Incremental improvement and “standing on the shoulders of others” works until it doesn’t work anymore.

At that point, one needs to hit The Big Red Button.

Japanese automobile manufacturers advanced their state of the art by allowing any production line workers to hit The Big Red Button.

Are we at this point in software development?

Are we at this point in hardware development?

Are we at this point in computer development?

Observations

Hardware Advanced Faster Than Software

Moore’s Law

Structured Programming, OO, FP, et al

Dynamic vs. Static

Functional Thinking

Correctness

Multitasking

Tells

  • Global Variables -> nesting
  • Structured Programming -> nesting
  • Types -> not nested, nested only 2 levels deep
  • Functions -> (flat namespace, mostly)
  • Namespaces ->
  • GC
  • one-in-one-out, Calculators vs. Computers
  • Sequencing vs. Asynch operation
  • GOTOs -> 1st Class Functions / CPS
  • Epicycles - Copernicus, Gallileo
  • O(n)

See Also

References
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