Slashdot Mirror
Mob Software
Hell O'World writes: "Wow! Mob Software." A concise submitter, how refreshing. To elaborate: an essay whose author argues that large software projects should be built, well, by a mob.
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"The builders shared a set of principles--the common pattern language."
Slashdot is, in its own, chaotic way, from the folks posting "goatse.cx" links to the helpful mirror-site posters, from the "Frist prost!" guys up to folks like Perens and Carmack, the place where engineering minds of many feathers come together, and as a group, we are able to keep in touch not just with news, culture, and technology, but to keep in touch with a common understanding and culture.
We ARE the mob.
At first glance, I thought he was talking about a database to keep track of whose kneecaps to break, with a friendly MS Word'esque helper with the face of Tony Soprano telling you "It looks like you're tryin' to write a fsckin' business letter." Then I actually read the article. . .
- Relativistic? That's barely Newtonian!
I'm confused.
Is it the Sicilians or the Yakuza?
And for the automatic transmission guy, he should step out of the North America once in a while. The rest of the planet uses a clutch. It ain't fun to drive unless you have one foot less than the number of pedals.
J:P
--- Worst tagline ever.
When I read this headline, all I could picture was a bunch of mobster software developers sitting around a table like in Goodfellas...
Joe Pesci: "Funny how? I mean, funny like I'm a closed source developer? I amuse you? I make you laugh? I'm here to fuckin' amuse you? How da' fuck am I funny? What da' fuck is so funny about me? Tell me, tell me what's funny."
A software methodology that has a stupider name than "X-Treme Programming"
Trolls throughout history:
Jonathan Swift
next on /., an essay where several renowned musicians are quoted supporting a "flowering carnation" development model. This development model is powerful and interesting for several reasons, as Britney Spears, members of the band Metallica, and popular rap artist Eminem point out to us.
You bring the pitchforks and I'll get some torches. We'll have Mozilla 1.0 out in no time!
"Prefiero morir de pie que vivir siempre arrodillado!"
You think I'm funny? You think I'm a frickin Code Clown huh?
evolvement?
evolvement ????
you, sir, are suffering from an over-enbiggened vocabulary.
The bigger the project, the more people should be writing it?
WOAH! Where'd that truck come from? I always thought that the bigger the project, the fewer people should work on it...
And all *my* story submissions get rejected...
Moderate away! I've got Karma and I know how to use it!
If God gave us curiosity
... no lights but for the sickly glow of hundreds of monitors... a mob of coders, all hunched over their various workstations.
Suddenly, a burly, unshaven brute of a coder stands up, thrusts an accusing finger towards another man across the room, and shouts "He's using global variables!... GET HIM!"
Pipes, chains, and two-by-fours appear out of nowhere as the entire mass of geeks converge on the poor victim, now bleating plaintively, pathetically trying to shield himself with his keyboard...
...
Yeah, I see how that could work out pretty well, actually!
...something about an infinite number of monkeys on an infinite number of typewriters. It could work... :)
"Your superior intellect is no match for our puny weapons!"
Somehow, I don't remember the CircleMUD code having sentient neural-nets coded into the Mob routines.
Even the best elven scribes would be out of their league with this one.
the liberator who destroyed my property has realigned my perception
www.quantumheresy.com
This sounds like a couple of guys who are unable to let go of the heady, exciting days of software development in its infancy, and move to the next stage.
Certainly mob creation has it's role in any industry, but as the industry matures, the place for the mob changes. Early on, each element of the mob was a person, creating operating systems, computers. As time has gone on, a person is no longer capable of creating a big application or designing a computer themselves. So now an element of the mob is a design team, or a company. And cooperating in our mostly free market, they act as a mob.
Even within a given time period of an industry, mob development works better in some places than others. The Linux movement? sure, the mob is working well. But the space shuttle code? They honestly and truly believe that something akin to the open source community should have designed the space shuttle code? Sure, the mob mentality would work, IF YOU HAD 20 SPACE SHUTTLES TO THROW AWAY IN SPECTACULAR FIREBALLS BEFORE IT WAS FINISHED.
Yes, disasters and mistakes are the hallmarks of any engineering endeavour, but that doesn't mean we can't try to avoid them.
If your only tool is a hammer...
I don't know what he's talking about. There's no mob mentality on the internet. The web is a place where individuals can share unique and sometimes conflicting ideas in a positive manner. To imply that there is any kind of groupthink...
I just realized where I was. Tra la la.
"I will give you a patch you cannot refuse"
Well, it might work
/Janne
Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
yeah, i sprained my duende once, and could hardly sit down for a week. terrible stuff.
A: None. The Universe spins the bulb, and the Zen master merely stays out of the way.