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RE: Engineering versus Science, Anecdote versus Evidence ...

• From: "Len Bullard" <cbullard@hiwaay.net>
• To: "'David Lee'" <dlee@calldei.com>
• Date: Thu, 29 Dec 2011 20:02:13 -0600

To sell, it speaks to others and enables others to speak.  It enables
speech.  The speech is the art.  Enabling speech is an art.  Both require a
designer to learn a vocabulary of properties and methods they can apply to
enabling the expression in another, code to GUI.

A private conversation is a private conversation unless you have it on the
web.  :)

Conversation has a proximity measure in a network.  Some local conversations
can be very very dense: XML as dedicated domain vocabulary.  Lots of names
with dependent values in a small package made by a system dedicated to doing
that one beautiful or stupid thing.  IME, and anecdotally, it only gets
harder to do XML the more namespaces you have to integrate not because of
the difficulty of naming the spaces but ensuring the network components can
analogically or logically sort the space such that all users of an atomic
data set have a reasonable expectation of screen real estate.  

Web or no web, XML is still a context-allocated based system of mostly
strings.  Strings make it predictable across mutations, but the more closed
the vocabulary, the better the reliability of the forms.  

len

-----Original Message-----
From: David Lee [mailto:dlee@calldei.com] 
Sent: Thursday, December 29, 2011 7:42 PM
To: Len Bullard
Cc: Costello, Roger L.; <xml-dev@lists.xml.org>
Subject: Re:  Engineering versus Science, Anecdote versus Evidence
... [Was: Designing an experiment to gather evidence on approaches to
designing web services]

IMHO the art of software is often invisible to nearly everyone but the
creator.  Say, an elegant and performant implementation of an API.   The
'message' is personal not public.  Few will see it and likely none will ever
appreciate it.
But yes it has to sell or none of us would have jobs.


Sent from my iPad (excuse the terseness) 
David A Lee
dlee@calldei.com


On Dec 29, 2011, at 7:13 PM, "Len Bullard" <cbullard@hiwaay.net> wrote:

> 
> Same as the comment Jon Taplin makes when extolling Apple:  Art and
Science.
> 
> A means to make things people like and will buy.
> 
> Pair it up and all you have to measure is the money.  And for some, art
> serves best that way.  And for them, IME anecdotally, they don't tend to
be
> people who DO both.
> 
> Money cannot make the message.  Art can.
> 
> len
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: David Lee [mailto:dlee@calldei.com] 
> Sent: Thursday, December 29, 2011 3:05 PM
> To: Costello, Roger L.
> Cc: xml-dev@lists.xml.org
> Subject: Re:  Engineering versus Science, Anecdote versus
Evidence
> ... [Was: Designing an experiment to gather evidence on approaches to
> designing web services]
> 
> I would disagree.
> I try to treat my software creations as art as well as science.
> Same with much on engineering. Architecture, design, human interfaces.
> Much is art in the literal sense. Backed by but not solely science.
> Science is interested in fact or truth.
> Engineering is interested in things that work well.
> For me, the expression (art) is important and working well is more
important
> regardless of if I can support it with a scientific basis.   If I can get
> both great, but given a trade off of theoretically sound and actually
works,
> I'll pick that which works.  Theory be damned.
> 
> As one with a hard science educational background I Agee "science is good"
> But something that actually works is better.
> And if that can be expressed with elegance and beauty it is transcendent
..
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPad (excuse the terseness) 
> David A Lee
> dlee@calldei.com
> 
> 
> On Dec 29, 2011, at 1:18 PM, "Costello, Roger L." <costello@mitre.org>
> wrote:
> 
>> 
>>> I'd suggest software design is closer to engineering than science
>> 
>> But isn't the goal of every engineer to move steadily away from
> engineering-as-an-art to engineering-as-a science? 
>> 
>> Stated differently, shouldn't we endeavor to approach engineering
problems
> as scientists?
>> 
>> /Roger 
>> 
>> P.S. Fascinating discussion!
>> 
>> 
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• References:
  • Re: Engineering versus Science, Anecdote versus Evidence ... [Was: Designing an experiment to gather evidence on approaches to designing web services]
    • From: David Lee <dlee@calldei.com>