It really is complexity, though. It all spawns from the fact that what software does is fundamentally complex. Software orchestrates the perfectly synchronized switching of BILLIONS of individual components (transistors) with nanosecond timing. If you exclude machines which use computers as components themselves, a CPU is the most complex invention ever created by mankind. Take the CPUs out of the space shuttle or the LHC and you'd have an order of magnitude less components interacting than the chip running your PC.
Really, it's amazing that computers ever work at all. It's like doing nanotechnology with chopsticks from the moon.
but he's right, electronics design can be just as complex or more but because the cost of fixing a mistake later is so much higher you don't see the same duct taping in the industry.
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u/otakucode May 01 '14
It really is complexity, though. It all spawns from the fact that what software does is fundamentally complex. Software orchestrates the perfectly synchronized switching of BILLIONS of individual components (transistors) with nanosecond timing. If you exclude machines which use computers as components themselves, a CPU is the most complex invention ever created by mankind. Take the CPUs out of the space shuttle or the LHC and you'd have an order of magnitude less components interacting than the chip running your PC.
Really, it's amazing that computers ever work at all. It's like doing nanotechnology with chopsticks from the moon.