Programming insights to Storytelling, it's all here.
For over two decades, I’ve worked as a software developer. At some point along the way, writing JavaScript stopped being something I had to think about, it just happened. Building CRUD apps, managing forms, handling the DOM, these became second nature. I could step into almost any project and instantly start wiring things up. This is what Daniel Kahneman refers to as System 1 thinking: fast, intuitive, automatic.
When I imagined the future of technology, I pictured a world where all my devices worked together seamlessly under my control. My car would never get lost in a parking lot because it could simply tell me its location. My home would intelligently manage the thermostat to save energy. The garage door would open automatically when it detected my arrival. My phone would serve as a personal assistant, coordinating everything to make each day run smoothly. At home, a central hub would connect all these devices, sharing information to optimize my life.
Looking at old applications, we always wonder who in their right mind thought of building them so badly. I encountered such an application in my career, and I was lucky enough that they had used version control to preserve its history. Let me describe how the application looked in its latest state.