The opposite of simple is not complex

Studying biology or economics, one finds organisms, ecosystems, and economies that are more than the sum of their parts. Somehow many interacting agents with limited information produce increasing organization, creating amazing complexity out of relatively simple components. In computing, if we want to harvest this potential for surprise, see results this interesting, we have to …

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One level deeper

It is often said that the developer should understand one level deeper than she’s working. If she’s writing Java, she should know how the JVM works. If he’s using a container, he should know conceptually what’s going on inside the container. This statement is true for more than just runtimes and frameworks, but all the …

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