Entry
Software engineering: Why does a programmer program?[What makes programming fun?/Mythical Man Month]
Mar 28th, 2005 07:07
Knud van Eeden,
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--- Knud van Eeden --- 28 March 2005 - 09:52 pm ----------------------
Software engineering: Why does a programmer program?[What makes
programming fun?/Mythical Man Month]
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Why is programming fun?
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What delights may its practioner expect as his reward?
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First is the sheer joy of making things. As the child delights in his
mud pie, so the adult enjoys building things, especially things of his
own design. I think this delight must be an image of God's delight in
making things, a delight shown in the distinctiveness of each leaf and
each snowflake.
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Second is the pleasure of making things that are useful to other
people. Deep within, we want others to use our work and to find it
helpful. In this respect the programming system is not essentially
different from the child's first clay pencil holder "for Daddy's
office."
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Third is the fascination of fashioning complex puzzle-like objects of
interlocking moving parts and watching them work in subtle cycles,
playing out the consequences of principles built in from the beginning.
The programmed computer has all the fascination of the pinball machine
or the jukebox mechanism, carried to the ultimate.
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Fourth is the joy of always learning, which springs from the
nonrepeating nature of the task. In one way or another the problem is
ever new, and its solver learns something: sometimes practical,
sometimes theoretical, and sometimes both.
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Finally, there is the delight of working in such a tractable medium.
The programmer, like the poet, works only slightly removed from pure
thought-stuff. He builds his castles in the air, from air, creating by
exertion of the imagination. Few media of creation are so flexible, so
easy to polish and rework, so readily capable of realizing grand
conceptual structures. (As we shall see later, this tractability has
its own problems.)
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Yet the program construct, unlike the poet's words, is real in the
sense that it moves and works, producing visible outputs separately
from the construct itself. It prints results, draws pictures, produces
sounds, moves arms. The magic of myth and legend has come true in our
time. One types the correct incantation on a keyboard, and a display
screen comes to life, showing things that never were nor could be.
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Programming then is fun because it gratifies creative longings built
deep within us and delights sensibilities we have in common with all
men.
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From The Mythical Man-Month, Anniversary Edition, pages 7-8.
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Book: see also:
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[book: source: author: Brooks, Frederik P. - title: Mythical Man-
Month - edition: anniversary - publisher: Addison-Wesley - ISBN: 0-201-
83595-9 - pages total: 322 - price: $34.95 - Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0201835959/ref=sib_dp_pt/104-3729449-
0343150#reader-link]
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Internet: see also:
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[Internet: source: http://www.google.com search for 'Frederick P.
Brooks Jr Mythical Man-Month book':
http://www.ercb.com/feature/feature.0001.html]
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