alt Hacker NewsWhat is the general consensus on Martin Fowler - I worked with Thought Works and they were obsessed with overcomplicating everything, but maybe that is just agency in general?
I think it goes without saying that the biggest fight we have as developers is keeping things as simple as possible when most external factors encourage complexity, especially LLMs.
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I'm curious too. In the Korean IT scene, his name is legendary. Because many articles reference his writings, and famous Korean IT YouTubers worship him. (I worship him too.)
So I do have some questions. First, I still enjoy reading ThoughtWorks Radar. For someone like me, who's in a vulnerable position far from the cutting edge of technology, it always helps me keep some level of synchronization with the tech world. But I'm curious whether this is just a perspective from Korea, or if it's the same in the West.
And as for the tendency to overcomplicate things—I think that even when something is implemented simply, the explanation often ends up being quite complex. Honestly, I find Fowler's writing easy to read
Ironically Martin fowler was among the wave of influencers that were trying to get away from complexity of enterprise software. remember EJBs lol.
That wave included
1. TDD by beck 2. spring framework 3. rails ( later ) 4. Agile manifesto 5. refactoring by fowler 6. gang of four design patterns
That said. Thoughtworks is a moneygrab that tried to cash in on fowler brand. I worked with them at sears ( worked closely with author of article) and siemens. they were no different from any other consulting firms that try to overcomplicate things so they can deploy more warm bodies to the project.