I really never expected to be witness of the kind of events like those ones we are seeing nowadays. Certainly, we are experiencing a huge impact on our conception of society mainly driven by the adjustment of the economic system; probably an era is ending, a new one is about to born I cannot possibly know that for sure. I just hope for a better one.
Normally, I am a pessimistic character; and more than ever we have reasons for being so. However in this post, I want to be a little less than usually, but with prudence. I just needed to reorder my thoughts for mental health: I have been seeing so much C++ and Javascript and the like code during the last time.
I am neither economist nor sociologist, nothing even closer, just an IT old regular guy, needless to say. I just want to reflect here, quite informally, about the IT model and more exclusively the software model and its role in our society, under a context as the one we are currently experimenting. What is a "software model" by the way? I mean just here (by overloading): in a society we have state, political, economical and legal models, among others. Good or bad, less recognized as such or not, I think we also have invented a software model which at some important extent orchestrates the other historically better known models, let us call them (more) natural models.
I am remembering the 90s as the new millennium approached and many conjectures were made about the Y2K problem, especially concerning legacy software systems, and its potentially devastating costs and negative effects. For an instance, from here, let us take some quotes (it is worthy following the related articles pointed to):
"People have been sounding the alarm about the costs of the millennium bug--the software glitch that could paralyze computers come Jan. 1, 2000--for a couple of years. Now, the hard numbers are coming in and, if the pattern holds, they point to an even larger bill than many feared just a few months ago.
[...]
Outspoken Y2K-watcher Edward E. Yardeni, chief economist at Deutsche Bank Securities Inc., says the numbers show that some organizations are ''just starting'' to wake up to Y2K's potential for damage--but he believes the possible impact is enormous. In fact, Yardeni puts the chances of a recession in 2000 or 2001 at 70% because of ''a glitch in the flow of information"
Suddenly after reading that again, the old fashioned term "software crisis" (attributed to Bauer in 1968, popularized by Dijkstra seminal work in the seventies) we taught at college rooms seemed to make more sense than ever. But romanticism aside, we in IT know, software is still quite problematic for the same reasons since then. It is now a matter of size. In Dijkstra own words almost forty years ago (Humble Programmer ):
"To put it quite bluntly: as long as there were no machines, programming was no problem at all; when we had a few weak computers, programming became a mild problem, and now we have gigantic computers, programming has become an equally gigantic problem."
But those were surely different times; weren’t they? Exaggerated (as a source of businesses or even religious opportunities) or not, however, Y2K also gave us a serious (and global) warning about to what extent software had grown in many parts of our normal society model even in a time when the Web was not wired into the global business model as we have lived in the last decades, apparently.
I do not know whether final Y2K costs were as big as or even bigger than predicted but certainly the problem gave a huge impulse to investment in the software branch, I would guess. I am afraid, not always, leading to an improvement of the software model and practices. Those were the golden times that are probably ending now when appearance was frequently more valued than content and Artificial Intelligence became a movie.
What will be going on with the software model if the underlying economic model is now adjusting so dramatically and together with them the other more natural models, too? Will be short of capital for investment and consume stop or change (again) for worst software model evolution and development?
I do believe our software model remains essentially as bad as it was in the Y2K epoch. It is a consequence of its own abstract character living in a more and more "concrete" business world. I would further guess, it is even worst now for it was highly proliferated, it got more complicated structurally. Maintenance and formally understanding are now harder, among others, because dynamism, lack of standardization and because external functionality has tended to be more valued than maintainability and soundness. And exactly for that reason, I also believe (no matter how exactly the new economic model is going to look like) software will have to be stronger structurally and more reliable because after economic stabilization and restart, whenever, businesses will turn more strict to avoid just appearance once again be able to generate wealth.
I would expect (wish) software for effectively manipulating software (legacy and fresher, dynamic spaghetti included) should be more than ever demanded as a consequence. More effective testing and dynamic maintenance will be required during any adjustment phases of the new economical model. I also see standardization as a natural requirement and driver of a higher level of software quality. Platform independence will be more important than ever, I guess. No matter what agents become winners during adjustment and after recovering of the economic system, a better software model will be critical for each one of them, globally. Software as an expression of substantial knowledge will be in any case considered an asset under any circumstances. I think, we should be seeing a less speculative and consistent economical model where precisely a better software model really will make a discriminator for competing with real substance not with just fancy emptiness. The statement must be demonstrable.
Sometimes things do not result as bad as they appeared. Sometimes they result being even worst and, now, we do have to be prepared for such a scenario, absolutely. But, I also want to believe, it can also be an opportunity out there. I would like to think a software model improvement will be an essential piece of the economic transition and a transition to something better in software will be taking place, at the end. I wish it, at least.
I recommend reading Dijkstra again especially on these days just as an interesting historical comparison; and trying honestly not fooling myself, I quote him referring to his vision of a better software model, as we called here:
"There seem to be three major conditions that must be fulfilled. The world at large must recognize the need for the change; secondly the economic need for it must be sufficiently strong; and, thirdly, the change must be technically feasible."
I think, we might be having the first two of them. Concerning the third one, and slowly returning to the C++ code I am seeing, I just reshape his words: I absolutely fail to see how I could keep programs firmly within my intellectual grip, when this programming language escapes my intellectual control. But we have to, exactly.