We like to talk about software as architecture. You design a thing. You build a thing. It is built.
Except, real architecture doesn't work that way, and it turns out metaphoric architecture doesn't either.
If you walk down the street long enough you will eventually see a house that is unmaintained. It wasn't broken to begin with, and no one broke it outright, but over time the paint (and shingles) have peeled, rot has set in, and now the foundation is cracked and the frame is starting to sag.
Even maintenance isn't always safe. Sometimes you're up on the cathedral, fixing the roof, someone flicks a cigarette butt the wrong way and it doesn't matter how well it was architected 800 years ago, it's on fire now.
We thought our digital creations were free from the decay or physical ones are subject to, but it turns out we were wrong, because even if the bits themselves don't actually rot, the digital environment they are living in constantly changes, and it amounts to the same thing.
We like to talk about software as architecture. You design a thing. You build a thing. It is built.
Except, real architecture doesn't work that way, and it turns out metaphoric architecture doesn't either.
If you walk down the street long enough you will eventually see a house that is unmaintained. It wasn't broken to begin with, and no one broke it outright, but over time the paint (and shingles) have peeled, rot has set in, and now the foundation is cracked and the frame is starting to sag.
Even maintenance isn't always safe. Sometimes you're up on the cathedral, fixing the roof, someone flicks a cigarette butt the wrong way and it doesn't matter how well it was architected 800 years ago, it's on fire now.
We thought our digital creations were free from the decay or physical ones are subject to, but it turns out we were wrong, because even if the bits themselves don't actually rot, the digital environment they are living in constantly changes, and it amounts to the same thing.