Tom Maffia

I came across this video a few weeks ago from Jonathan Blow, the lord almighty of hot takes. Though I was initially dismissive, some of his points hit home. He argues that modern developers are drowning in shallow knowledge: the study of arbitrary APIs, specific frameworks, and temporary tooling choices. We spend years mastering complexity that was invented by another human, rather than mastering deep knowledge: fundamental truths about computation, data structures, and architecture that remain true regardless of the tech stack. Shallow knowledge is instance-specific—knowing how to use a tool. Deep knowledge is universal—knowing why that tool exists and how it functions under the hood. ...

It goes without saying that even the best programming languages suck a little bit. Despite being powerful tools written by thousands of smart people, developers will never agree on what perfect is. At some point, the language you love the most will make design choices that you don’t like. Go is the language I love the most right now, and it’s no exception. There are things that I think could be better. ...