Comment by calinet6 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by calinet6 | Hacker News Reader

Architects don't build cathedrals anymore, either. Neither do most software architects. Yet, look what they have built: an incredibly diverse collection of structures of all shapes and sizes, all working together to form an imperfect yet efficient system. Surely its success is due in part to its flexibility and imperfection, and the fact that they are no longer over-engineered and inflexible behemoths made from stone.

If you try too hard to design a rigid structure around anything, it can come back and bite you in the ass. Part of the reason why this seemingly disorganized and haphazard collection of buildings makes a working and thriving metropolis is because of its diversity and resilience to change and progress. If you attempt to over-engineer something of such complexity, you might just end up with Pyongyang instead of New York. Instead, we have a competing ecosystem of libraries and options with the good ones theoretically rising to the top. Better communities and communication of these values make this process work even better, just as in the greater economy. For all its complexity, this process works surprisingly well.

For all the explaining Kamp did in this article, the one thing he failed to account for was the resounding success of the current model. He did use a surprisingly apt metaphor, however. Cathedrals are no more; their old place as the center of society had to be explained by a series of myths and lies that placed ideals above reality. The thriving Bazaar easily replaced them at the center of any thriving modern city, based on the simple truth that the dynamic edge of reality was ever-changing, and that quality based on that reality would indeed be more successful.

Could it be better? Of course. But it is reality and truth that will move us forward—not mythology. Good riddance to cathedrals.

So you don't count the iOS and Android OS'es as cathedrals ?

Have you never wondered about their surprisingly coherent APIs and wondered why that was so different from, say, UNIX ?

See my other comment about knowing what a cathedral is to begin with.

Fair, but I would describe them more as well-engineered skyscrapers. Or even simply good city planning. They're large structures designed around the idea of flexibility and growth from the outside. Ironically, both of these described platforms have orders of magnitude more functionality in their 'bazaar' app-stores than the foundation itself. The foundation enables the market to work, but in itself it is simply a very well-designed support system.

I guess you're saying that there's no reason UNIX should be different—that it has somehow become a disorganized mess of libraries and code re-use, and that it is broken.

I don't see this. Android and iOS are like brand new cities; Dubai and Abu Dhabi. UNIX is Paris. Perhaps you can make some updates to the city infrastructure, but in the end the streets are still cobblestone underneath, designed for horse carts and not cars. But you have the Notre Dame at the center (ironically, a cathedral), the architecture, tons of history, you have a thriving culture and countless people working and playing in this city every single day with great success. You can complain about it all you want, but there is a reason that people are fundamentally attracted to it.

I think you're right about a lot of things, but if you propose rebuilding Paris, well, you may have some opposition. I think you might want to build a new city, rather than trying to build over very old history with some ideal of the cathedral you think it should have been. And to use your examples again, that strategy has been very successful for Android and iOS.

And now you are starting to see what is meant by "cathedral": Not a place of religious worship, but a construct with a coherent vision.

Read Brooks book.

I knew exactly what you meant by "cathedral," I simply extended the metaphor even further because I thought it was quite strikingly appropriate.

Will do, thanks for the thought-provoking article.

Paris was substantially redesigned as a planned city by Haussmann[1]. London is a better example where the street plan is pretty much unchanged.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haussmanns_renovation_of_Paris

Working link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haussmann%27s_renovation_of_Par...

yet efficient system.

Citation needed. :) What metric did you use to measure the efficiency of the software bazaar?

> an incredibly diverse collection of structures of all shapes and sizes, all working together to form an imperfect yet efficient system.

Efficient?

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