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Agree, but I’ve found designing robust, future proof interfaces to be one of the hardest problems in developing software. Even intentionally setting out to avoi

Agree, but I’ve found designing robust, future proof interfaces to be one of the hardest problems in developing software. Even intentionally setting out to avoid tech debt at all costs, it’s just hard to do correctly. It requires more than technical bravado and architectural vision. It really does get into the realm of predicting the future.

abc-1 2y ago
Look at how mathematicians build minimal yet complete definitions for inspiration. An algebraic system can be created with a set of operations such as multiplication and addition, and existing concepts can be mapped to this system, such as money, but the underlying algebraic system will never change. It is complete. Much of the system can be complete like this with forethought. The pieces that cannot can be factored out to the edges.
- appplication 2y ago
  You’re not wrong in a theoretical sense, but building useful interfaces that your average dev can grok enough to build on top of requires higher level abstractions, approximations, and “reasonable defaults”. My experience is that only a small number of devs actually well understand the codebases they work in (and care enough to be thoughtful in interfacing with it). The majority of devs generally are happy to tack on their features and PRs to whatever random scaffolding they can, without regard or awareness for how their individual component fits into the larger system, or how it may be extended. And to be honest it’s not necessarily a bad thing, because they do need to get work done, and merging PRs shouldn’t be reserved for the enlightened. I guess I’m just pessimistic. The reason we don’t see perfect software is because we are not capable of producing it. At a certain point it all becomes spaghetti. If you work with software that isn’t spaghetti, it’s only because the people who care about it not becoming spaghetti haven’t left yet. This is good, but eventually they will leave, standards will decline, and you will become one with the pasta.
  - abc-1 2y ago
    Keep fighting the good fight. It’s more satisfying, even if entropy inevitably wins ;)
  - hnthrow289570 2y ago
    You're not too pessimistic yet. Projects that devolved into spaghetti paid their engineers roughly the same as they will pay new ones. Looking at the incentives, it's hard to take on the burden of undoing technical debt if your salary isn't going to change much. Businesses take advantage of passions to fix things like technical debt because they know they don't have to pay too much extra for it.
- pjc50 2y ago
  > forethought Forethought is only possible if people tell you the requirements precisely correctly upfront. Real systems design is you get 90% built and someone drops a hard requirement that's also a layering violation on you.
- AtlasBarfed 2y ago
  That is incredibly naive. Math arises from first principles, human behavior does not.
  - abc-1 2y ago
    Consider how often SQL, a hash implementation, a data compression algorithm, or a standard library changes. Not often, because they are complete systems. If you don’t like them, you don’t change them- you switch to another system. But they can support an infinite variety of use cases. Hopefully that clears it up for you.
grues-dinner 2y ago
> 15. (Shea's Law) The ability to improve a design occurs primarily at the interfaces. This is also the prime location for screwing it up. https://spacecraft.ssl.umd.edu/akins_laws.html https://spacecraft.ssl.umd.edu/akins_laws.html
- mumblemumble 2y ago
  It's important to accept that you will screw it up. Repeatedly. Interfaces have to be designed before you can start using them, which means that you will never have less information about how a module will be used than you do when you design its interface. The best defense against this that I've found is to ensure, as much as possible, that interfaces can be replaced. The single responsibility and interface segregation principles can help here. Using small, focused interfaces and letting modules implement more than one of them makes it easier to use the strangler pattern to replace interfaces that no longer work well with new and improved ones. Also avoid temporal coupling as much as is feasible. Unnecessary statefulness is the easiest way to make this sort of thing harder than it needs to be.
  - grues-dinner 2y ago
    Mr Akin's gotchu, fam: > 2. . To design a spacecraft right takes an infinite amount of effort. This is why it's a good idea to design them to operate when some things are wrong . > 3. Design is an iterative process. The necessary number of iterations is one more than the number you have currently done. This is true at any point in time. > 4. Your best design efforts will inevitably wind up being useless in the final design. Learn to live with the disappointment. Also 9 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 and a bunch of the others apply too.
intelVISA 2y ago
A good middle ground is modularize everything into stateless funcs where possible so it can be reassembled in different configurations without much stress. An excellent interface will eventually be deformed beyond recognition chasing the architectural dragon; a well-crafted library will outlive the project.

