The Rise of Software

Some may find this topic odd as the first piece of software was written in 1842 by Ada Lovelace, but technology always finds a way to surprise us. The landscape has drastically changed over the last century and a half with Moore’s law pushing the bounds of what we thought capable. I suspect that the biggest disruptions for at least the next generation will be in the software space. This is due to 3 things Empowerment, Opensource Software (OSS) and software – defined hardware (SDH)

Empowerment:

One of the perks of being in the information age is that never before has the populace been so empowered. Individuals given the desire and/or incentive to do so can learn anything. Learning to code is now something that can be picked up part-time, so it can be inferred that it cannot be truer that anyone can make software.

There is a clear demand for coding skills to be more readily available this has led to new companies like Udemy, Pluralsight and Code Academy which aim to fill this gap in the skill market. For those who think coding is too complex an endeavour we now have software designed to build software. For example, Labview allows individuals to build complex robotics programs without any coding experience, the only requirement is to develop a logical set of actions for the robot to follow.

Opensource Software (OSS):

I’ve always found OSS to be an extremely interesting concept. People giving out sophisticated pieces of software for free. Aside from the creative monetisation techniques that have come out of the years OSS has accelerated the rise of software. OSS provides a firm foundation for new software to build on top of, integrate with or re-engineer. This has led to multiple iterations of which add value in a variety of ways.

Software -defined hardware (SDH):

In my opinion SDH is currently the biggest disruptor to conventional IT. This is an umbrella term I’ve coined to describe how software is gradually taking over the role of hardware. Some may be more familiar with terms such as Software – defined networks (SDN) and Software – defined datacentres (SDD). The ability to mimic hardware functions with a few lines of code is immensely powerful, actions which would require heavy hardware investments can now be done at low cost. One example for the everyday consumer would be with the Pixel phone line by Google. The Pixel is one of the, if not the best smartphone camera mainly due to its ability to mimic professional photos using software. On a larger scale we are also using software to virtualise datacentres, build logical networks etc.

So why do I think software will be the greatest disruptor? Because software gives every individual interested a blank canvas to paint a new future. Additionally, we are equipped with the knowledge to build that future relatively inexpensively no less. So, if you agree with me take up your brush and paint your next version of the future and if you disagree sound your views and lets see the other disruptors we should expect.