3 ms·

> they moved too slow, were stuck in their ways, and unable to change This goes beyond just engineering- people generally get more like this in all aspects of

by _yb2s 2y ago

> they moved too slow, were stuck in their ways, and unable to change This goes beyond just engineering- people generally get more like this in all aspects of life as they get older, and I believe you can prevent it by deciding not to be that way, and taking actions to not be that way. Personally, I feel that I was very rigid and closed minded when I was younger, and I've been learning and working on how to be less like that as I get older. I used to get angry when people believed or did things I thought were "wrong" - and I found if I take the time to understand why they think it is the right way, I am not bothered by it anymore, and am more able to work with them and be kind and understanding to them, even if I disagree still.

stavros 2y ago
I'm also very wary of being stuck in my ways, but even after all that bias-compensation, I still hold the belief that the fastest/most maintainable/easiest/best for the user way to make web apps is server-side rendered with minimal JS (mostly to enhance components). I don't know if this makes me a dinosaur, but I firmly believe that the best way to make 95% of modern websites is Django+HTMX (or similar), instead of a heavy SPA with an API. Of course, when it comes to web apps, like Google Docs or similar, SPAs all the way, but that's a tiny minority of the web.
- _yb2s 2y ago
  This is an interesting example, because in this case- I think it could be seen as being stuck in old ways by a younger person that is excited about new stuff, but it sounds like you actually just have more experience and a broader perspective, and so know when something "old fashioned" can be simpler and more effective than using the latest most trendy method. I hate having to use what is basically a simple static page but is effectively a large app that is being downloaded and executed client side- it makes it unresponsive.
- anothername12 2y ago
  My belief too, as a grey beard 25 years in. I’ve seen all sorts of shit come and go. There’s a lot of “slack” in the industry that we get away with. Ridiculous incidental complexity, far-out frameworks, architectural astronautics etc. But if you care about “adding value” or your business succeeding, tools like Rails/Django are way to go. (And btw, use a RDBMS ffs)
  - stavros 2y ago
    Oh yeah, the RDBMS is the other big pet peeve of mine, but luckily the tide seems to have turned towards those pretty thoroughly.
    - segfaltnh 2y ago
      Yeah the NoSQL tide seems to have been stemmed by people actually trying to use them.
- mrj 2y ago
  This is the way a lot of people feel lately, and it's nothing to do with being a dinosaur. It's a whole movement. I'm wary though, because lots of things start nicely but fail to manage complexity of even a moderately sized app, and everything grows over time. I feel like a lot of people are going to rediscover why we started making everything a SPA. There have been a lot of approaches on the frontend over the years and it's been my job too many times to clean up where that approach eventually collapsed as the app grew larger or ran into limitations. I am looking for the upgrade path -- I want to start simple but not risk an entire rewrite when the complexity exceeds that pattern. To date, very few of these things work well enough together to consider it seriously. (htmx+react would work fine but you'd pay a large cost for upgrading a single component, like rewriting it and a chunk of new runtime code. And if everything eventually gets more complex, somebody starts asking "why we have two ways of doing things?? We should consolidate!" And the rewrite cycle continues...) It's a balance between hard-won experience and becoming too wary of new things. It's hard to see new frameworks completely based on events, for example, and not cry does nobody remember that we tried it already? Having a glob of untyped context in Angular v1 was always bad, and I refused it even when it made me look like a dinosaur back then. But React was a great pattern for complex code, and I immediately switched to that. I would switch to something tomorrow if it kept those good parts, like handling complex apps, but didn't have to render everything a minimum of two times server and client. Maybe a new winner will emerge. Experience is still good to have. It doesn't === dinosaur. Instead, it has saved me a lot of misadventures.
  - stavros 2y ago
    > lots of things start nicely but fail to manage complexity of even a moderately sized app, and everything grows over time Is it size, do you think? To me it's more about how much interactivity you want the app to have. If I'm making an online shop, I don't think I'll need tons of interactivity, so I don't see the codebase ever outgrowing simple SSR views. If I'm making something much more dynamic, then I probably would go with an SPA from the beginning. What kinds of things have you seen that made sense to start with Django but then had to be split up, and why did they need to?
    - 2y ago
- arp242 2y ago
  > I don't know if this makes me a dinosaur, but I firmly believe that the best way to make 95% of modern websites is Django+HTMX (or similar), instead of a heavy SPA with an API. I agree; at some point someone said that I'm "like the anti-vaxxer of frontend development", because "I'm not listening to the experts". Hmkay. Maybe I'm old and stuck in my ways. But telling people they're like anti-vaxxers because they disagree with them (with caveats: "SPA is nice for some things, but for many template-driven apps are better") means you're just as much "stuck in your ways".
lo_zamoyski 2y ago
I think we must remember to mention "rationality" in such conversations whenever we speak of things like "rigidity". Rigidity is a kind of irrational stubbornness, and unwillingness to consider alternatives when reason compels otherwise. Someone who is principled and has a reasoned basis for his principles isn't stubborn or rigid. He's principled. His certainty isn't irrational, because it is rooted in the best justifications he has, perhaps even very good justifications that have successfully resisted all counterarguments he has heard, perhaps justifications that necessarily follow and could not be otherwise. Certainty is not a sin if rationally justified. Indeed, there is a performative contradiction in claiming that it is with certainty.
- _yb2s 2y ago
  Good point, those are totally different things, but it is often hard for someone else to tell the difference unless you explain.... explaining can also be a complex issue in office politics, because some people will see explaining as seeking and requiring their approval, and therefore subordinating yourself to them.

