[dwallin]

I very much agree with this. Over-engineering and under-engineering are poorly named as they are not on opposite ends of the spectrum. They are actually both badly-engineered and actually both lead to many of the same issues (which I believe this article gets wrong). Of the listed cons both overlap on all of the following:

- Fragile code

- Technical debt

- Reduced Agility

- Understanding Complexity

Over-engineering can be abused an excuse for poorly-engineered solutions and cutting corners. The future being hard to predict is often used as justification, but this swings both ways, you also often won't know what code is going to get built upon. Frequently an obscure one-off piece of code can become more useful than expected, with functionality tacked on over time, until the point where an entire product is resting on really shaky foundations.

Build a culture of quality engineering. Build the minimal solution but build it well. Have a strong (and flexible) product vision as a guiding light but always take small steps towards it. Optimize towards understandability and replaceability.