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<jargon /> |
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creeping featurism: /kree´ping fee´chr·izm/, n. |
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1. Describes a systematic tendency to load more chrome and features onto systems at the expense of whatever elegance they may have possessed when originally designed. See also [[feeping creaturism]]. |
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''“You know, the main problem with [[BSD]] [[Unix]] has always been creeping featurism.�?'' |
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2. More generally, the tendency for anything complicated to become even more complicated because people keep saying “''Gee, it would be even better if it had this feature too''�?. (See [[feature]].) The result is usually a patchwork because it grew one ad-hoc step at a time, rather than being planned. Planning is a lot of work, but it's easy to add just one extra little feature to help someone ... and then another ... and another.... When creeping featurism gets out of hand, it's like a cancer. The [[GNU]] [[hello]] program, intended to illustrate GNU command-line switch and coding conventions, is also a wonderful parody of creeping featurism; the distribution changelog is particularly funny. Usually this term is used to describe computer programs, but it could also be said of the federal [[government]], the [[IRS]] 1040 form, and new cars. A similar phenomenon sometimes afflicts conscious redesigns; see [[second-system effect]]. See also [[creeping elegance]]. |
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from the [[Jargon File]] |
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* http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/C/creeping-featurism.html |
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sometimes also called "creeping featuritis" |
sometimes also called "creeping featuritis" |
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Latest revision as of 16:37, 2 November 2007
<jargon />
sometimes also called "creeping featuritis"
"Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler." - Albert Einstein