
“Humanizing Application Building” by Mel Conway [pdf] - dang
http://melconway.com/Home/pdf/humanize.pdf
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dang
This is the Conway of Conway's Law, who also did some of the earliest work on
recursive descent parsers.

[http://www.melconway.com/Home/Inventor.html](http://www.melconway.com/Home/Inventor.html)

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ziyadb
Interesting research, in my opinion, this been long coming as the next phase
in the evolution of computing and society in general. It's how tech is going
change the world to the point of 24/7 always-on connectivity; once the tools,
applications, and entire ecosystem is created with more consideration to the
human element of the system.

We're actually applying to YC's Summer 2016 batch with a fully automated
application deployment process to accommodate for developers, by shifting
focus to deployment considerations that have _not_ been eliminated.

To whom it might interest: I've written about how this applies to deployment
in some detail here: [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1iU4Qez-
EjHTz6o5IUVa8l18n...](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1iU4Qez-
EjHTz6o5IUVa8l18naUlKpRLD7bLSNGFF8_s/edit?usp=sharing) any additional thoughts
on the subject would be appreciated.

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lioeters
This paper presents concepts for building interactive applications, from
philosophical to concrete implementation. I read it several times, and will
read it again, because there are some unique insights that helped me
understand my work in a new way.

One idea I liked was viewing the user/developer as an artisan.

He emphasizes the importance of tools that provide immediate feedback, _to
give the illusion that the user is working directly on the object he is
building_ ; utilize hand-eye-brain coordiantion (visual builders, WYSIWYG
editor..)

This reminded me of developing with file watch/build/live-reload, where a live
application is evolving as I write the code. As he puts it:

"in-place transformation of the working material: a single always-working
application being gradually transformed from its initial to its final form"

That's agile.

Later in the paper, he describes an application model with components and
"unidirectional flow". I don't know when this was written, but it's
interesting how this paradigm is gaining wide acceptance these days.

