Working Notes: my commonplace notebook for recording & exploring ideas.
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• software exists within a social system
• relationship is reflexive
• we shape our tools and our tools shape us

need – leverage

• systemic repetition (!= DRY)
• essential vs accidental complexity (no silver bullet)
• moving around the complexity
• refactoring complexity involves refactoring teams / organizational design
• refactor to pit of success; transfer of risk
• failure mode: mistaking motion of progress
• failure mode: excessive rigidity
  • non technical: org priorities, working with other TLs
  • technical: complex migration, unacceptable intermediate state
  • fast failure, constant re-evaluation, scoped goals
  • (OODA loop)
    • orient is to update how to proceed explicitly based on observations
• don’t scale, then scale fast
  • choose a minimum set of clients;
  • minimize overfit and maximize flexibility;
  • become inevitable [it is happening]
• tracer bullets
  • just start coding and adjust targeting
• deliver value at every increment (why would I adopt this)
• yagni – don’t build every feature in one shot
  • leave some low hanging fruit – infra people will build it, shared ownership
• raise the level of abstraction, not the window
  • escape hatches
  • allow for incremental adoption
• do not fear temporary scaffolding

evolutionary means revolutionary ends

beliefs and values about the world

• vetting underlying assumptions

• understand and honor best practices, but don’t be help captive

• a lot of software is encountering intense pain, and over-reacting to it

• slaughter a lot of sacred cows

It is critical to understand that due to our maellable standards of evaluation, this process fundamentally has no end, ever. We are simply never going to realize a state of software nirvana where everything is supremely satisfying. That’s an important emotional realization. The fundamental reward of an improvement process is the experience of betterment, not some mythical destination. – Mark Slee

Rage is important in software. – Makinde Adeagbo

True focus lies in between rage and serenity.

— Kunal