5 ms·

> If you sat down in front of a 15 yo computer, or tried to solve a technical challenge with the tooling of 15-10 years ago, I don't think you'd get a significa

by dangus 1y ago

> If you sat down in front of a 15 yo computer, or tried to solve a technical challenge with the tooling of 15-10 years ago, I don't think you'd get a significantly worse result. While you have decent points in your comment (essentially, the idea of tech industry growth slowing due to low hanging fruit being picked), if this statement going to be your barometer you’re going to end up looking stupendously wrong. You can sit your Grandma down at her computer and have her type in “please make me a website for my sewing club that includes a sign up form and has a pink background” and AI will just do it and it’ll probably even work the first time you run it. 15 years ago tossing a website on Heroku was a pretty new concept, and you definitely had to write it all on your own. 10 years ago Kubernetes had its initial release. Google Drive and Slack are not even 15 years old. TensorFlow is just hitting its 10th birthday. I think you’re vastly underestimating the last 15 years of technological progress and in turn value creation.

apercu 1y ago
I tried that a few months ago. Just wanted a static site to replace an old WP site. It was a total disappointment. I’m not invested enough to do a write up but I tried 3 LLM models and multiple services and all I got was a bunch of dependencies and technologies that I explicitly said I didn’t want. I would has been better off using one of those build your website services for non technical people.
ndriscoll 1y ago
I just tried it and no, you can't. I don't really even see how you could. Where is the form supposed to go? Is Grandma supposed to rent a server somewhere to do processing? Where? 25 years ago we had wysiwyg editors to build web pages, and she could just include a link to email her to have people ask her to "sign up" (the entire point of a sewing club is to socialize. You don't need an automated newsletter or whatever. That's for people that want to sell you something). You'd put it into the space your ISP gave you, or Windows actually included a personal web server. You had to be somewhat technical to use the Windows server, but it could've been made more friendly instead of being removed, and personal computers should make it easy to share a static website. We've clearly regressed since then. People think you need an engineer or AI to build basic web pages. My actual grandma was doing some of this stuff when I was a kid in the 90s, as was I. What happened to the web seems analogous to me to as if we abandoned word processors and spreadsheets and said you need a six-figure engineer to do custom programming any time you need the features of one of those things.
- chipsrafferty 1y ago
  15 years ago I couldn't order mozzarella sticks in bed from my phone.
- ansgri 1y ago
  100% this. At that time if one needed a simple custom database client with GUI and analytical reports, the go-to solution was MS Access and it was working well. Could even be placed on a shared drive. Now, as accepted solution, you either pay for different SaaSes, each with a fraction of functionality, or have to code a bespoke website using overcomplicated frameworks.
  - dangus 1y ago
    MS access still exists and is still maintained and offered for sale. You should not look back on those solutions and neglect to acknowledge their limitations. Access can only handle small databases (maximum 2GB) and about 100 simultaneous connections. Access is basically a product of the technological limitations of its time. It isn’t designed the way it is because that way is the best design. The kind of business that relied on Access is going to find that solutions like Airtable are far easier and more powerful, and certainly less prone to data loss than mom and pop’s shared drive. There are even open source self-hosted alternatives like NocoDB and Baserow (or cloud hosted). You’ll inevitably complain about the subscription cost of SaaS solutions but it’s not like MS Office business licenses were ever cheap.
- dangus 1y ago
  The thing is that you and grandma were only accomplishing static sites back then. You can still do that today with many more options than you had back then and you can even use many of the exact same methods. But when it comes to actually accomplishing something with application logic on the web, Grandma could ask the AI agent literally all these questions and get solid answers. At any point you get confused you can just ask what to do. You can highlight a line of code and ask “what does this mean?” You can even say “I want this web page to be put online what do I do?” Beats waiting for a human to answer you. You’re also taking my example application way too literally. No I don’t know why Grandma needs a signup form, I just couldn’t think of a web app off the top of my head. MS Access and WSYWIG tools like FrontPage and iWeb were not good. I know because I was there and I used FrontPage at work. A link to your email (get spammed forever) is not a replacement for an application or email form. The whole reason code is preferred over WYSIWYG is because you inevitably have issues with change management even for simple personal projects, which is why static site generators have gained popularity. I’m sure your grandma could have handled markdown + someone else’s Hugo template + Netlify. Hell, if we want to talk about progress in WYSIWYG editors, Trix greatly improved and modernized the shortfalls of that process and that was launched in 2014, less than 10 years ago. So even in the world of WSYWIG we have better tools now than before. IIS has not been removed from Windows home edition, by the way.
