Programming metaphors (Was: Programming as literature.)

[Philipp Lenssen]

"Jarno J Virtanen" <jajvirta at cc.helsinki.fi> wrote in message
news:slrnac7qns.dh0.jajvirta at sirppi.helsinki.fi...
>..
> I find every other metaphor [for programming] lacking something
> essential too.  One popular metaphor is building construction or
> engineering activity in general.
>..

I once read about gardening as such metaphor. This was in the context of
refactoring software constantly, like making sure nothing grows too big.
Plant a seed here, and there, then go to another part, take a bit off the
earth and put it in somewhere else, and so on, see it grow over time and
manage to keep it living. I have to say I certainly think e.g. architecture
has much more planning before the actual "product" is build, and the process
of building that product isn't quite as coupled with the design phase, like
growing in organic ways. (Of course if you believe that you can have the
perfect product specification, the programmer's are simply builders in a
process of creating this fixed thing, but I haven't experienced that so far
in my own job, nor would I work in programming if that would be the case.)