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It's a shame he doesn't give the origin of this expression in programming. It comes from Ward Cunningham (inventor of the wiki) in his work with Kent Beck. In a
by ternaryoperator 1y ago
It's a shame he doesn't give the origin of this expression in programming. It comes from Ward Cunningham (inventor of the wiki) in his work with Kent Beck. In an interview a few years back on Dr. Dobb's, he stated that as the two of them were coding together in the late 80s, they would regularly remind each other of the principle. Eventually, it became a staple of their talks and writing.
They were cognizant of the limitations that are touched on in this article. The example they gave was of coming to a closed door. The simplest thing might be to turn the handle. But if the door is locked, then the simplest thing might be to find the key. But if you know the key is lost, the simplest thing might be to break down the door, and so on. Finding the simplest thing is not always simple, as the article states
IIRC, they were aware that this approach would leave a patchwork of technical debt (a term coined by Cunningham), but the priority on getting code working overrode that concern at least in the short term. This article would have done well to at least touch on the technical debt aspect, IMHO.
- jdlshore 1y agoKent Beck went on to formalize Extreme Programming, which is a collection of practices for allowing simple systems to evolve as requirements change.
- evanmoran 1y agoHere’s the Extreme Programming manifesto from that time. Very similar sentiment from around two decades ago. http://www.extremeprogramming.org/rules/simple.html http://www.extremeprogramming.org/rules/simple.html
- commandersaki 1y agoYet its maiden project was an abject failure.
- thefourthchime 1y agoThis should be the top comment.
- socalgal2 1y ago> inventor of the wiki It's interesting you gave that example. Before my first use of a wiki I was on a team that used Lotus Notes and did project organization in a team folder. I loved that Notes would highlight which documents had been updated since the last time I read them. In the next project, that team used a wiki. It's simpler. But, the fact it didn't tell me which documents had been updated effectively made it useless. People typed new project designs into the wiki but no one saw them since they couldn't, at a glance, know which of the hundreds of pages had been updated since they last read them. It was too simple
- avhon1 1y agoFWIW, showing recent changes is a very common wiki feature. Here's the page for my local makerspace's wiki, which runs on mediawiki: https://bloominglabs.org/Special:RecentChanges?hidebots=1&limit=50&days=90&enhanced=1&urlversion=2 https://bloominglabs.org/Special:RecentChanges?hidebots=1&li...
- something98 1y agoA terse diff like that, on a separate page, is probably not what they were referring to.
- me-vs-cat 1y agoThe first wiki by Ward Cunningham included a RecentChanges page from the beginning or very nearly so. > It was too simple That happens when you ignore requirements, either because they were outright discarded or because they were never recognized. "The simplest thing possible" is understood to include: "to meet all requirements."
- rsedgwick 1y agoI heard the expression from a colleague who made it his mantra and manifesto, and had no idea who it came from originally! Perhaps the highest honor for an expression's originator is for it to be so ubiquitous that no one knows he said it.
- bjclark 1y agoI came here to say this! Ward taught me this when I paired with him every day when we worked together. It’s his, dare I say, mantra when starting a new feature.
- csomar 1y ago> It's a shame he doesn't give the origin of this expression in programming. It is possible the OP came to this conclusion without knowing about Ward Cunningham?
- rendaw 1y agoThis sounds a lot like the apocryphal Einstein quote > Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler. And I found a similar quote from Aquinas > If a thing can be done adequately by means of one, it is superfluous to do it by means of several; for we observe that nature does not employ two instruments where one suffices (Aquinas, [BW], p. 129).
- ternaryoperator 1y agoNot apocryphal. The article is referenced and discussed in this interview with Kent Beck[0]. As you see, the link goes directly to Dr. Dobb's--although the page is down. Search for "Cunningham" and the first hit takes you right to the conversation. [0] https://blogs.oracle.com/javamagazine/post/interview-with-kent-beck https://blogs.oracle.com/javamagazine/post/interview-with-ke...
- placebo 1y agoReally surprised there in no mention of William of Ockham - you know, the guy that made razors...
- threetonesun 1y agoOl' Billy Ockham never saw a world with six bladed personal razors though.
- nrvn 1y agoTo honor the memory of this noble man I am using a single bladed razor.
- alexjm 1y agoWatch out for Occam's Hacksaw: Any complex problem can be made to look simple by hacking away enough parts of it as "not essential", saying you'll handle them in version two.
- manoDev 1y ago
- jbs789 1y agoJust to add I think the same applies in business and in life. So if you’ve got managers who have this vision and cascade it down then things become easier on the ground / the design.
- dewey 1y ago> It's a shame he doesn't give the origin of this expression in programming. Sometimes better to not assume the worst of people by default. Very easy to not know where something comes from, misremember or come up with something in parallel.
- ternaryoperator 1y agoI'm not sure what you're referring to. HN is a site where article pro's and con's are discussed. The comment was respectful and I believe informative. At no time was anything like the "worst of people" anywhere on the radar.
- dewey 1y ago“It’s a shame…” sounds like it’s was done deliberately.
- ternaryoperator 1y ago"It's a shame" is an expression of mild disappointment or regret. It makes no statement even by implication about intent.