Member-only story
Software Development Value Traps
Price is what you pay, the quality of the software is what you get
“Fools ignore complexity. Pragmatists suffer it. Some can avoid it. Geniuses remove it.” — Alan Perlis
In Howard Mark’s memo — something of value, he talks about how to value’s companies and stocks. In software development, we make decisions considering the value of time, quality, and complexity.
- Time = money
- Complexity = Complexity is technical debt. When code and solutions aren’t simple, they take longer to understand, maintain and update.
- Quality = Quality code is simple. Quality is less complex and with less technical debt.
Marks talks about value traps. What has a cheap price can seem like good value but in certain situations, this can be a trap.
In software development, there are value traps where development looks cheap or shortcuts seem a quicker way to create software. Most shortcuts save time in the short term but cost more time in the long term.
Why adding more people to a project doesn’t make it go faster— reality = onboarding, increased communication, conflicting with each other. Can lead to increased complexity and more…
