Pennington: Professional corner-cutting
In a blog post that likens software development to cabinetmaking, Havoc Pennington makes the case for cutting corners—but only the right corners:
"Software remains a craft rather than a science, relying on the experience of the craftsperson. Like cabinetmakers, we proceed one step at a time, making judgments about what’s important and what isn’t at each step.

A professional developer does thorough work when it matters, and cuts irrelevant corners that aren’t worth wasting time on. Extremely productive developers don’t have supernatural coding skills; their secret is to write only the code that matters.

How can we do a better job cutting corners? I think we can learn a lot from people building tables and dressers."