I found the comparison pretty useful. I used to compose music solely by playing around on an instrument until I hit upon something that sounded good, but I had

I found the comparison pretty useful. I used to compose music solely by playing around on an instrument until I hit upon something that sounded good, but I had no idea why it sounded good. I can still compose that way, but after studying music theory, I can compose directly from my head to a sheet of paper without any instrument, as (1) I can now envision in my mind what the music would sound like, and (2) I understand and can employ reusable patterns and concepts of composition that I know will sound good and work together. Similarly, when I started programming, I had little overall vision for what I was doing. I just started writing code, and stopped when I had built up a pile of spaghetti statements that did what I wanted them to do. Now, with better understanding of design concepts and reusable patterns, the development process is much more clean and structured rather than poking around with guesswork.