Sax and Violins

Okay, not really.  No violins, anyway.  But Dennis did follow through on his persistent whim of taking up the saxophone.  Last week he picked up a used one and just now is starting to get a feel for the reed and stops.  "What's the 'Stairway to Heaven' of the sax?" I wondered out loud as he was assembling the sax and clipping on the neck-strap.

Neither of us had a good answer.  Which at first surprised me--I mean, doesn't every instrument have its own Stairway?  For instance, the piano has "The Entertainer."  Drums have the solo from "Inna Godda Da Vida"; the harp has "The March of Brian Boru," and bagpipes "Scotland the Brave." But nothing comes to mind (my mind, anyway) as the calling-card of the saxophone.  Except maybe the theme of The People's Court.  Or possibly a Kenny G pastische.  But, then, it's not like I could carry a tune in a two-handled bucket, so what do I know?

But then it occurred to me that, any number of non-musical skills have their own Stairway.  It represents an inflection-point on the learning curve--namely, the spot where the student can start feeling confident about being competent.  Unsurprisingly, a software developer is no different in that respect.  Particularly when the developer can expect to be in perpetual student mode, scrambling up at least one learning curve at any given time.

For instance, in mainframe-based systems (meaning text-only terminals--or, even more retro--green-bar paper), the Stairway app. was something like an accounting report crunched from flat files.  (Mercifully, I haven't had the tedium of [shudder] counting columns, specifying output formats, and fretting about data overflows since Bill Clinton and Jean Chrétien were in office.)

Likewise, back in the days of Visual Basic/C++, an angel got its wings when you deployed a multi-form app. that shuttled data back and forth to some sort of permanent storage.  (Alternatively, outside the Microsoft Universe, it likely involved Lotus Notes.)  As pure client-server topologies went out of fashion in favour of the web, so (mercifully) did this skill-set (most especially debugging your way through "DLL Hell.").

Before 21st century content management systems, having a home-brew collection of HTML pages for photos of your pets, vacation photos, and a mouldering blog was the Stairway of web programming.  Or, if you were coding for a business, it was an online catalogue with a shopping-cart duct-taped on.  (Nowadays, in this age of Wordpress, all bets are off...but if it doesn't involveHTML5 plus jQuery and/or AJAX, you might still be a n00b.)

On the server side, the Stairway once was any database-backed application.  While that's still the bread-and-butter of many developers, although with the emphasis on REST, it has more of a roll-your-own-API kind of feel to it.  Double that if you're providing/fielding data that could be consumed or produced by a variety of devices.

For mobile development, it seems to be the venerable list app. with cloud storage, drag-and-drop functionality, and probably some cool icons for classification.  (Disclaimer:  I'm not beyond the "Hello, Android" phase m'self, so don't take my word for that.)

Database?  If you're using a standard relational database, you should know your way around a stored procedure (with input and output parameters) that punches at least two of the SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE, or DELETE buttons.  Bonus points for advanced use of aggregate functions, conditional sorting, or pagination of results.

And, finally, in the strange world of physical computing, things get real when you have to power at least one of your widgets with a supply that's not the Arduino / Raspberry Pi / Beaglebone / Etc.  Extra credit for using interrupts or making it talk to another device that's not the PC that programmed it.

Obviously, there is a world full of other tunes to play with any instrument.  And now a solar system of things (given that humans sent a camera-spaceship out to Pluto and all) for coders to work at.  But just as musicians don't become (or stay!) musicians without practice, so it is with software development.   (Although, significantly, I have yet to see a title like Learn the Trombone in 24 Hours in the bookstore.  And, of course, there's no such thing as Autotune for programmers.  Grrrrrrr.)

My point is that when you buy an album from an artist or band, you're not actually paying for the individual notes or even, really, the songs.  You're paying for a bit of the inspiration that made them tackle those particular songs in the first place.   You're paying off the equipment.  You're paying for the collaboration of many talents.  You're paying those who mentored them, either directly or indirectly.  And, mostly, you're paying for countless hours of experimentation and error, for "Just one more try and we can call it a day" all-nighters, for head-banging frustration and moments of sheer hopelessness.  In a word, you're buying craftsmanship (and the commitment it requires).

And, although I'm not remotely musical, that sounds remarkably like software development.