Even in the early days of mankind were
arrows and Flintstones were used to make food and other necessities, I bet
there were this distinct people who where rather unique from the groups who
experiment on ideas and bring changes despite the challenges. For instance, I
don’t think the cave drawings of those times were meant to have artistic value
but rather used as blue print or tactical drawing for improved hunting
capability or better yet exciting for the contemporary animal right activists, it
was used for taming/grazing strategies some wild animals (I bet it was a feat
that was seen as a work of divine power or pure science fiction at that time).Those
were the men and women who were behind the prehistoric futuristic S.W.A.T
At any time of man kind struggle for
betterment of Life such individuals are indispensable. At our times, computers
have given a way to smarter devices, unimaginable interconnection and endless possibilities.
We may not desperately need Iron smith or a reputed royal sword maker. Yet the
same zenith filled individual is needed in the field of computers. Human intellectual
evolution has been witnessed through out human history. Upon focusing our
lenses towards coders things get even much interesting.
Lets compare Coders/programmers/developers
to the middle age noble knights who where considered the elite of their times (not
by the current standard of course) due to the facts that they were the only few
who travel to strange lands, read posters, bring justice to the mass, read
maps, explain about the ancient Roman ruins to the ignorant village people,
speak Latin, go deep into the woods, learn lessons from the Arabs and Turks, and live for a cause!
A Knight can only serve one Lord for his
life time, but a Coder can (in fact must) serve at least more than three Lord
like programming languages.
A Knight with light yet durable armor has
many advantages over his companions with unwieldy armors, as for a coder with a
laptop of the size of dead-man chest from the movie Pirate of the Caribbean
will always be tempted to switch his love of his life to an ultra-thin laptop.
A Knight fight against bandits, foe land
lord, witches, dragons and not often but with demons all one at a time, but a
coder deals with sudden demonic like user interface errors, performance issues
which equals dark ages, horribly ugly code bugs that are similar to black death
symptoms, deal with hunchbacked algorithm implementation, documentation as
large as library of Alexandria, and the internet menace all at the same time.
After a battle, a Knight retires in a
lavish a royal bowl with drinks, foods, and women (sorry ladies it’s the middle
age) that last like months. But a coder who just delivered a successful project
is expected to reply in 12 hours for any bug report, email request.
A Knight severely wounded or even killed in
a battle is given a high rank, his name written in royal archive, cathedral
bell rang on his name, but if a coder failed to deliver a working package then
he is sued, trialed if guilty state prison is a possibility.
For a Knight there is always this lady to
be saved (not necessarily one though) that awaits him, who can deliver her from
toil of every day, evil step mother, evil land Lord, so on and on. But for a
coder such scenario is only a folk story, as there are lady coders who are too
awesome to fall for such poetic incidents.
One mistake in a battle for a Knight can
cost him his life or worse ,living in dungeon like Count of Monte Cristo, as
for a coder there is plenty of room for a mistake as long as it abides with the
contractual agreement …
To be a Knight you need to have a royal
blood in you, simply you need to be destined to be one. For a coder such racist
beliefs do not pass system requirement check.
From this comparison, one can be tempted to
contemplate over how human beings have evolved in the past 1000 years be it
culture, technology. The question I must ask you, is how will our greatest
achievements in field of computer technology will be seen a thousands years
later? Instead of searching for answer, just start working on your latest ideas, who
knows they could be placed next to a Knight armor as mankind greatest
achievements in the future museums.
Great Achievement to All
