What I do

I don't often write about coding.  It takes up a large part of my life.  However, whenever I think about writing regarding code, I consider responses.  Let me state right off-the-bat I currently work in a Microsoft shop.

I have developed an affinity for Microsoft products.  Part of that is simply familiarity.  For over 25 years, I had at least one machine in my possession that had a DOS prompt.  In the last few years, I have come to the conclusion that familiarity is not the only reason for my use of Microsoft platforms.

The truth is that memorizing command line arguments by rote has never been a good approach to interacting with a machine.  It was necessary for decades to do so, but a keyboard is by no means the ideal human interface device any more than punch cards were.

The truth is that graphical user interface became the paradigm in the early 1980's.  It would take another 15 years or so for this to be accepted.  Most levels of abstraction do require overhead but in my experience, the usability increase always outweighs the overhead.  I am a coder but I don't work in assembly nor do I wish to do so.

And so when I interact with a Web server or a database and that interaction relies heavily on text commands or modifying configuration files, I am put off.  The flexibility gained by allowing an end-user to directly configure every aspect of the server is a huge benefit of these platforms.  I will not dispute their popularity nor claim they are in any way deficient.  I do feel that there is a barrier to entry imposed by such platforms.

When I code something that involves a lot of encoding or parsing or file manipulation, I always add a layer of abstraction to it.  I am not claiming that others won't be able to improve on my code.  I will revisit this in the future.  New ideas will come in.  I may not have thought of all the options the first time.  However, in day-to-day use, I don't want to worry about it nor do my colleagues.

I am also put off by costs I consider excessive.  What one considers excessive varies based on not only personal preference but on situation.  I am in general opposed to barriers to entry.

And so I will return to my code.  I will continue to code in a Microsoft shop for now.  I have no intention of changing this.  I will code in other environments when asked but I can't say I have found another environment I prefer.