[3np]

I had an experience similar to their Lambda one not that long ago. Needed somewhere to host a static Hugo site, went with Netlify, who marketed some vaguely specified special support and functionality for Hugo, and "sync-to-git-repo" functionality.

Ended up spending several hours digging through their docs and scattered code until it became clear to me that the hugo-stuff was just out-of-date and poorly stitched together tooling around hugo build that was made to run in CI, and there was no actual git functionality, just web hook APIs specific for GitHub/GitLab/Bitbucket.

Even leaving that aside and figuring out how to properly upload the ready-made static directory, which I got to in the process, would have taken its own fair share of detective work.

Whereas if I had treated it like magic, I could have just zipped it up and drag-and-dropped it in their web UI and be done in 2 minutes.

It still bothers me how they go to such great extents to make it as appealing and smooth as possible for the majority happy-path use case but end up making it extremely confusing to do what in the end turns out to be trivial. Even deliberately using technically incorrect terminology in documentation (which act as misdirection) just to align with common misconceptions.

I can't seem to properly verbalize the eerie feeling I have but it relates to a trend leading to devs only using ready-made tools and APIs precisely on their abstraction level, dumbing down, total centralization of internet infrastructure, and an eventual ban on or unavailability of general computing for individuals.

</rant>

[paskozdilar]

This quote feels oddly relevant:

    Almost anything in software can be implemented, sold, and even used given enough determination. There is nothing a mere scientist can say that will stand against the flood of a hundred million dollars. But there is one quality that cannot be purchased in this way—and that is reliability. The price of reliability is the pursuit of the utmost simplicity. It is a price which the very rich find most hard to pay.

- C.A.R. Hoare

[marcosdumay]

Well, it's valid for security too. Any kind of engineering (science and arts too) has those qualities that come from competence and simplicity. Those are always rare.

[blippage]

> Even deliberately using technically incorrect terminology in documentation (which act as misdirection) just to align with common misconceptions.

I like to play with microcontrollers. Nearly everyone uses the terms IoT (internet of things), despite the fact that the vast majority of microcontrollers don't have internet connectivity out of the box. AI is picking up some buzz at the moment, and I even saw the term AIoT being used. Gotta get those buzzwords in.

What I find astonishing is that these are all things directed at technically-competent programmers who are supposed to appraise things objectively rather than being given a lot of marketing guff. Could you ever imagine trying to sell a product to a chemist, engineer or physicist in this way?

I do have one app that's connected to the internet, but that uses a Raspberry Pi. I have had other projects that used Wifi. I've come to the conclusion that it is way better to avoid anything internet if at all possible. It makes devices much more unreliable.

And that's what grinds my gears.