←back to thread

837 points turrini | 1 comments | | HN request time: 0.343s | source
Show context
alkonaut ◴[] No.43973126[source]
"The world" runs on _features_ not elegant, fast, or bug free software. To the end user, there is no difference between a lack of a feature, and a bug. Nor is there any meaningful difference between software taking 5 minutes to complete something because of poor performance, compared to the feature not being there and the user having to spend 5 minutes completing the same task manually. It's "slow".

If you keep maximizing value for the end user, then you invariably create slow and buggy software. But also, if you ask the user whether they would want faster and less buggy software in exchange for fewer features, they - surprise - say no. And even more importantly: if you ask the buyer of software, which in the business world is rarely the end user, then they want features even more, and performance and elegance even less. Given the same feature set, a user/buyer would opt for the fastest/least buggy/most elegant software. But if it lacks any features - it loses. The reason to keep software fast and elegant is because it's the most likely path to be able to _keep_ adding features to it as to not be the less feature rich offering. People will describe the fast and elegant solution with great reviews, praising how good it feels to use. Which might lead people to think that it's an important aspect. But in the end - they wouldn't buy it at all if it didn't do what they wanted. They'd go for the slow frustrating buggy mess if it has the critical feature they need.

replies(4): >>43973280 #>>43973469 #>>43973484 #>>43973923 #
1. sabellito ◴[] No.43973280[source]
Perfectly put. People who try to argue that more time should be spent on making software perform better probably aren't thinking about who's going to pay for that.

For the home/office computer, the money spent on more RAM and a better CPU enables all software it runs to be shipped more cheaply and with more features.