View source for The problem with current day programming and its causes

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Current day (2021) programming <small>(aka telling computers what to do – pretty much everyone needs to do that these days)</small> has a severe and worsening accessibility problem. <br>
A top level symptom of this accessibility problem is that most of us have become degraded to so called "end users". <br> 
And when we as "end users" encounter/pass-by obvious trivial problems that we would expect to be able to easily fix <br>
(for ourselves and others) in a mere few minutes then to a good chance we absolutely can no longer do so. <br>
A very frustrating and damaging experience that continues to grow worse. <br>
In the following an analysis of underlying sub-problems and causes of the symptoms:

== Problems ==

=== Job caused by flawed fundamentals: "full stack developer" ===

– There is a big (and growing) stack of tools that needs to be learned before we can even to begin <br>"to tell computers what to do" beyond what the developers designated to be possible for "end-users". <br>
'''It has gotten so bad that''' a job description emerged: "full stack developer".<br>

=== Situation caused by flawed fundamentals: ridicule of proposals for fixing the fundamentals ===

– Code can't be accessed and fixed directly from within the space designated for the "users" (typically GUIs). <br>
Overall the "wall of inaccessibility" between designated "users space" and designated "developer space" seems to have been steadily growing. <br>
Only locally shrinking maybe a bit sometimes but never overall shrinking. <br>
'''It has gotten so bad that''' even suggesting that something could almost totally remove that barrier can make one subject to ridicule. <br>
<small>Guess what's going to be suggested here ... </small>

=== Process caused by flawed fundamentals: "deployment" ===

– Publishing something that is more than "locally running toy code" but <br>
a part of an interactive online program (even if it's a tiny trivial change like adding a button trivially combining some data) <br>
has become increasingly difficult. <br>
'''It has gotten so bad that''' this bloated unnecessary process now has attained a name: "deployment". <br>
And a whole terminology and an "industry" has evolved. <br>

=== Dilemma caused by flawed fundamentals ===

– The current tools for programming have ... 
* either a deterringly steep learning curve ...
* or quickly run out of expressiveness.

== Likely causes (high abstraction level) ==

The causes for these problems (on a very high abstraction-level) are likely twofold:
* '''(A) the increasing centralization of the internet – an emerging governance problem''' <br>– <small>(Philosophically: This may perhaps be an "eternal" problem of any intelligent social life that periodically waves up?? maybe ...)</small>
* '''(B) a technical software crisis''' <br>– <small>(sheer technical difficulty and an economics caused focus on short term investment focusing on fixing symptoms rather than fixing causes)</small>

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For what can be done regarding point (B) see: 
* ultra fine-grained [[content addressed]]ness
* consistent [[progressive disclosure]]
* [[Future of human computer interaction]] ([[Higher level computer interfaces for deveusers]])
* [[Projectional editor]], [[Structural editor]]
* Making programming a nicely guided puzzle game [[Typed holes]]
* <small>[[Purely functional programming]], [[Visually augmented purely functional programming]]</small>

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Perhaps especially noteworthy:
* The Hazel project (Cryus Omar, David Moon, Andrew Blinn, et.al.)
* The various explorations of Jonathan Edwards (especially newer work on versioning/diffing)

A lot of the work of [[Category:Conal_Elliott|Conal Elliott]] seems quite relevant.
* High level: [[Tangible values (Conal Elliott)]]
* Low level: [[Compiling to categories (Conal Elliott)]]
* Low level: [[Denotative design (Conal Elliott)]] ... <br>making comprehensibility and reliability of software scaleable rather than exponentially dropping with composition.

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The "[[annotated lambda diagram]]s" (ALDs) discussed here <br>
would also be an attempt in tackling the latter point: (B). <br>

== Related ==

* [[Software]]
* '''[[New software crisis]]'''
* [[Annotated lambda diagram]]
* [[Annotated lambda diagram mockups]]

[[Category:Programming]]
[[Category:Software]]