I wonder if a lot of that has to do with how it's being "marketed" --- it might just be me, but whenever I see "modern" being used to describe something, it evokes the negative connotations of being trendy, fashionable, boring, vapid, fleeting, style-over-substance that's all too common with software today (Windows' "modern UI/Metro" being one of the first examples to come to mind); not exactly the right sentiment for promoting a tool that's supposed to be long-lasting, foundational, and practical.
Perhaps if the title didn't contain "modern", the discussion here would go in a different direction.
Indeed, for me "modern" has become an overused buzzword with a negative connotation --- well-deserved too, I think. What's really sad is that this is an article about low-level stuff, and not some more "typical" topic like web applications; I'd be far less surprised, though no less annoyed, if it was the latter.
>I wonder if a lot of that has to do with how it's being "marketed" --- it might just be me, but whenever I see "modern" being used to describe something, it evokes the negative connotations of being trendy, fashionable, boring, vapid, fleeting, style-over-substance that's all too common with software today
For me, when I see people waxing poetically about the unix way and the old, crufty, POSIX userland, it's all about cargo cult, "that's how things have always been", minimum viable progress while keeping compatibility, and heritage-over-substance.
So let me guess: "modern" here is indicates a shitty new thing that doesn't work as well as the old thing.
Funny how the software industry has managed to turn the connotation of "modern" for me from "neutral/slightly positive" to "definite negative" in around a decade.
Not related to this particular tool: It strikes me as extremely odd that nowadays „modern“ has become a desirable software feature. For me, „modern“ is the opposite of „durable“, which seems to be a rather bad thing.
I really wish people would stop using the word "modern" in marketing rhetoric as if it was a good thing, because more often than not they're using it and other buzzwords because they don't have any better compelling reasons to convince you to use their product.
No, I do not care that the newer version is more "modern", "stylish", "sleek", "clean", or any other number of useless buzzwordy adjectives. Tell me concretely what's actually better about it and how it will improve my (my, not your!) "experience". An OS should not be a fashion statement nor an advertising platform. It's a tool people use to get real work done.
Could we all just agree to stop using the adjective “modern”? It’s such a weasal word. If there are advantages to your program, describe them. Simply being “newer” or in the currently trendy style does not make it automatically better.
I’m not saying that this is a bad project. But “modern” doesn’t tell me anything about why I might want to use it.
Isn't any library released today, which improves on libraries from yesterday, by definition "modern"?
Whenever I hear "modern" I just picture the developer thumbing his nose at the old fuddy-duddies who don't know how to code and spew out garbage. Yeah yeah, I get it -- the older stuff sucks. But maybe I'm imagining it. If people here tell me that the word "modern" is truly free of derision, I'm open to that viewpoint.
> When a project proudly declares itself as "modern," it implies that it's up-to-date and built with the latest technologies.
> Would anyone suggest replacing TeX with a "modern" alternative simply because it's newer?
No, “modern” implies that the existing solutions have some shortcomings which are perceived to be due to old age or legacy/tech debt.
That’s why no one is proposing an alternative to TeX.
Whether that perception of old age therefore bad is valid or not is a different question. Chances are that the “modern” solution will end up reinventing the wheel and rediscovering why the old tools did things a particular way.
Other times modern means the new tool cherry-pick the best part of its predecessors and omit the bad parts.
Interesting. My take is more negative than that: modern indicates they are unaware of prior art and the key challenges in the particular space, and consequently the software is buggy and/or fundamentally broken its approach.
I think you should drop “modern” for something like “designed for CI”, “CI-first” or “CI-native”. It’s more informative.
While this article makes some good points about modern design borrowing far too much from the past, I fail to see how this is a pressing issue in software today as the author would like me to believe.
Yet another example of something with "modern" in its name which is much worse than what came before. This trend has been so infuriatingly consistent that anytime I hear something advertised as "modern" I think "the only reason they want you to think it's better is because it's newer, not because it's actually any better".
I found the repetitive use of "outdated" to be off-putting. It implies that much of the value of a new interface (including this one) lies in it's novelty. Except for a minority, the precise opposite is true - most people aren't interested in learning how to use their computer again.
I see a neat GUI application that looks straight-outta-92, though the author describes it as "modern."
At this point, I read "modern" in an application's description as a subtle way of saying "not old and busted like all of the shitty competing projects."
I would argue all of you suggested words are just as overused and meaningless as "modern". At the end of the day, I would still need to see the product to understand what it does.
"Modern" is another meaningless software-project marketing adjective like "blazingly fast". I'm pretty sure we'll eventually be able to use these buzzwords to perform carbon-dating of old projects.
"Hmm, uses the term 'modern' but the README has limited image macro memes... seems like an early 2019 release."
I like the term as it brings excitement. To me modern just means new. Sure, maybe these things haven't been battle tested or widely adopted but they still have a place. The last thing we want is to be stuck with something legacy and unable to progress.
As with all things YMMV. I like having the flexibility of reaching into the toolbelt and having all the tools available, but you can be sure I'll pick the best tool for the job.
I'm not sure I care very much about which piece of software is a "product" or not (I have no qualms with devs asking for money), but I definitely agree that calling a piece of software "modern" actually carries negative connotations nowadays. I think most would agree that apps developed within the last 4 years are often more resource-intensive and slower than the equivalents from 15+ years ago.
Warp looks really cool as a tool and I intend to try it as soon as it's available on Linux, but it was pretty bold of them to include outgoing network requests by default before presenting directly to HN. I saw the post about "everything is opt in, where 'everything' means 'sending terminal contents'" - as if people read privacy policies before trying out a new dev tool.
I wonder if a lot of that has to do with how it's being "marketed" --- it might just be me, but whenever I see "modern" being used to describe something, it evokes the negative connotations of being trendy, fashionable, boring, vapid, fleeting, style-over-substance that's all too common with software today (Windows' "modern UI/Metro" being one of the first examples to come to mind); not exactly the right sentiment for promoting a tool that's supposed to be long-lasting, foundational, and practical.
Perhaps if the title didn't contain "modern", the discussion here would go in a different direction.
reply