Saturday, December 11, 2004

Greatness... and Advantages of Coding!

Another trip to Cribbs Causeway (third in three days!) and another discussion with my friend on topics ranging from coding software to achieving greatness...
We somehow managed to link the two.
Coding is one of the very few 'arcane' arts left. It is directly related to how in the ancient times learned scholars used to spend entire lives pouring over manuscript after manuscript detailing rituals and spells to appease one kind of God or another. In return the God would grant them special favours and perform miracles.
In the modern day, computer programmers are the new scholars and computer the new God.
We have equally thick tomes on the different ways the simple grey box sitting on (or under) your desk can be coaxed and appeased to perform miracles!
Be it downloading your favourite music through illegal (ha ha!) means or chatting to your buddy 6 timezones away (when you should actually be working!).
Indeed to call yourself a 'coder' requires years of diligent worship. Thousands of hours spent slouching over the keyboard staring into the face of the new God waiting for a sign.

So the question remains.. can we achieve greatness through 'coding'?
I think not. Coding gives you the kind of tunnel vision which is helpful when you are looking at a problem from a point of view of finding an absolute solution. It is totally useless when you want to soak in the problem and examine all its aspects. This requires more abstract thinking and cannot be codified.
Ask a good designer how he designs... he will say it is common sense and 'creativity'. In other words this means he has no idea how he designs, he just knows that it involves common sense.



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