RailsConf 2014 - Keynote: Writing Software by David Heinemeier Hansson
Why Hacker News recommends it
HN points to it in discussions of programming as a creative craft and of how to write clear software.
What it is
David Heinemeier Hansson's RailsConf 2014 keynote argues that programming is closer to writing than to science, with clear code produced by iterating through drafts. It prioritizes clarity and craft over technical superiority.
Recommended by 3 HN commenters across 4 different months, 2014 to 2021.
What Hacker News said
Recommends luhgor · 2014-12 · on “Software engineers should write”
Many people might have already seen it, but I thought it'd make sense to mention DHH's talk at RailsConf either way. In his talk, he is coining the term "software writer", which goes one step further and motivates a style of programming which prioritizes clarity of code over alleged technical superiority. Very opinionated, but recommended nonetheless: [this video]
Recommends mosselman · 2017-11 · on “Sick of Ruby, dynamic typing, side effects, and object-orientation (2014)”
I don't really see how this would be much more different from language to language. The being 'sick of' part, not so much the specific irritations. Every languages has its issues and from all the languages I have tried I have found Ruby to be the most pleasant to work with, but I am sure this is different from person to person. One of the struggles that the writer seems to have is that programming applications is not science, but he seems to think it is. DHH has a great keynote on this phenomenon: "Writing Software by David Heinemeier Hansson" [this video] As mentioned in the comments of the article you will run into issues with any programming language. One of the tricks is to not hold on so tig
Recommends mosselman · 2018-06 · on “Why Crystal Is My Next Language”
I really like this[1] talk from DHH on the subject, where he talks about the misconception of many programmers that we are doing science rather than something creative. While laced with hyperbolic statements it is at the very least thought provoking on some of the things that we do as developers. 1: [this video]
Recommends shaicoleman · 2021-02 · on “Ask HN: What is your advice to someone who is starting out in software industry?”
Software is read orders of magnitude more often than it is written. Therefore, the most important thing is to optimise your code for clarity. Software is an interative process. Sometimes it can take 5+ draft versions before you produce high quality code. There a good talk on this topic: Writing Software by David Heinemeier Hansson [1] If you're short on time, you can skip to the highlight here: [2] 1. [this video] 2. [this video]
Cites frou_dh · 2020-05 · on “Programming is boring art”
> This brought me back to the time my SO tried to explain an 84 year old lady she was assisting what is it that I do for a living. The consensus was that I'm a writer. Maybe relevant talk from DHH coming to the same conclusion: [this video]
Cites raihansaputra · 2020-11 · on “Ask HN: How correct are geohot's opinions on CRUD developers?”
Half true, I guess? I'm definitely in the camp of the CRUD developers. I do accept that I don't do lower level work (even making plugins/affecting how the framework works) in my day to day job. And it's fine. Evidently these skills are worth paying for and create value (monetary or otherwise) in the world. An interesting take on this and the wider topic of how to write software is DHH's keynote from 2014[0]. He states that he himself is more interested in the 'Information System' parts instead of the 'Computer Science' part. I think there's space for more specialized titles to differentiate these jobs/skillsets. 0: [this video]