Where there’s muck, there’s brass (2007)

https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2007/12/06/where-theres-muck-theres-brass/

by Tomte • 4 years ago

27 15 4 years ago

drewcoo• 4 years ago

In the case of FogBugz, the muck is the problem they decided to create for themselves (lots of targets to run on) that justifies solving the non-core business problem (creating Wasabi[1]). Or does it? [2] That kind of thing runs contrary to what I usually recommend and see recommended. It would be interesting to get a recent Spolsky take on it.

[1] https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2006/09/01/wasabi/

[2] https://jacob.jkrall.net/killing-off-wasabi-part-1

krallja4• 4 years ago

Supporting (Windows|Mac|Linux) on (MySql|MS SQL|Access) was a small but meaningful portion of our revenue stream for over a decade.

Having our own compiler meant we could migrate easily to a new platform (.NET/Mono, in our case) with two engineers working full time for only a few months. Should we have spent that time rewriting the app in C# by hand instead? How would we ship new code in the meantime?

Lascaille3• 4 years ago

While a fun read Joel on Software always seemed like a what-not-to-do blog to me.

The complexity for the sake of complexity!

No, you don't need to write your own programming language and compiler to deploy a webapp across multiple platforms.

No, you don't.

Whatever the problem is.

Yes, I understand it's complex but really, you don't.

(Even in 2006 when you couldn't just stuff your whole support stack into a container.)

Trust me.

reginaldo• 4 years ago

"What I cannot create, I do not understand", as Feynman said. I for one defend people's right to do unusual things. You do not need to write your programming language, but when you do that, you end up with something that changes you, even if the idea of writing your programming language was stupid in hindsight, perhaps especially if the idea of doing whatever you did was stupid in hindsight.

Two thoughts for you to ponder: exercising will is doing precisely what you don't need to do. Also, I feel that programming is a lot like writing. When you read something as a reader, you just read it, but when you read it as a writer, you're thinking about what makes the text flow, or "tick", and the ultimate test of that is whether you can write a similar thing yourself, or perhaps a slight variation.

krallja4• 4 years ago

How would you deploy an ASP web application to Linux hosts in 2005?

Linux and Mac made up a small but meaningful portion of our revenue for over a decade. Would you have foregone that, all because you didn’t want to write a compiler? It took one intern three months to do the first version of Thistle.

Thetawaves• 4 years ago

You could have chosen any of the cross platform frameworks of the day? PHP or Python would have been an easy choice at the time.

lmm2• 4 years ago

This has aged pretty poorly. Turns out there really are a lot of dollar bills lying in the street if you can code at all. Turns out you can make a huge amount of money by doing something easy and just not fucking it up (e.g. Slack). A lot of the time you look at the existing solutions and assume there must be some reason why they're so awful - and a lot of the time there isn't one, the makers really have just been dumb.

brianmcc• 4 years ago

Sort of.

The premise "rewards shall pass unto those who solve difficult problems" isn't neutralized by "rewards shall also pass unto the barely competent who can wing an interview in the correct trendy tech stack", or by the fact that solutions to solve everyday things like messaging are sadly so widely pretty mediocre.

Maybe it's wishful thinking but I'd like to think rewards more munificent in nature shall still pass unto those getting stuck right into the super tricky stuff...

lmm2• 4 years ago

Meh. IMO we have bigger problems due to the protestant work ethic and a kind of performative (almost macho) desire to do things the hard way than we have from a lack of raw talent. I hope those with the courage to do something easy and get mocked for it ("three kids and an iguana" indeed) are rewarded.

onion2k• 4 years ago

Google offer(ed?) an in-house search appliance that you could host yourself - they solved many of the configuration problems by selling you the hardware it runs on so they still had control of the whole stack.

Other providers solve (well, limit) the configuration problems by selling an in-house solution with very tightly locked down environment specs and they won't support anything else. If you want it in-house you have to follow their lead.

Solving a gnarly problem doesn't have to mean doing all of the work yourself. Very often a customer will put some effort in to meet you in the middle.

cushychicken• 4 years ago

the whole company is three kids and an iguana

I missed this gem the first time I read this essay. Legitimately lol'ed when I reread just now.

Where there’s muck, there’s brass (2007)

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