Developing Usable Experiences

Munging and Architecture

September 10th, 2008 10:48 pm —  61 views

I was lucky enough to find myself in a meeting today to discuss what I equate to be the future of applications where I work. Sure, having always developed web applications one might think I’m a little biased, but I’m not. I value the knowledge and expertise of desktop developers. But I feel that the future of applications isn’t tied to the desktop or the web. It isn’t so clearly distinguished. It is a munged future.

The question has come up before, “do we rewrite applications to work on the web or transform existing applications to be Internet aware?” The answer, as any information architect should reply, depends on the content, context, and users…and in every case, the overall circumstances. If you have dozens of gifted, brilliant, windows application programmers, expecting them to become web developers isn’t realistic. If you have a bunch of gifted web developers, expecting them to understand the challenges of desktop applications is just silly. The answer is a munge. It is a reworking, a transformation. Something new is built on and from something old. A developmental evolution that requires and involves everybody.

I can’t help but think that every day is sort of like that. A string of situations that sometimes seem like mistakes, failures, successes, maybe totally random WTH events. As a result we find room to explore, to experience confusion, frustration, anger, warm fuzzies. We find fertile ground in which to grow understanding and awareness. School is like that. Work is like that. Marriage is like that. All fertile ground.

But it is never that easy. Often movement is sideways-seeming or backward-tracking. This might be the result of un-directed or misdirected focus. Part of growth that has to be dealt with.

Growth is about munging what is with what can be. Munging is about embracing what exists while continuously working to transform it into something you want it to be. I don’t see this is a derogatory effort. Imperfectly transforming something presupposes perfection…and something supposed is nothing while something composed, however haphazard it may be, is something that cannot and should not be ignored or dismissed. Munge that shix and see what happens.

Image: I could have had better pictures for this post had not my camera mysteriously fallen into a garbage can near my cat’s food bowl. Lucky for me, W. thought to look there and all is well. I took this picture tonight. This pile of books is waiting for me to continue my embrace of the wisdom they contain. Not enough time…but alas.

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4 Comments 

Comments

4 Responses to “Munging and Architecture”

  1. Dawn on September 11th, 2008 9:45 am

    I went to my handy-dandy online dictionary to look up “munging” and all I found was “mung bean an erect bushy annual bean (Vigna radiata syn. Phaseolus aureus) that is widely cultivated in warm regions for its edible usually green or yellow seeds, for forage, and as the chief source of bean sprouts; also : its seed”

    Is munging a real term? Perhaps a new (to me anyway) technical computer term? See I’m trying to stay in school vicariously!

  2. Spike on September 11th, 2008 6:11 pm

    I’ve added a URL to dictionary.com on the first instance of “munging” in this post.

    But the actual word is “munge”…so probably proper use of munging is “to munge” information.

    /muhnj/ 1. A derogatory term meaning to imperfectly transform information.
    2. A comprehensive rewrite of a routine, data structure or the whole program.
    This term is often confused with mung and may derive from it, or possibly vice-versa. One correspondent believes it derives from the french “mange” /monzh/, eat.

  3. Dawn on September 11th, 2008 11:20 pm

    interesting!

  4. Mike H. on September 16th, 2008 7:20 pm

    Wow. Sounds like what’s going on where I work. The future isn’t the web, or the internet aware desktop app, it’s somewhere in the messy, mushy middle. Embrace the mess and create order in the universe.

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