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The monoculture of meritocracyThe monoculture of meritocracyPosted Nov 14, 2012 9:12 UTC (Wed) by quintesse (subscriber, #14569)In reply to: The monoculture of meritocracy by aryonoco Parent article: Crowding out OpenBSD
> it has a cost in that it reduces readability and maintanability of code
I'm sorry, but this is a myth that always gets thrown about by people who somehow have an allergy to the word "layers". One of the reasons for introducing a layer can be abstraction where you reduce a certain problem to its bare essentials making it *easier* to understand (and implement).
> and it has a cost in that every additional layer is a potential new source of bugs.
Any code you add can improve or reduce readability/maintainability and introduce bugs, it's definitely untrue to say that a layer will always worsen the case.
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The monoculture of meritocracy Posted Nov 14, 2012 11:54 UTC (Wed) by dgm (subscriber, #49227) [Link]
All of this is only true if (and only if) the abstraction is correct, in the sense that nothing relevant is omitted. Sometimes this is not the case, and then they make things more complex instead of simpler. Coming up with good abstractions is hard.
And there's always a price to be paid for the abstraction, be it in performance, flexibility or simplicity. As with many things, there's a trade off that has to be considered.
The monoculture of meritocracy Posted Nov 14, 2012 12:06 UTC (Wed) by quintesse (subscriber, #14569) [Link]
Of course, but making things more complex instead of simpler is not something unique to layers. In fact if you just keep adding more and more code to an application without any thought to structure and design you'll probably end up with a mess that nobody but you understands.
The monoculture of meritocracy Posted Nov 14, 2012 14:35 UTC (Wed) by dgm (subscriber, #49227) [Link]
I agree. The problem is that some think (or at least that's what they say) that abstraction is some kind of panacea that solves all problems, for free. Neither is true.
The monoculture of meritocracy Posted Nov 14, 2012 14:40 UTC (Wed) by quintesse (subscriber, #14569) [Link]
You get no beef from me on that point. In fact over-engineering can turn something relatively simple into this hugely complex monster. (I've probably been guilty of that myself a couple of times before learning to KISS)
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