

Do The Simplest Thing That Could Possibly Work - joubee
http://xp.c2.com/DoTheSimplestThingThatCouldPossiblyWork.html

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NathanKP
The website itself is definitely an application of the "Do The Simplest Thing
That Could Possibly Work" principal. It's pretty much just plain text.

Nonetheless I think it has a fairly good argument, though it could lead to
woefully inane mistakes because of not thinking things through sufficiently.

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jeffcoat
That website is the Very First Wiki. And indeed, Ward Cunningham was going for
simplicity.

<http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?WikiDesignPrinciples>

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NathanKP
I must say that it is cool in a retro sort of way, but I still like Wikipedia
better. I mean the fact the page titles tend to have no spaces, and instead
have the first letter of each word capitalized such as:

ExampleTitleInTheVeryFirstWiki

That's interesting from a programming point of view, but I'd rather see clear,
clean titles. Hence my judgement that is is cool in a retro, back to the early
90's sort of way.

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sjs
There is enough timeless content there to attract interested people anyway.
Despite its retro look the site is still active to a degree, though I'm not
sure how much original content there is. Many of the popular topics have been
beaten to death and the conclusion, as always, is that the best solution or
method depends on the problem. The arguments can be very engaging, but it goes
the other way too.

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zeynel1
Thanks for this link. The following "laws" of simplicity by John Maeda may be
of interest too:

10 Laws of Simplicity

1\. Reduce: the simplest way to achieve simplicity is through thoughtful
reduction.

2\. Organize: Organization makes a system of many appear fewer.

3\. Time: Savings in time feel like simplicity.

4\. Learn: Knowledge makes everything simpler.

5\. Differences: Simplicity and complexity need each other.

6\. Context: What lies in the periphery of simplicity is definitely not
peripheral.

7\. Emotion: More emotions are better than less.

8\. Trust: In simplicity we trust.

9\. Failure: Some things can never be made simpler.

10\. The one: Simplicity is about subtracting the obvious and adding the
meaningful.

[From the book The laws of simplicity by John Maeda]

[http://www.amazon.com/Laws-Simplicity-Design-Technology-
Busi...](http://www.amazon.com/Laws-Simplicity-Design-Technology-
Business/dp/0262134721)

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rokhayakebe
9\. I suspect everything can.

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zeynel1
I thought the same. Then, I was trying to find examples for systems that
cannot be simplified further without changing their functional definitions.
For instance, chopsticks appear to be a tool that is as simple as it can be.

