An essay using kitchen cleanup as a metaphor for technical debt in software engineering. Skipping immediate cleanup feels faster but accumulates costs over time, requiring costly refactoring later. The piece argues that small, continuous maintenance during development prevents larger structural problems and reflects craft in engineering.
A designer-turned-developer reflects on how design's perceived importance in software creation has fluctuated with technological constraints. As programming became easier and usefulness became paramount, design shifted from a key differentiator back to a secondary consideration, now a nice-to-have rather than essential.