Devil’s Dictionary of Programming

With apologies to Ambrose Bierce

simple — It solves my use case.

opinionated — I don’t believe that your use case exists.

elegant — The only use case is making me feel smart.

lightweight — I don’t understand the use-cases the alternatives solve.

configurable — It’s your job to make it usable.

minimal — You’re going to have to write more code than I did to make it useful.

util — A collection of wrappers around the standard library, battle worn, and copy-pasted from last weeks project into next weeks.

dsl — A domain specific language, where code is written in one language and errors are given in another.

framework — A product with the business logic removed, but all of the assumptions left in.

documented —There are podcasts, screencasts and answers on stack overflow.

startup — A business without a business plan.

hackday — A competition where the entry fee is sleep deprivation and the prize is vendor lock in.

entrepreneur — One who sets out to provide a return on investment.

serial entrepreneur — One who has yet to provide a return on investment.

disrupt — To overcome any legal, social, or moral barrier to profit.

Even human brain can't solve general problems. Humans have to study hard, train their, and then still master solving particular cases. I.e. a dancer who mastered one dance, wont automatically master all other dances.

>>2
Other dances will be easier to master though.

>>3
That is your "framework" case. It still assumes you're going to dance a similar dance.

>>2
Agreed, there is no such thing as general intelligence. There is nothing special about what we do with our brains--it just can do lots of flops. If artificial general intelligence arises, it would be the first of its kind.