Folks doing programming and they don’t even know it! I had a couple of reactions to this articlea.
First, a lot of our interaction with computing and programs has a puff of the air of mystery1 at times. From the interfaces to the software to the hardware to the connections beyond. We don’t know what we’re doing when we make it. We don’t know what we’re doing when we use it. We don’t know who else is using it, or how they’re using it. We don’t use the manuals that aren’t provided with the computers or software we buy. It’s all so new, and also just so so vast. Maybe some practitioners do know in their narrow domain of expertise, but knowing enough is not something we can claim in general.
Second, as this article points out, there is the intended use of the system presented, and then there are the affordances that it actually offers.2 We can usually do something else than what the original authors intended. Maybe even the system is so large that our uses may go undetected for a time. Or for a very long time. Or not. These off label uses aren’t very discoverable; they exist as little niches in the desert that you might wander into.
Third, a lot of our current computing systems have a serious discoverability problem.3 How is it supposed to be used? It can be really hard to find that out by looking at it. Sometimes it is even difficult to know what to search for to find out. There is no common keywords or language to describe it. Everything is jargon. At times there is just an unending wash of these unknowable interface questions and you just give up and move on with your day. Maybe you discover a new hidden user interaction and share it with a friend. Maybe you’ve known some of these since forever and are shocked that your friend hadn’t a clue. We’re all little lost tribespeople wandering around the computer wastelands knowing our little pieces of discovered computer knowledge.
Fourth, you see, I thought the author of the article was going the direction of this oral tradition of collectively collected how-to-use-its. The modern folklore of computing. Maybe some of the myths of what you could or couldn’t used to be able to do. Things are still a little too churny right now, the broth is always mixing, so we haven’t really got a solid traditional base to build on yet. Maybe we never will get there for one reason or another. I don’t know. One reason: our great wave of culture recedes before we can establish a stable priesthood of the tablet. Another: it’s not in the interests of the corps to allow their product to stagnate, it must always be new, always novel. But maybe we’ll reach a time when we share common compute practice in the ritual uses of our pocket computers.
Fifth, I think I would have chosen the word “vernacular” instead of folk for the idea here. But maybe that’s just because I’ve seen it used that way, e.g. vernacular architecture, or vernacular photography, or maybe even vernacular culture which I just found but am still a little skeptical of. I suppose contrariwise there are folkways, folk songs, folk dancing, and even folk etymology. Syllabically, I think you’d want a word like folk to pair up with some other short word if you want it to catch on, and neither program or computer is that. I think they’re not even in the same linguistic family, but I’m no expert.
Sixth and last for now, as the user of these programs and devices, we have the option to use them in any way we can think of. Provided we can think of those ways. And those unexpected ways, the creative divergent sideways thinking ways, are out there for us all to find and use. The surface area of program interfaces is enormous and growing as fast as we can develop new interfaces. So keep plugging away, exploring and discovering the human uses of these machines. Whether you want to call it folk programmers or vernacular computing, it doesn’t matter what you call it. Just use it to be good humans. Please.4
Nietzche (caveat emptor on that guy): “We once more behave as we have always behaved, namely mythologically.” Note the context is a bit different, he was referring to our explanations of why something happened. Only some overlap with my point here which is about how we work with these still relatively new and under development computing devices. The Syntopicon, Vol. 1, 2nd ed., p 127(d). The corresponding page in the 1st ed., 162(b), is missing the quote but otherwise the same. The (d) and (b) indicate which quadrant of the page the quote appears in. ↩
I know it’s not the topic here, it reminds me of Gwern’s article on Seeing Through, which I got via Henrik’s article on being perceptive. I didn’t find either of those article to be very helpful to me in particular. Maybe someday I’ll write my own version in response so we can have a dialogue instead of my random footnote complaining about it. ↩
Here is an example of exactly what I mean. Hidden stuff secreted behind every corner. I’m not really sure what this guy is talking about with “continuity”, the only reference I could find that in settings was about the camera and tv. But, I happen to have learned about the universal clipboard in the late recentness, and there is a findable manual for that, if you know where to search for it. Hint: it’s not on the device itself. I used the feature to get all these links into this page right here! ↩
If you are introducing some of your knowledge to someone you know, make it fun and special. One of today’s lucky ten k. No one should feel bad for getting to learn something new. ↩
The Link: https://joinreboot.org/p/folk-programmersa
See more links on the Interesting Links page.
Email me your folk programming ways.
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Tags only on this post: Apple, computing, folk programmers, Gwern, Hacker News, hacking, Henrik Karlsson, Nietzche, vernacular, xkcd.