torginus 1y ago
[dead]
dep_b 1y ago
25 years ago I uploaded zip files with my PHP update to overwrite my older site, and possibly I had to do a MySQL migration before I could go live again. And when I don't have to care about anybody else's professional standards, that's still how I make simple websites. Apart from doing the styles and layout, I don't think current tools have less friction. They're a lot safer though. Can't say I never dropped a production database.
ViewTrick1002 1y ago
Kind of missing the existence of Wordpress? A random theme + a "form builder" plugin and it would be done with hosting taken care off wherever you created the site.
- dangus 1y ago
  I really just didn’t bring it up because it is older than 15 years old and just spans the evolution of the web. I definitely agree that it’s a reasonable choice.
ModernMech 1y ago
Their point was that we don't need things like Heroku, Kubernetes, Slack, TensorFlow, etc. They're not creating value, they're propping up a tech stack, whose value is questionable, given the amount we've invested in it. It seems that over the past 15 years of tech, the end result is that a few companies and people became fabulously wealthy, and the rest of us are pretty much worse off. Tech isn't transforming our lives or society the way tech companies promised it would 15 years ago. As for grandma, 15 years ago she could have just posted her sewing club on Facbook, she doesn't need Heroku or AI.
- dangus 1y ago
  I think you’re willfully ignorant if you’re going to claim that Slack and Kubernetes haven’t created any value. And of course these are just random examples that I happened to think of. I would say that these technologies/products being so wildly popular puts burden of proof on you to show me some kind of evidence that these technologies aren’t productive. Like are you trying to say that something had better deployment velocity and reliablity than Kubernetes at handling high-complexity application infrastructure deployments for large enterprise companies? What was it? Why was it better than Kubernetes? The analogy is that you’re basically saying that zippers aren’t really better than buttons but then literally everyone is overwhelmingly wearing pants and coats with zippers and very strongly prefer zippers. So really it’s on you to prove to me that I should be using pants with buttons instead. Finally, there’s a lot of irony in your first paragraph complaining about a few tech oligarchs becoming fabulously wealthy and then suggesting that Grandma just use Facebook instead of building her own site. In any event, my web app example was just a poorly thought out example of a web app, I really just mean a website that has a little more utility than a static site.
  - ModernMech 1y ago
    > I think you’re willfully ignorant if you’re going to claim that Slack and Kubernetes haven’t created any value. The juice hasn't been worth the squeeze. You can look at all societal indicators except the stock market pointing downward to get to that conclusion. Nothing is actually better than it was in 2010 despite Uber, Airbnb, Kubernetes, Slack, and all the other SV tech "innovations". People are not happier or wealthier because of the tech coming from Silicon Valley. In general the end result of the last 15 years of tech is that it's made us more neurotic, disconnected, depressed, and angry. We don't need "better deployment velocity and reliability for high-complexity application infrastructure deployments for large enterprises". Listen to yourself man, you sound like you've been hypnotized by the pointy-haired boss. The tech sector makes false promises about a utopia future, and then it just delivers wealth for shareholders, leaving everyone else worse off. Grandma especially doesn't need deployment velocity, she's being evicted by her landlord because he wants to turn her flat into an Airbnb. She can't get to the grocery store because the town won't invest in public transport and Uber is the only option. She's been radicalized by Meta and Youtube and now she hates her own trans grandchild because her social media feed keeps her algorithmically outraged. Oh, and now she's getting scammed by AI asking her to invest her life savings in shitcoins and NFTs. > The analogy is that you’re basically saying that zippers aren’t really better than buttons but then literally everyone is overwhelmingly wearing pants and coats with zippers and very strongly prefer zippers. I don't agree that the ubiquity and utility are necessarily correlated, so I don't see the zippers and Kubernetes as analogous. But the proliferation of zippers has more to do with the fact they are easier for manufacturers to integrate into products compared to buttons -- they come pre-measured and installing them is a straight stitch that can be done with a machine, whereas installing buttons is more time-consuming. Zippers are worse for consumers in many ways, repairability chief among them. But really they are part of a general trend over my lifetime of steadily falling garment quality, as manufacturers race to the bottom. > In any event, my web app example was just a poorly thought out example of a web app, I really just mean a website that has a little more utility than a static site. You said it, not me. We had the technology to throw up a static site in 2010 and my grandmother could actually do that with dreamweaver and FTP, and it worked fine.
insane_dreamer 1y ago
> vastly underestimating the last 15 years of technological progress based on your examples, I'd say you're vastly overestimating sure, those are all new techs, but it's not like you couldn't do those things before in different ways or they are revolutionary in any way

