the airline captain analogy
hands on the cables in the early days of aviation, pilots flew by feel. they had their hands directly on the cables, their feet on the specialized pedals, mechanically pulling and pushing to move the rudder and ailerons. the connection between intention and action was physical, immediate, and demanding. software development followed a similar trajectory. we used to write every line of code by hand, manually configuring servers, and stitching together disparate systems. it was a one-developer-one-module scope. then came version control, better tooling, and open source, which allowed us to operate at a higher level of abstraction and manage larger scopes. but despite these advancements, the work remained largely manual—hands on the keyboard, mind on the syntax. ...