lesscode.org


Welcome to lesscode.org  

By Ryan Tomayko under Talk, Theory on 07. July 2005

For a really long time now I’ve wanted to get my development related projects, essays, and other ramblings into a more coherent place on the web. At the same time, I’ve been thinking a lot about this “movement” (for lack of a better word) that I’ve grown a small part of that is simplifying, humanizing, and opening up IT.

There’s a significant portion of the development community that’s just plain pissed off at the status quo and have begun pursuing radically different ways of building and delivering systems from what is now commonly accepted by the established industry. To our delight, we’re finding that There’s Plenty of Room at the Bottom and that the next big thing in IT should really be making it smaller.

We’re also finding that this new-think will not be accepted by the mainstream analyst firms, tech publications, and vendor powerhouses on simple merit. Pimping the latest acronym from the latest vendor with the latest money is a much easier way of bringing in stupid amounts of cash than is trying to move an industry forward in providing real value to actual people. So screw you guys - your goals are in direct competition with those of my customers.

As you can see, I’m a little bitter… But I’m also excited - we’re assembling a stack of tools and techniques that are demonstrably superior and yet somehow much simpler than those of the mainstream past. We’re starting companies and controlling our future and it just feels right.

So I’m proud to announce that lesscode.org is open for business. It’s still a work in progress but here are my goals for the place:

  • Advocate, communicate, and discuss the happenings of the less movement.

  • Provide tools and resources for like minded individuals to collaborate on projects (subversion, mailman, trac, etc).

I’m also prepared to chase funding in the form of hosting, bandwidth, admin time, etc. should their be significant interest in the concept.

8 Responses to “Welcome to lesscode.org”

  1. Jarek Zgoda:

    May I ask you to remove this orange flicking when hovering a mouse over masthead of pages? I think it will be hm… less iritating?

    comment at 08. July 2005

  2. Ryan Tomayko:

    Here I thought I was being trendy and cool. But, yea, the novelty has worn off a bit. Better?

    comment at 08. July 2005

  3. David O'Hara:

    I like the site - clean and well designed. I’ve been reading some of the links in your “About” and am quite curious about your ideas and philosophies on design. Hopefully, there will be some forthcoming posts on them. hint hint

    comment at 08. July 2005

  4. Peter Williams’ Weblog » Blog Archive » lesscode.org:

    […] Ryan Tomayko is trying to start a “less code movement“. We’re assembling a stack of tools and techniques that are demonstrably superior and yet somehow much simpler than those of the mainstream past. […]

    pingback at 08. July 2005

  5. Thomas Joad:

    It would help to have clear definitions of “less” and “code”. I’ve seen all sorts of Perl that did an awful lot with very few characters, but I’d be hard pressed to ever advocate that sort of coding practice.

    Similarly, Python relieves one of having to type the closing block ‘end’, but at the cost of a mandated code layout. While this is peachy keen for many, I find that waht you gain is far less than the epressive fredom lost.

    comment at 08. July 2005

  6. Curt Hibbs:

    Thomas: It’s true, you can write unreadable code is any language — its just easier to do in some languages. But your point is well taken and I think the idea is defintely less code that is concise, yet succinct and understandable.

    Also, if you don’t like the “mandated layout” of Python, then check out Ruby. Both Python and Ruby off many of the same benefits, yet still have their distinct philosophical differences.

    comment at 10. July 2005

  7. Ryan Tomayko:

    Hi Thomas,

    “lesscode” isn’t so much a literal concept as it is an overall feeling you have when developing applications using simple tools and agile/dynamic languages. It’s less everything, really; less framework, less complexity, fewer abstract concepts, etc. It’s hard to put a finger on one specific aspect of the system, and we’re still figuring out what works best. But there are many with strong J2EE and other “enterprise” backgrounds who, upon developing a front to back application using dynamic languages such as Ruby, Python, or even PHP, realize that there’s something special there. That many of our assumptions about what was required to build applications were perhaps all wrong.

    We’re finding that not only can we build applications faster and with fewer lines of code but that we feel better about managing and maintaining them.

    comment at 10. July 2005

  8. Thomas Joad:

    Also, if you don’t like the “mandated layout” of Python, then check out Ruby. Both Python and Ruby off many of the same benefits, yet still have their distinct philosophical differences.

    Oh yes, Ruby is great. Indeed, Ruby is a good example of “succint” versus “terse”

    comment at 10. July 2005