Professional Software Development

It's a respectable practice, as many others are. It is a job as honest as the cause it serves.

But, at the end of the day, like all jobs, it's just an exchange of freedom for survival, comfort, and/or ego, depending on the social level you belong to.

Recreational Programming

I started programming almost at the same time I learned to write. Of course, the programs I wrote as a 7-year-old are not very interesting; neither are the ones made by a 14-year-old me.

Actually, I've finished only a few out of all the programs I've started. Out of the finished ones, a quite low percentage could be considered interesting. Out of these ones, I felt proud enough to write about them... at the time I created them. In their historical context.

Nevertheless, the point is I've been writing and reading software, more or less consistently, for three decades. Despite the ridiculous percentage of not-garbage outcome, there are around a dozen projects I would like to talk about, but I probably never will. The best I can do until I reach a point where I really can spend time writing about the past is to publish where my interests are focusing, from now into the future.

Also, I would like to comment on a few points.

The first one is the value of developing software. Despite most of the "outcome being garbage", it is important to realise the activity is valuable: Recreational programming, in contrast with professional or job programming, means the value lies in the process, not in the outcome.

TODO: There was at least another point here, but I don't remember.

Programming as an Art

First thing I should to clarify is I have no much idea about art. But I did a humble research about it.

TODO:

• Give a formal definition of art.
• Deduce programming is art.
• Discus the concessions and the edges of the above reasoning.