Author here. No analogy is perfect, but this is how working with code has felt for me for a while, so I wanted to write down my thoughts about it.
I wrote this a couple of months ago, and everything moves so fast nowadays that the concept of factories is already being blurred as harnesses get better and require less tooling around them. I still think that the distinction between wanting to be in the loop vs removed from it holds up, though.
There are other interesting aspects of malleable code that I don't explore in the article, for example:
- How it affects ownership. People feel less attached to their code, which has both good and bad consequences (e.g. fewer ego battles, but also less accountability).
- Software that's malleable to users. A big topic with many interesting open questions to explore.