From Plato to Pixels

incomparable.studio

11 pointsPaulVanOijen2 comments

I remember a design book that emphasized that the best designs are those left after you remove all the distractions and cruft from the current design.

Crazily, I remember Joel on Software saying the best programs are full of cruft, ie all the inelegant details that make it work with all the various environments which can make it deal with the imperfections of the real world, so that using it is as smooth as possible and not revealing all those places which making using it so difficult.

I don't see any contradiction. Both things are true. Best software might mean most profitable (coming from a software maker who makes a living out of software, that seems likely). No one is getting paid to create 'the best design' in software. People are paid to create functioning software with useful features and in the current compute landscape, that often means building and shipping a lot of cruft.

I don't like this situation but I think it's a fair assessment.

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