← recall

Out of the Tar Pit conceptpaper

Moseley & Marks, 2006.

Moseley & Marks, 2006. Argues complexity is the single greatest cause of software project failure, and that most complexity is accidental — caused by state, control flow, and code volume. Proposes 'functional relational programming' as a way out: separate essential state, essential logic, and accidental state/control. The recommended architecture didn't catch on, but the diagnosis (state is the enemy; mutable shared state especially) deeply influenced functional programming, immutable infrastructure, and the rise of declarative systems.

see also

• mvcc
• event-sourcing
• deep-module
• information-hiding

topics: engineering-judgment, architecture

references:

• Out of the Tar Pit (PDF)