Comments on: Of Wizards and Magical Machines

By: Petri Sirkkala

Petri Sirkkala — Mon, 02 Sep 2013 21:31:27 +0000

Nice article about being a programmer. I agree with the comment about first car of a new model being very expensive. That is exactly the same with custom applications. But there exists a real bargain in software. Learn to program!

By: Geert Schuring

Geert Schuring — Wed, 28 Aug 2013 09:35:54 +0000

Thank you for this well written article. It’s a spot-on analysis of what’s going on in many projects.
Thanks!

By: Rob

Rob — Mon, 19 Aug 2013 16:52:49 +0000

Maybe there is an aspect to this story where everybody needs to learn to be a programmer. How many programmers out there no how to change their own car radiator? That is actually a fairly simple process but being a master programmer of 15 years I still prefer to pay someone else to change my radiator. The world is becoming more hands on – maybe it is time to let main stream masses know how to think like a programmer and if the trend cathes on perhaps they will honor the teachers this time around.

By: Software costs are a step function

Software costs are a step function — Sun, 18 Aug 2013 16:24:12 +0000

[…] This one’s recently come up again on Hacker News – Of Wizards and Magical Machines: […]

By: Robin Debreuil

Robin Debreuil — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 18:07:21 +0000

The first car of a new model year also cost millions and millions and is built on the backs of all previous cars. It’s the second car that is about $20,000. The only difference in software is the second car is free to produce. The problem imo is that people’s wants are much more specific and varied with software.

In reality we do cobble together solutions with different libraries and custom plugins to run on standard architectures, probably much like cars (without the quality control).

By: James

James — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 07:05:56 +0000

Firefox actually just started doing something like that. After updating to Firefox 8, the browser launches with an extra tab containing an embed of this video[1] and a link to a donation page, if I recall correctly. It’s inclusion was likely motivated by the uncertainty of the Google funding deal, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they keep it.

1. https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/video/?video=brand