This post originated from an RSS feed registered with Java Buzz
by Ugo Cei.
Original Post: Simplicity is not enough
Feed Title: Agylen on Cocoon
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Feed Description: Rumblings on Software, the Internet, Open Source and Everything
These words were written circa 1975, but they are still relevant today:
For a given level of function,
however, that system is best in which one can specify things with the
most simplicity and straightforwardness. Simplicity is not
enough. [...] The expression of the things one wants to do often
requires involuted and unexpected combinations of the basic facilities.
It is not enough to learn the elements and rules of combination; one
must also learn the idiomatic usage; a whole lore of how the elements
are combined in practice. Simplicity and straightforwardness proceed
from conceptual integrity. Every part must reflect the same
philosophies and the same balancing of desiderata. Every part must even
use the same techniques in syntax and analogous notions in semantics.
Ease of use, then, dictates unity of design, conceptual integrity.
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