https://alexsun98.github.io/tags/reflection/Recent content in Reflection on Alex's BlogHugoen-usFri, 04 Sep 2026 00:00:00 +0000https://alexsun98.github.io/series/mythical-man-month/01-the-tar-pit/Fri, 04 Sep 2026 00:00:00 +0000https://alexsun98.github.io/series/mythical-man-month/01-the-tar-pit/<h2 id="is-the-tar-pit-better-or-worse-now">Is the tar pit better or worse now?</h2> <p>I keep coming back to Brooks&rsquo;s opening picture of big software projects as prehistoric tar pits, where teams got stuck and sank deeper the more they struggled. He wrote that in 1975. Rereading it in 2026, I wanted to know whether the pit had got better or worse. It is the same pit at the same depth. What changed is the water on top of it. It is clearer than it has ever been, and a pit that looks shallow is a more dangerous pit.</p>https://alexsun98.github.io/series/mythical-man-month/00-why-i-went-back/Mon, 24 Aug 2026 00:00:00 +0000https://alexsun98.github.io/series/mythical-man-month/00-why-i-went-back/<h2 id="why-i-went-back-to-it">Why I went back to it</h2> <p>I still remember someone proposing to add people to a project that was already late. It is a reasonable instinct, the work is behind, so find more hands. Someone else stepped in and mentioned Brooks&rsquo;s <em>The Mythical Man-Month</em>. Nobody was added. The book won the argument. The project took a few more months anyway, and I cannot remember what we said it would take at the start.</p>