Software Development should be fun

Like a lot of people my age, I got into what is now called the IT business because I really enjoyed programming. We didn't really consider the money side of things, or whether it was a long-term career, we just liked messing around with computers. If people were going to pay us for it, that was even better. The word 'geek' came later...

David Intersimone, now Vice President of Developer Relations and Chief Evangelist for Borland Software, has an article on the Dr. Dobbs site called "Why Programming is Fun", which reminded me how I got started. But it isn't just nostalgia for me - I think we need to bring some of that attitude back. I know the last few years have been hard, and projects today are more challenging than they ever were 20 years ago, but these things do not preclude enjoyment. David's article quotes 5 reasons why software development is fun from Fred Brookes legendary "Mythical Man Month":

• The sheer joy of making things.


• The pleasure of making things that are useful to other people.


• The fascination of fashioning complex puzzle-like objects of interlocking moving parts.


• The joy of always learning.


• The delight of working in a tractable medium.

I don't see anything in that list that is less valid today than it was when Brooks wrote it. A critical part of my job, and the job of our sales teams, is to make sure that those aspects of our work are not overshadowed by less positive influences.