The modern vehicle has evolved to a highly specialized state. Though we have the capacity to design a vehicle that the common man could fix himself on the weekend, we clearly don't have enough demand for one, and the regulatory market for pollution and safety might very well make it impossible.
The consequence of this is that knowledge of the mechanics of the complex system that is a modern vehicle is typically beyond any one person, and certainly well beyond the majority of its users.
Today there is leverage in far flung industries for the individual who has specialized knowledge of his field AND knowledge of how to apply software development to that field. But these opportunities will not last long. Any software that can increase profits in an industry will attract competition from other software developers. That software will be improved and refined by software specialists. It will (and has) evolved to a systemic complexity that equals the modern vehicle.
Software is a tool. The civil engineer who uses AutoCAD to design your road does not need to know how to code his own AutoCAD.
So, once your niche has sufficiently good software tailored for it, there's no profit in being a developer. That makes sense.
Although industry standard tools with scripting environments often have active communities of people developing sophisticated tools on top of them. Encase is one example; the Canadian Mounties write quite a bit. Splunk is another. Niches may asymptotically outrun good software.
Maybe not but a lot of them are very well versed in autolisp and customize their environment with it. That's what's interesting about software in my view. Once the low level plumbing is done you can always move up to a higher level and continue to build. I'm not sure what the max might be. Maybe one day programming will be much less direct and be done by non programmers than it is now, I won't hold my breath that this will occur too soon for most of us to be out of a job.
The consequence of this is that knowledge of the mechanics of the complex system that is a modern vehicle is typically beyond any one person, and certainly well beyond the majority of its users.
Today there is leverage in far flung industries for the individual who has specialized knowledge of his field AND knowledge of how to apply software development to that field. But these opportunities will not last long. Any software that can increase profits in an industry will attract competition from other software developers. That software will be improved and refined by software specialists. It will (and has) evolved to a systemic complexity that equals the modern vehicle.
Software is a tool. The civil engineer who uses AutoCAD to design your road does not need to know how to code his own AutoCAD.