by dangus 1y ago

apercu 1y ago

I tried that a few months ago. Just wanted a static site to replace an old WP site. It was a total disappointment. I’m not invested enough to do a write up but I tried 3 LLM models and multiple services and all I got was a bunch of dependencies and technologies that I explicitly said I didn’t want. I would has been better off using one of those build your website services for non technical people.

ndriscoll 1y ago

I just tried it and no, you can't. I don't really even see how you could. Where is the form supposed to go? Is Grandma supposed to rent a server somewhere to do processing? Where? 25 years ago we had wysiwyg editors to build web pages, and she could just include a link to email her to have people ask her to "sign up" (the entire point of a sewing club is to socialize. You don't need an automated newsletter or whatever. That's for people that want to sell you something). You'd put it into the space your ISP gave you, or Windows actually included a personal web server. You had to be somewhat technical to use the Windows server, but it could've been made more friendly instead of being removed, and personal computers should make it easy to share a static website. We've clearly regressed since then. People think you need an engineer or AI to build basic web pages. My actual grandma was doing some of this stuff when I was a kid in the 90s, as was I. What happened to the web seems analogous to me to as if we abandoned word processors and spreadsheets and said you need a six-figure engineer to do custom programming any time you need the features of one of those things.

chipsrafferty 1y ago
15 years ago I couldn't order mozzarella sticks in bed from my phone.
ansgri 1y ago
100% this. At that time if one needed a simple custom database client with GUI and analytical reports, the go-to solution was MS Access and it was working well. Could even be placed on a shared drive. Now, as accepted solution, you either pay for different SaaSes, each with a fraction of functionality, or have to code a bespoke website using overcomplicated frameworks.
- dangus 1y ago
  MS access still exists and is still maintained and offered for sale. You should not look back on those solutions and neglect to acknowledge their limitations. Access can only handle small databases (maximum 2GB) and about 100 simultaneous connections. Access is basically a product of the technological limitations of its time. It isn’t designed the way it is because that way is the best design. The kind of business that relied on Access is going to find that solutions like Airtable are far easier and more powerful, and certainly less prone to data loss than mom and pop’s shared drive. There are even open source self-hosted alternatives like NocoDB and Baserow (or cloud hosted). You’ll inevitably complain about the subscription cost of SaaS solutions but it’s not like MS Office business licenses were ever cheap.
dangus 1y ago
The thing is that you and grandma were only accomplishing static sites back then. You can still do that today with many more options than you had back then and you can even use many of the exact same methods. But when it comes to actually accomplishing something with application logic on the web, Grandma could ask the AI agent literally all these questions and get solid answers. At any point you get confused you can just ask what to do. You can highlight a line of code and ask “what does this mean?” You can even say “I want this web page to be put online what do I do?” Beats waiting for a human to answer you. You’re also taking my example application way too literally. No I don’t know why Grandma needs a signup form, I just couldn’t think of a web app off the top of my head. MS Access and WSYWIG tools like FrontPage and iWeb were not good. I know because I was there and I used FrontPage at work. A link to your email (get spammed forever) is not a replacement for an application or email form. The whole reason code is preferred over WYSIWYG is because you inevitably have issues with change management even for simple personal projects, which is why static site generators have gained popularity. I’m sure your grandma could have handled markdown + someone else’s Hugo template + Netlify. Hell, if we want to talk about progress in WYSIWYG editors, Trix greatly improved and modernized the shortfalls of that process and that was launched in 2014, less than 10 years ago. So even in the world of WSYWIG we have better tools now than before. IIS has not been removed from Windows home edition, by the way.

torginus 1y ago

[dead]

dep_b 1y ago

25 years ago I uploaded zip files with my PHP update to overwrite my older site, and possibly I had to do a MySQL migration before I could go live again. And when I don't have to care about anybody else's professional standards, that's still how I make simple websites. Apart from doing the styles and layout, I don't think current tools have less friction. They're a lot safer though. Can't say I never dropped a production database.

