The desire to code

So here I am at work again. I have in front of me a partially completed manual that i have been charged with creating titled "Fiber Optic Termination Instructions". I am supposed to make this manual for my work but i don't exactly know why, its not going to end up inside of any product, and it is not anything that any of our customers actually asked for or even mentioned that "it would be nice to have". As I know nothing about terminating fiber optic cables I must find a resource within the company to show me how it is done so that I might write this un-asked-for manual.

So I find Rick in the fiber department and ask if he could help me. His reply is predictable "What's this manual for? we don't have a fiber optic cable termination kit so whats the purpose?". "I don't know" I reply, but I proceed to explain that its something our Regional (insert ridiculous made up title here) manager asked for. So I tell Rick that I will ask him again and copy him in on the Email so that he can know why we are doing this.

The reply from the regional (dipwad) is circular, basically we need it because we need it. Forget the fact that we don't sell to consumers, and all our customers are already trained AND CERTIFIED! to do this exact thing! Forget the fact that this will TAKE A WEEK OF MY VALUABLE FUCKING TIME! no. we must have this. I must learn how to terminate fiber optic cable and write a manual teaching others how to do it even though they all already know how to do it way better than me.

So then I started thinking. Why is this angering me so much. Is it because my career goal is not to write manuals on fiber termination (or anything else for that matter). Is it because whenever I start to do the thing that I really want to do I get sidetracked into doing something else retarded? is it because I could really give a flying fuck how much fiber optic cable this company sells? or is it because I have a desire to code?

Its the code. Why you ask? Well essentially it's because a programmer is an artist, and like a true artist I do not care about money so much as I care about beauty. The salesmen in life (aka most people) only care about making money.

Take my work for example, we sell cables. Who in their right mind would say as a kid "i want to grow up to be a cable salesman" Sure you might say i want to be on TV because TV is liked by everyone, but no one ever thinks of the cable connecting it, who would? Yet every day I see people getting exited about selling cable to other people. why is this? the only explanation is money.

Code on the other hand, (which can be used to make a lot of money mind you) is beautiful. It's logical, a well written piece of code is something you show your friends (if they are programmers) and marvel at.

When cavemen looked up at the stars millions of years ago they noticed something. Patterns. Why did they notice these patterns? simple, because they are patterns. Patterns are the evidence that universal truths exist. Truth, is universal, omniscient, omnipotent. Truth is god.

When the cavemen settled down and made up some rules to explain the patterns they saw in the sky, they started noticing other patterns. more subtle ones such as: Every round object rolls better than every square object; A lever can be used to lift more weight than you could normally; If you have 5 good hunters in your tribe and every good hunter kills 4 buffalo; you will have 20 buffalo to last you through the cold months. 5 X 4 = 20. math was born.

Unfortunately, as man progressed and solved all the basic equations that were obvious to him, he was left with fewer and fewer easy problems to solve. Until one day, it came down to one of the most complicated equations of all time. how do we calculate a perfect formula for selling more fiber optic cable to more people? wow, this was tough. not only could we not calculate the formula but we didn't even know what all the factors were. we couldn't even come up with all the variables involved in this formula.

So what did we do? we gave up. Gave up on all the math, gave up on the logic which is in fact what had gotten us to this point. Instead we try random actions. lets see if chaos might work? We can't come up with the formula, so we presume that there is in fact no formula. We spite logic! we become salesmen, and work on emotion alone. whim. grunt and point. "you buy cable now!"

This is why I code. A piece of code is a small encapsulated block of pure logic. Pure beauty. If something is not working in your code, you can guaranDAMtee it is because of something YOU did. It is the existentialist utopia.

So how is it then that in a world that man has be refining for thousands (millions) of years that we are left with any simple equations to solve? why is it that these simple equations have not already been solved? Why didn't Plato or Socrates figure out how to normalize my database, or how to configure my xmlrpc protocol? duh.

Because we aren't living in the same world. We in fact are creating a new one. one where we understand everything. one where all truths are known. one where we are gods!

this is why i code.