
Ask HN: RailsConf18 keynote DHH, how improvements kept Bascamp from sharding? - valdezm
In the keynote titled FIXME by DHH, he mentions more memory and SDD among other technology improvements as keeping Basecamp from having to shard as they thought they would, but I am curious as to how they arrived at not having to? That is, I wish this point of new technologies solving a problem was elaborated on. I can only speculate as to how at this point and am not satisfied with my own ruminations..
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valdezm
RE the question of summarizing the talk:

I'd add, DHH speaks greatly at a philosophical level to a revolution that he
envisions has to take place if we are to beat conquistadors(those who by any
means necessary seek their bottom-line alone) and the general miasma of change
that is our day as Developers and (increasingly complex)baselines that cause
barriers to/of entry because now we need to understand the new XYZ-technology
of the month... Underlying this, I think he challenges what it means to have a
prestigious company on your resume in light of the effective outcome of a
coding academy. He mentions Taleb and Software iatrogenics at a point to
discuss how Software specializations creates distance(again found at these
very large prestigious institutions) from the product and in so doing creates
a vacuum of lack of responsibility and ownership, which creates opportunity
for the end-product to be abused. This is some deep stuff that likely will
require a second go around.. I build products from the ground up, a true full-
stack Engineer for nearly a decade and I live in this tension of comfort in
specialization(which tempting but the road I have never traveled, mostly
innately) vs. the pursuit of volatility and measured effective utility
abstraction.. You can even hire me at this very moment and "arm this rebel",
lest I surrender to those dogmatic Conquistadors.. but DHH is having a hiring-
freeze at the moment because their product is too good? (I just started to
read, may not be accurate, will edit if not)

