First Principle - Respect Lindy

I love heuristics. Simple rules that get you most of the way there. We love to complicate: ML, CDK, etc.

Rules of Thumb are Lindy. Lindy is a Rule of Thumb.

The Lindy Effect is a heuristic that states:

The robustness of an item is proportional to its life! ¹

That is, for any non-perishable, you can expect it to be around in the future for roughly as long as it has lived to today. A book published 50 years ago will be around another 50. A book published 2000 years ago will be around another 2000.

What does this have to do with software engineering? Our industry obsesses over "the new"; but your best friends are the tools, processes, and practices that have been around a while.

Examples

Nubank

Nubank is one of the largest Fintech companies in the world. Though young, Nubank distinguished itself with valuable products. How did it do this? By building out a Double Entry Accounting system on top of a LISP dialect: that is, implementing a 600+ year old technology using a 60+ year old programming language.

The point isn't to say that success requires older technologies. But you must always research them first.

tl;dr

We dance into the great beyond with the notion that no-one but we know how to solve the problem:

G.K. Chesterton authored this principle, referred to as "Chesterton's Gate" (translated to Twitter Quote Syntax):

There exists [...] a fence or gate erected across a road.

THEM: I don't see the use of this; let us clear it away.

YOU: If you don't see the use of it, I certainly won't let you clear it away.

YOU: Go away and think. Then, when you can come back and tell me that you DO see the use of it, I MAY allow you to destroy it.

Advice

Before choosing the latest and greatest, first consider the ideas that have stood the test of time.

NOTA BENE: An old technology must have some usage to prove robustness, i.e. don't pick a 100 year old technology that no one has used in 90 years.

For example, when picking a library for your programming language of choice, scour the documentation for references to prior art. The best libraries are written by authors who've researched what exists.

Lindy is a Rule of Thumb and Rules of Thumb are Lindy.

It's OK to choose boring technologies.

Notes

1

https://archive.org/details/isbn_9781400067824