The perfect code base will never be achieved; an inherent imbalance exists within the relationship between business and technology.

1. {
A Developer’s
Nirvana Fallacy
Embracing the Imbalanced Relationship between
Business and Technology by Matthew Montañez

2.  Create a technical foundation of such superb
quality and architecture that it is capable of
seamlessly integrating changes in business
logic without error.
 Crafted – Elegant – Beautiful
 Allows for rapid modification and deployment
 Completely bug free; always 100% tested
 This is the ‘ideal’
The Developer’s Single,
Most Important Goal

3. {The Evolution of Coding Style
The Origins of the Goal

4.  First phase of development
 Learned and sharpened during formal
education and small business development
 Focus is getting things ‘to work’
 Important for startup cultures
 Vital for launching initial technical platforms
 Essential for productivity in new and uncertain
environments
Becoming a Hacker

5. ‚At some point, all programmers will experience this.‛
http://imgur.com/l3aFizL

6.  Phase two of a developer’s evolution
 Learned when confronted with large scale,
evolving systems
 Required for GROWING software
 Involves writing code that easily
accommodates change
Discovering the Value of
Maintainability

7.  Third phase of development
 Learned in team environments focused on a
high traffic, large scale code bases
 Focus on readability by ‘other’ developers and
efficiency in code execution
 Thoughtfulness towards overall code base
architecture and design
Coding for Scalability

8.  Final pursuit of development
 A desire for simplicity created by the
complexity of large scale systems
 Requires a vision for the potential elegance of a
code base
 Occurs when code is managed holistically and
thoughtfully
 Only drawn upon by passion for development
and pride in craftsmanship
 In poetry, no word is wasted
 Draws developers toward the ‘ideal’ code base
Code as Poetry

9. Hack
Maintainable
Scalable
Elegant
The Evolution of Coding Style

10. {An Imbalanced Relationship
Why I Will Never Succeed

11. An Imbalanced Relationship
Technology Business

12. We CANNOT expect
business to completely
inherit the goals of
technology and vice-versa.

13.  Technical Debt
 Developers are incapable of moving beyond the
‘hacker’ stage due to incompatibility with the
speed and nature of business
 Code becomes bug-ridden
 Becomes apparent only in the ‘long run’
 Undesirable environment for developers
 Leads to overall organizational frustration
 Stifles innovation
The Cost of Imbalance

14. Initial technical platform
is constructed.
Short-term business
needs outweigh the
long-term need for
technical stability.
Technical debt compiles.Productivity diminishes.
Complete code rewrite
is desired.

15. {Striving for the Ideal
Why Failure is OK

16. The nirvana fallacy is the informal
fallacy of comparing actual things with
unrealistic, idealized alternatives. It can
also refer to the tendency to assume that
there is a perfect solution to a particular
problem. A closely related concept is the
perfect solution fallacy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_fallacy

17. ‘Le mieux est l'ennemi du bien’
‘The perfect is the enemy of the
good‘
Voltaire (1694 – 1778)

18.  We can achieve balance through awareness
 Through balance, we can achieve and minimize
the costs of an imperfect code base
 We do not have to achieve the ideal code base
but we must make an effort towards it
 Requirements for Organizational Success
 Energy
 Open Communication
 Pride in Craftsmanship
 Execution via Pride not Fear
Achieving Organizational Success

19.  Avoidance of technical debt
 Solid, technical foundation motioning towards
the ‘ideal’
 Business remains agile and competitive
 Satisfaction for both business leaders and
technical developers
 Real value for the cultivated technical platform
 Poised for innovation
Benefits of Balance