Marathon Tyre Kicking and Insecurity

on January 8, 2012

From Dec 20 last year to Jan 7 this year I did a marathon of checking out various web frameworks. I burned both ends of the candle as well as the middle so long that the seasonal flu caught up with me. Still I kept on testing till my PC too went down.
It took me a couple of days to find and fit replacements for the PC. Then I went on with my testing. In a couple of hours with the revamped PC, I finished all testing.

I tested the following frameworks, across different languages, generations, paradigms, communal styles, and even across different philosophies:

1. Code Igniter 2.1.0


2. Yii 1.1.8


3. Rails 3.2.0


4. Sinatra + DataMapper


5. Django 1.3.1


6. Rails + DataMapper

These 2 to 3 weeks saved me a lot in terms of time, effort, and money.

Most important of all, it cures me of my insecurities-driven hunger for aa2d tools.

I am insecure, well, at least, most of the times or some of the times. It's hard for me to ignore or accept risks.

A Past Example

XSLT, XPath, bah, blah ........ and I got scared.
SOAP, Web Servies, WS-* bah, blah ........ and I got scared.
At that time, I studied half a dozen of such books and decided that I had no choice but to accept this risk of staying ignorant of such technologies. None of them become decisive competitive advantages. The RISKs I sadly accepted turned out to be no risks at all. Paper tigers? Smoke screens?

A Future Saving

I wanted to do DSL(domain-specific languages) very much. I still want to.

It will take at least a few years to do a DSL for any domain, say, public transport, health care, trading, education. It will take a genius like me ;-) to take on such a challenge.

Certain languages are provably better than others for doing DSL, say, C++ vs Python. So, with my insecurities, my chain of thoughts will go like this: "I cannot allow my competitors using Python doing DSL while I stick with C++ or VB. I must also use Python etc."

Relax in Peace

Now these 2 or 3 weeks' tests rid me of many such insecurities. I don't need to deny access or area to anyone.

The universe is too abundant for our own good! There have been and there will ever be a lot of self-defeating technologies, and a lot of useless inventions!

Yes, it is also full of life-saving technologies, customer-smiles-winning inventions too. It's 100% up to us. I want to save lives, to make customers smile, to keep them smiling, to comfort them, to help them sleep better, to change lives for the better, to reduce poverty, to make life more meaningful ... then I will keep finding tools for those ends.

Those who want to lock in customers, ransom them, torture them, out-wit them, play fast and loose with them .. too will find all the tools they need in this abundant universe.

Choose wisely and live happily, with or without any insecurity!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!