developers who understand the system deeper than "box connects to other box makes things go brr", and if you have developers who know what they're doing they'll make a better system faster with actual code. Low code is just a GUI on top of some library. I'd rather just write the code and call the library functions directly than mess around with boxes that do nothing other than limit my options.
OkayPhysicist 3y ago
Any no/low code problem trivial enough to be hacked together by a non-programmer can be completely replaced with code in extremely short order by someone who knows what they're doing. The nightmare scenario, where that principle breaks down, happens when you hire people specifically to work on your low/no-code codebase. As a rule of thumb, the only kind of job posting that should mention a low/no code solution is one for a software developer hired to migrate your current solution to real code.

namaria 3y ago

Yeah code is not a bad thing. It constrains us and make the hard things about designing and building non trivial systems up front. It may seem like a good idea to postpone such considerations. And it might even be in some situations. But complexity will still bite you in the ass even if you sweep it under the carpet and tell people not to worry about it (for now). But if people say you can't replace a railroad consist that necessitates engineers and designs with wheel barrels that anyone can push and you say "you totally can, you just need enough wheel barrels" you're being disingenuous about the realities of the two approaches.

cookie_monsta 3y ago
> Yeah code is not a bad thing I think code is a great thing, just that the "everything looks like a nail" argument goes both ways
- namaria 3y ago
  This whole hammer metaphor gets too stretched in the context of software. Code is not a single thing, it's a whole approach to programming computers. It's hard won territory, seeing people had to use machine code and op code tables to program for a good chunk of history. And the allergy some people feel about it is unjustified in my opinion. The strengths of coding tooling are well worth the investment and trying to avoid code as if it ware a deterrent to "getting things done" is failing to understand what is hard about programming. Not learning how to code (and properly, with version control, code reviews etc which are surprisingly shunned by some professional programmers). The hard things about programming non trivial computer systems are made easier by the scaffolding of programming languages. Not harder.
- sfn42 3y ago
  Low code is great if you don't know programming. For more complex systems you want developers who understand the system deeper than "box connects to other box makes things go brr", and if you have developers who know what they're doing they'll make a better system faster with actual code. Low code is just a GUI on top of some library. I'd rather just write the code and call the library functions directly than mess around with boxes that do nothing other than limit my options.

OkayPhysicist 3y ago

Any no/low code problem trivial enough to be hacked together by a non-programmer can be completely replaced with code in extremely short order by someone who knows what they're doing. The nightmare scenario, where that principle breaks down, happens when you hire people specifically to work on your low/no-code codebase. As a rule of thumb, the only kind of job posting that should mention a low/no code solution is one for a software developer hired to migrate your current solution to real code.