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Every couple of years, the hope surfaces that a simple graphical interface will replace teams of developers. Business people to quickly and easily create beautiful expressions of their ideas and launch them into production seamlessly. A handful of startups in every generation take up this challenge, and they mostly fail.
Why do people keep trying to breathe life into a solution that is so obviously doomed to fail is an interesting question, but a more useful question would be why is it doomed to fail, and what are the alternatives.
The reason why companies keep trying to create canvas driven development tools has 2 components. The first is that as a software engineer, you learn to map out your ideas in some visual representation. These simple flow charts, UML diagrams, or high fidelity mockups then have to be translated to code that a computer can interpret. During the design phase the process feels really smooth, you clarify your thoughts and produce a lot of value in a relatively short amount of time, if only the actual coding could be this frictionless. The second reason is that working with developers can be frustrating. Business people often have to contend with neverending lists of constraints in terms of what the "system" can and cannot do, or constant excuses for why deadlines were not met because of some unforeseen technical difficulty. Surely there has to be a better way. Where these two motivations meet, a business idea is born: "Let's create a tool that makes building software as easy as drawing up a flow diagram!"
(Score: 3, Insightful) by MostCynical on Friday May 31 2019, @11:31AM (6 children)
all the "codeless" UI-driven "config-only" systems still have databases, interfaces, and code underneath.
Something has to interact with the operating system and the memory and intepret the ui "inputs"
Hiding behind ui driven design there is still.. a computer.
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday May 31 2019, @12:06PM (3 children)
It all still gets implemented as current flows, binary voltage levels in the system inputs, memory, processing, communication, display, etc.
We've built up some pretty powerful macro functions in the last 60 years, but the users still haven't decided what they really want.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Osamabobama on Friday May 31 2019, @07:55PM (2 children)
So the creative work largely gets pushed up to higher levels of abstraction as the lower levels are 'solved'. Initially, it was hardware specialists that used computers, then the issues got sorted out well enough to have people specialize in software. They wrote applications where others could implement their ideas without code (e.g. Excel).
At the same time, programming languages kept getting more abstract, evolving from punch cards to machine language, to fortran, to pascal, to python and java, and whatever the kids are using these days.
But throughout it all, we still have hardware specialists, and we will still have software developers after the next great leap.
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 01 2019, @09:29AM (1 child)
No one is using Java anymore. It's all Javascript these days.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 04 2019, @03:06PM
Javascript libraries, you mean.
(Score: 1) by Mer on Friday May 31 2019, @12:10PM
Something that happens though is code-light software. Where the client is little more than a view and all the coding difficulties are with the stability of the back end, the algorithm that tells people what to watch and maybe, sometimes security. Essentially going back to the philosophy of mainframe/terminal except your pocket terminal is still super powerful just to render the bells and whistles.
The problem is that software crippled by codeless planification doesn't disappear due to its flaws. Look at the trend of removing features from software, yet somehow cluttering the ui even more.
Shut up!, he explained.
(Score: 2) by Dr Spin on Friday May 31 2019, @06:37PM
Something has to interact with the operating system and the memory and intepret the ui "inputs"
Yes. That is why I developed my system for writing PHP by throwing cow dung at the screen with a Nintendo Wiimote.
Close examination of the average PHP programs in use today will reveal its close connection to cow dung.
Warning: Opening your mouth may invalidate your brain!