Factor Work Into Independent Modules

If possible, factor work products into independent modules; if not, grow slowly and optimize If your work product—e.g. codebase, documents, etc.—can be factored into independent modules, do so. The key word there is independent. Slicing your shit up into a hundred microservices will not help you if everyone needs to change ten of them to get anything done. Some problems are not particularly amenable to partition; these are also problems which do not benefit much from additional workers. If the problem is a fixed point, look at ways of optimizing the sequential portion of the work. Know that throwing bodies at that problem will produce a clusterfuck.

A text-heavy screenshot presents advice about designing work products and software systems, emphasizing independent modules and warning against excessive microservices. The joke is the blunt contrast between sensible optimization advice and the profanity-laced warning that adding more workers to a fixed-point problem only creates a clusterfuck, making it useful as a reaction to overengineering or scaling a task with more people.

• @jemalloc / 959 2022-09-13