abc-1 2y ago

Look at how mathematicians build minimal yet complete definitions for inspiration. An algebraic system can be created with a set of operations such as multiplication and addition, and existing concepts can be mapped to this system, such as money, but the underlying algebraic system will never change. It is complete. Much of the system can be complete like this with forethought. The pieces that cannot can be factored out to the edges.

appplication 2y ago
You’re not wrong in a theoretical sense, but building useful interfaces that your average dev can grok enough to build on top of requires higher level abstractions, approximations, and “reasonable defaults”. My experience is that only a small number of devs actually well understand the codebases they work in (and care enough to be thoughtful in interfacing with it). The majority of devs generally are happy to tack on their features and PRs to whatever random scaffolding they can, without regard or awareness for how their individual component fits into the larger system, or how it may be extended. And to be honest it’s not necessarily a bad thing, because they do need to get work done, and merging PRs shouldn’t be reserved for the enlightened. I guess I’m just pessimistic. The reason we don’t see perfect software is because we are not capable of producing it. At a certain point it all becomes spaghetti. If you work with software that isn’t spaghetti, it’s only because the people who care about it not becoming spaghetti haven’t left yet. This is good, but eventually they will leave, standards will decline, and you will become one with the pasta.
- abc-1 2y ago
  Keep fighting the good fight. It’s more satisfying, even if entropy inevitably wins ;)
- hnthrow289570 2y ago
  You're not too pessimistic yet. Projects that devolved into spaghetti paid their engineers roughly the same as they will pay new ones. Looking at the incentives, it's hard to take on the burden of undoing technical debt if your salary isn't going to change much. Businesses take advantage of passions to fix things like technical debt because they know they don't have to pay too much extra for it.
pjc50 2y ago
> forethought Forethought is only possible if people tell you the requirements precisely correctly upfront. Real systems design is you get 90% built and someone drops a hard requirement that's also a layering violation on you.
AtlasBarfed 2y ago
That is incredibly naive. Math arises from first principles, human behavior does not.
- abc-1 2y ago
  Consider how often SQL, a hash implementation, a data compression algorithm, or a standard library changes. Not often, because they are complete systems. If you don’t like them, you don’t change them- you switch to another system. But they can support an infinite variety of use cases. Hopefully that clears it up for you.

grues-dinner 2y ago

> 15. (Shea's Law) The ability to improve a design occurs primarily at the interfaces. This is also the prime location for screwing it up. https://spacecraft.ssl.umd.edu/akins_laws.html https://spacecraft.ssl.umd.edu/akins_laws.html

mumblemumble 2y ago
It's important to accept that you will screw it up. Repeatedly. Interfaces have to be designed before you can start using them, which means that you will never have less information about how a module will be used than you do when you design its interface. The best defense against this that I've found is to ensure, as much as possible, that interfaces can be replaced. The single responsibility and interface segregation principles can help here. Using small, focused interfaces and letting modules implement more than one of them makes it easier to use the strangler pattern to replace interfaces that no longer work well with new and improved ones. Also avoid temporal coupling as much as is feasible. Unnecessary statefulness is the easiest way to make this sort of thing harder than it needs to be.
- grues-dinner 2y ago
  Mr Akin's gotchu, fam: > 2. . To design a spacecraft right takes an infinite amount of effort. This is why it's a good idea to design them to operate when some things are wrong . > 3. Design is an iterative process. The necessary number of iterations is one more than the number you have currently done. This is true at any point in time. > 4. Your best design efforts will inevitably wind up being useless in the final design. Learn to live with the disappointment. Also 9 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 and a bunch of the others apply too.

intelVISA 2y ago

A good middle ground is modularize everything into stateless funcs where possible so it can be reassembled in different configurations without much stress. An excellent interface will eventually be deformed beyond recognition chasing the architectural dragon; a well-crafted library will outlive the project.