"No" is a beautiful word.

Even engineers need a bit of the Steve Jobs mojo:

"People think focus means saying yes to the thing you've got to focus on. But that's not what it means at all. It means saying no to the hundred other good ideas that there are. You have to pick carefully. I'm actually as proud of the things we haven't done as the things I have done. Innovation is saying no to 1,000 things."

Just like in product design, a great software architecture is often defined even more by what you choose /not/ to do than what features you choose to implement.

Awesome article, thanks!

Also, "never give an answer with more precision than is warranted." -> http://clabs.org/blog/DesignPrecision