ViewTrick1002 1y ago

Kind of missing the existence of Wordpress? A random theme + a "form builder" plugin and it would be done with hosting taken care off wherever you created the site.

dangus 1y ago
I really just didn’t bring it up because it is older than 15 years old and just spans the evolution of the web. I definitely agree that it’s a reasonable choice.

ModernMech 1y ago

Their point was that we don't need things like Heroku, Kubernetes, Slack, TensorFlow, etc. They're not creating value, they're propping up a tech stack, whose value is questionable, given the amount we've invested in it. It seems that over the past 15 years of tech, the end result is that a few companies and people became fabulously wealthy, and the rest of us are pretty much worse off. Tech isn't transforming our lives or society the way tech companies promised it would 15 years ago. As for grandma, 15 years ago she could have just posted her sewing club on Facbook, she doesn't need Heroku or AI.

dangus 1y ago
I think you’re willfully ignorant if you’re going to claim that Slack and Kubernetes haven’t created any value. And of course these are just random examples that I happened to think of. I would say that these technologies/products being so wildly popular puts burden of proof on you to show me some kind of evidence that these technologies aren’t productive. Like are you trying to say that something had better deployment velocity and reliablity than Kubernetes at handling high-complexity application infrastructure deployments for large enterprise companies? What was it? Why was it better than Kubernetes? The analogy is that you’re basically saying that zippers aren’t really better than buttons but then literally everyone is overwhelmingly wearing pants and coats with zippers and very strongly prefer zippers. So really it’s on you to prove to me that I should be using pants with buttons instead. Finally, there’s a lot of irony in your first paragraph complaining about a few tech oligarchs becoming fabulously wealthy and then suggesting that Grandma just use Facebook instead of building her own site. In any event, my web app example was just a poorly thought out example of a web app, I really just mean a website that has a little more utility than a static site.
- ModernMech 1y ago
  > I think you’re willfully ignorant if you’re going to claim that Slack and Kubernetes haven’t created any value. The juice hasn't been worth the squeeze. You can look at all societal indicators except the stock market pointing downward to get to that conclusion. Nothing is actually better than it was in 2010 despite Uber, Airbnb, Kubernetes, Slack, and all the other SV tech "innovations". People are not happier or wealthier because of the tech coming from Silicon Valley. In general the end result of the last 15 years of tech is that it's made us more neurotic, disconnected, depressed, and angry. We don't need "better deployment velocity and reliability for high-complexity application infrastructure deployments for large enterprises". Listen to yourself man, you sound like you've been hypnotized by the pointy-haired boss. The tech sector makes false promises about a utopia future, and then it just delivers wealth for shareholders, leaving everyone else worse off. Grandma especially doesn't need deployment velocity, she's being evicted by her landlord because he wants to turn her flat into an Airbnb. She can't get to the grocery store because the town won't invest in public transport and Uber is the only option. She's been radicalized by Meta and Youtube and now she hates her own trans grandchild because her social media feed keeps her algorithmically outraged. Oh, and now she's getting scammed by AI asking her to invest her life savings in shitcoins and NFTs. > The analogy is that you’re basically saying that zippers aren’t really better than buttons but then literally everyone is overwhelmingly wearing pants and coats with zippers and very strongly prefer zippers. I don't agree that the ubiquity and utility are necessarily correlated, so I don't see the zippers and Kubernetes as analogous. But the proliferation of zippers has more to do with the fact they are easier for manufacturers to integrate into products compared to buttons -- they come pre-measured and installing them is a straight stitch that can be done with a machine, whereas installing buttons is more time-consuming. Zippers are worse for consumers in many ways, repairability chief among them. But really they are part of a general trend over my lifetime of steadily falling garment quality, as manufacturers race to the bottom. > In any event, my web app example was just a poorly thought out example of a web app, I really just mean a website that has a little more utility than a static site. You said it, not me. We had the technology to throw up a static site in 2010 and my grandmother could actually do that with dreamweaver and FTP, and it worked fine.

insane_dreamer 1y ago

> vastly underestimating the last 15 years of technological progress based on your examples, I'd say you're vastly overestimating sure, those are all new techs, but it's not like you couldn't do those things before in different ways or they are revolutionary in any way