by _yb2s 2y ago

stavros 2y ago

I'm also very wary of being stuck in my ways, but even after all that bias-compensation, I still hold the belief that the fastest/most maintainable/easiest/best for the user way to make web apps is server-side rendered with minimal JS (mostly to enhance components). I don't know if this makes me a dinosaur, but I firmly believe that the best way to make 95% of modern websites is Django+HTMX (or similar), instead of a heavy SPA with an API. Of course, when it comes to web apps, like Google Docs or similar, SPAs all the way, but that's a tiny minority of the web.

_yb2s 2y ago
This is an interesting example, because in this case- I think it could be seen as being stuck in old ways by a younger person that is excited about new stuff, but it sounds like you actually just have more experience and a broader perspective, and so know when something "old fashioned" can be simpler and more effective than using the latest most trendy method. I hate having to use what is basically a simple static page but is effectively a large app that is being downloaded and executed client side- it makes it unresponsive.
anothername12 2y ago
My belief too, as a grey beard 25 years in. I’ve seen all sorts of shit come and go. There’s a lot of “slack” in the industry that we get away with. Ridiculous incidental complexity, far-out frameworks, architectural astronautics etc. But if you care about “adding value” or your business succeeding, tools like Rails/Django are way to go. (And btw, use a RDBMS ffs)
- stavros 2y ago
  Oh yeah, the RDBMS is the other big pet peeve of mine, but luckily the tide seems to have turned towards those pretty thoroughly.
  - segfaltnh 2y ago
    Yeah the NoSQL tide seems to have been stemmed by people actually trying to use them.
mrj 2y ago
This is the way a lot of people feel lately, and it's nothing to do with being a dinosaur. It's a whole movement. I'm wary though, because lots of things start nicely but fail to manage complexity of even a moderately sized app, and everything grows over time. I feel like a lot of people are going to rediscover why we started making everything a SPA. There have been a lot of approaches on the frontend over the years and it's been my job too many times to clean up where that approach eventually collapsed as the app grew larger or ran into limitations. I am looking for the upgrade path -- I want to start simple but not risk an entire rewrite when the complexity exceeds that pattern. To date, very few of these things work well enough together to consider it seriously. (htmx+react would work fine but you'd pay a large cost for upgrading a single component, like rewriting it and a chunk of new runtime code. And if everything eventually gets more complex, somebody starts asking "why we have two ways of doing things?? We should consolidate!" And the rewrite cycle continues...) It's a balance between hard-won experience and becoming too wary of new things. It's hard to see new frameworks completely based on events, for example, and not cry does nobody remember that we tried it already? Having a glob of untyped context in Angular v1 was always bad, and I refused it even when it made me look like a dinosaur back then. But React was a great pattern for complex code, and I immediately switched to that. I would switch to something tomorrow if it kept those good parts, like handling complex apps, but didn't have to render everything a minimum of two times server and client. Maybe a new winner will emerge. Experience is still good to have. It doesn't === dinosaur. Instead, it has saved me a lot of misadventures.
- stavros 2y ago
  > lots of things start nicely but fail to manage complexity of even a moderately sized app, and everything grows over time Is it size, do you think? To me it's more about how much interactivity you want the app to have. If I'm making an online shop, I don't think I'll need tons of interactivity, so I don't see the codebase ever outgrowing simple SSR views. If I'm making something much more dynamic, then I probably would go with an SPA from the beginning. What kinds of things have you seen that made sense to start with Django but then had to be split up, and why did they need to?
  - 2y ago
arp242 2y ago
> I don't know if this makes me a dinosaur, but I firmly believe that the best way to make 95% of modern websites is Django+HTMX (or similar), instead of a heavy SPA with an API. I agree; at some point someone said that I'm "like the anti-vaxxer of frontend development", because "I'm not listening to the experts". Hmkay. Maybe I'm old and stuck in my ways. But telling people they're like anti-vaxxers because they disagree with them (with caveats: "SPA is nice for some things, but for many template-driven apps are better") means you're just as much "stuck in your ways".

lo_zamoyski 2y ago

I think we must remember to mention "rationality" in such conversations whenever we speak of things like "rigidity". Rigidity is a kind of irrational stubbornness, and unwillingness to consider alternatives when reason compels otherwise. Someone who is principled and has a reasoned basis for his principles isn't stubborn or rigid. He's principled. His certainty isn't irrational, because it is rooted in the best justifications he has, perhaps even very good justifications that have successfully resisted all counterarguments he has heard, perhaps justifications that necessarily follow and could not be otherwise. Certainty is not a sin if rationally justified. Indeed, there is a performative contradiction in claiming that it is with certainty.

_yb2s 2y ago
Good point, those are totally different things, but it is often hard for someone else to tell the difference unless you explain.... explaining can also be a complex issue in office politics, because some people will see explaining as seeking and requiring their approval, and therefore subordinating yourself to them.