Climb out of 'Copy–Paste' Engineering mindset!

Today, 15th September, is celebrated as Engineers Day across India to appreciate the outstanding engineering contributions to our society from Sir. M. Visvesvaraya. There are several hundred stories about how dedicated and committed he was to the engineering profession. Not only was he in a league of his own with his craft but also as a true human being. It is matter of pride to remember his birthday as Engineers Day.

Sometime earlier, I had written about Bad Jugaad and Good Jugaad (https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/bad-jugaad-good-dr-krishna-prasad/). The context was Indian Innovation. Innovation never ceases to be a boring topic. I would like to extend my thoughts on this Engineers Day.

Why am I bringing this up today? In the last few of years, the word Agility is being used in every context. What started in software development and IT projects, now, being Agile in all aspects of the business is every leader’s wish. There is much talk about shrinking time to market and getting things done much faster and making money for the company even faster. Yes of course, with all good intentions from customers’ or share-holders’ perspective. Somehow Agility is being equated to doing everything in less time.

So, what is happening, intentionally or otherwise, teams and individuals are pushing mind-less Jugaad in the name of Agile Engineering. One wide-spread behavior is to just deliver something working, be it software code or a design or an artifact but with no documentation to back it up. This makes it impossible for anybody in the future to trace back or verify the engineering thought process behind it.

Copy-Paste Engineering is becoming rampant, thanks to open source and tonne of material out there on the Internet which is so easily accessible. I mean legitimate material around without infringing on copy rights or anything like that. When asked what is going on in the code for example, no idea! This approach is different from using open libraries with standard APIs perhaps. Engineers do not have time to even make an attempt to understand the engineering principles behind, but too fanatically focused on getting things done.

Sir M. Visvesvaraya was known for his dreams and big hairy audacious goals, but was always backing it up with sound engineering. All his creations have stood the test of time. So, it would be a fitting tribute to him if we can climb out of Copy-Paste engineering mindset but instead figure out a way to stand on top of the shoulders of other smart engineers and then reach a greater height. That gives us a solid foundation to build upon but also saves time.