Programmers Don’t Like to Code

Jonathan Rentzsch has blogged that Programmers Don’t Like to Code and I couldn’t agree more with what he says. The gist of his post boils down to this:

Programmers don’t like to code, we like to solve problems. Coding is not problem solving, but software problem solving usually involves some coding.

Solving problems is far more interesting than writing code. Writing code is tedious and annoying half the time. And personally, once I’ve solved the problem I am very disinterested in the rest of the code that needs to be written to create a full application. I’m not really a finisher. Any projects I have finished took a lot of effort to push through the de-motivation of working on something I was fundamentally not interested in. When you’ve got a problem you want to solve you are generating ideas and ideas are fun to play around with. Once you’ve got a solution in mind finding how to implement it can also be fun (though not always). I enjoy writing prototypes and getting the guts of the solution in place but once it comes time to move beyond that I start to slow down. My interest wanes and my procrastination increases.

This isn’t only in relation to software projects. I enjoy the act of photographing and solving the problem of creating the picture I want but I rarely bother to print the result. The series of articles I want to write for this blog were a lot of fun to research and makes notes about but I haven’t sat down to write them yet. When I took my first course at The Workshops the founder of the school gave a presentation that resonated with me. He said it was quite alright that you not be a finisher so long as you form a relationship with a craftsman who is one. In photography this means finder yourself a master printer. I wonder if such detail oriented folks exist in the software industry? Perhaps I need to find one for my software projects.

Leopard Tech Talk Review

I’m a bit late posting about the Boston area Leopard Tech Talk that I attended on January 22nd. Both Michael and Daniel were much more prompt in their coverage.

Overall I thought the event was worthwhile if, like me, you weren’t able to attend WWDC. I suspect that if you did attend WWDC this was better as a meet and greet than an educational experience. I will echo what others have said with regard to the exciting APIs coming in Leopard. Much of what was shown really makes you contemplate a Leopard specific version of your applications. My suggestion to people is branch your development to work on Leopard features and put your Tiger code base into maintenance. That doesn’t necessarily mean do it now, but definitely look to take advantage of what Leopard offers as soon as possible.

I think that for the most part Apple did a wonderful job on the Tech Talks, especially considering it was free to attend. Still I think there is room for improvement and I’ll be sure to send these suggestions to Apple.

• Make sure the hotel hosting the event isn’t connected to the internet via a 56k modem.
• Consider tables in addition to chairs.
• Please, please, please consider providing power to us. You ask us to bring laptops knowing well that no laptop (Apple or otherwise) will run for 9 hours yet provide us no way to power them.
• Ditch the box lunches in favor of a buffet. If something runs out at a buffet it is replaced, not true with the box lunches. I wasn’t the only vegetarian there that didn’t score a box. Alternatively poll us for our preference when we sign up so you at least have a semi-accurate count to base your boxing on.

But as I said overall it was great and if you didn’t make it to WWDC and are near one the cities where the tour is going (and it is worldwide now) definitely try to secure a slot.

Developer – the dirty word

It occurred to me today that there are different understandings of the word developer with regard to software development. It is an overloaded word and I think it may be a source of confusion.

Leopard Tech Talk – Boston

Just received my registration confirmation for the Boston area Leopard Tech Talk! I’m very happy to be able to go. I look forward to meeting other east coast developers as well as learning about cool things like Xray. Hope to see you there!

Save MacXword!

MacXword was my first real Cocoa application for Mac OS X. It has been available since 2002, back when the platform was still fairly young. It was one of those applications that allowed people to free themselves from Classic. At the time creating a Cocoa-Java application was the most sensible approach for me as I came to the platform with a strong Java background. Unfortunately, as the years have passed this has become more of a liability. Apple no longer expands the Cocoa-Java API, and with the move to Intel-based Macs it is just plain broken in some ways. One of those ways affects MacXword. I reported the bug to Apple when I first learned of it and even included a simple example application that illustrates the problem. Alas, it has never been fixed.