7 Reasons why web development is running in circles

7 Reasons
why web development is
running in circles

Christian Heilmann | http://wait-till-i.com | http://twitter.com/codepo8

<head> 2008, London Hub, 15 minutes of fame

Web development is not
professional.

It is easy to blame the
technology...

It is also easy to blame the
web.

But when it comes down to it
- we are to blame.

I found over the years
several things to stand in our
way to be a professional
entity in the market.

Turf Wars
Ego
Quick Win Tutorials
Antique Recommendations
Tickbox Standards
Status Quo Fetishism
Form Over Function

1 of 7:
Instead of working Turf wars
together on
solutions, people
find their
technology of
choice...

1 of 7:
... and use this one Turf wars
to solve any
problem that might
ever come up -
regardless of
consequences.

1 of 7:
Prejudices, truisms Turf wars
and total failure to
accept and
understand other
technologies
prevent us from
working together on
the best solution.

1 of 7:
This even reflects in Turf wars
conferences.

1 of 7:
There is no end to Turf wars!
end conference - we
love to be in our
own echo chambers.

2 of 7:
Fighting the good Ego
fight on the web is
the most awesome
thing we can do!

2 of 7:
There is no way Ego
anything that is
already done can be
good enough.

2 of 7:
It is up to us and us Ego
alone to show
everybody else how
things are done.

2 of 7:
Then we make sure Ego
to give it a cool
title, reap the
applause and never
re-visit it again.

2 of 7:
Generic things are Ego
never sexy.

2 of 7:
Instead we need to Ego
solve our problem
and then add
hundreds of bells
and whistles.

2 of 7:
When people find Ego
problems with it
they should fix
them.

2 of 7:
After all we are too Ego
busy to solve the
next puzzle and get
to the next stage.

2 of 7:
Maybe one day you Ego!
will be the one who
wins the internet!

3 of 7:
Writing good Quick
tutorials is a real art. win
tutorials

3 of 7:
You want to explain Quick
a certain win
tutorials
methodology,
technology or idea,
but you also don’t
want to overwhelm
the reader.

3 of 7:
The trap we fall into Quick
is give people easy win
tutorials
solutions that are of
mediocre quality.

3 of 7:
Not because this is Quick
how people should win
tutorials
build things but
because this is
easiest to explain.

3 of 7:
Tutorials that are Quick
challenging or point win
tutorials
out issues that
might occur with a
certain solution
don’t get dugg.

3 of 7:
If the tutorial Quick
doesn’t teach me in win
tutorials
5 minutes how to
solve an issue the
writer was bad.

3 of 7:
Quick
win
tutorials

3 of 7:
Build your own CSS Quick
menu in 5 steps. win
tutorials

3 of 7:
Styling menus with Quick
CSS. win
tutorials

3 of 7:
Case Study: How we Quick
styled the menu of win
tutorials
example.com.

3 of 7:
Menu systems that Quick
work and CSS win
tutorials!
technologies that
help to build them.

4 of 7:
The W3C is too
Antique
slow. Recommenda
tions

4 of 7:
HTML is not rich
Antique
enough to build Recommenda
tions
systems we expect
to find.

4 of 7:
Overly complex
Antique
recommendations Recommenda
tions
like the DOM don’t
get revised.

4 of 7:
Yet people love to
Antique
fight to the death to Recommenda
tions
defend them.

4 of 7:
Most of the time
Antique
these are people Recommenda
tions!
that don’t get them
or never really
implemented them
in real world
scenarios.

5 of 7:
The antique Tickbox
recommendations standards

lead to people
coming up with
their own - binding -
standards.

5 of 7:
Which most of the Tickbox
time are borderline standards

ludicrous.

5 of 7:
“We like YUI grids Tickbox
but we cannot use standards

them as the
government
accessibility
standards disallow
using CSS
frameworks”

5 of 7:
The scariest thing Tickbox
about these kind of standards!

standards is that
they are normally
part of a 3 to 5 year
plan that cannot be
changed until the
next 5 year period.

6 of 7:
Maintaining the Status
status quo in a Quo
fetishism
company secures
your job.

6 of 7:
Making yourself Status
indispensable Quo
fetishism
means you cannot
be made redundant.

6 of 7:
This applies to Status
subject matter Quo
fetishism
expertise: “I am the
CSS guy here”

6 of 7:
But even more Status
annoying it applies Quo
fetishism
to ownership of the
infrastructure.

6 of 7:
Everything we built Status
and bought over the Quo
fetishism
last years works in
Internet Explorer 6.
We cannot and will
not upgrade or
change that.

6 of 7:
These are the Status
statements and Quo
fetishism
facts of work life
that hold us back.

6 of 7:
Yet nobody tackles Status
those - we are too Quo
fetishism!
busy building the
perfect validating
rounded corner
solution.

7 of 7:
No, I am not ranting Form
about designers over
function
here.

7 of 7:
I want to point out Form
that we don’t lean over
function
towards learning
real life examples...

7 of 7:
Instead we lust for Form
the next big over
function
inspirational piece.

7 of 7:
Where are the Form
tutorials how to over
function
style a CMS driven
site that uses an
enterprise system?

7 of 7:
Where are the Form
tutorials and talks over
function
about i18n and
JavaScript?

7 of 7:
Where are the Form
showcases of how over
function
example.com was
built?

7 of 7:
I think it is high time Form
to tell people how over
function
to deliver their day-
to-day jobs faster,
better and work for
the people who take
over from them.

Seven problems to have in
mind before we post our
next piece or give our next
talk.

I want to hear more from
people from the trenches.

7 Reasons why web development is running in circles

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