> Code is malleable enough that we think of applying changes on top of existing code to get a new product, slightly different from the previous one. In this way, code is more similar to genetic material than other types of design.
This is an interesting perspective and will take me some more time to apply to my understanding (see what I did there?). A first thought is how this condemns designing and architecting for an unknown future.
For code, future is neither unknown nor certain - we often do have a valid, informed opinion about what kind of changes are likely (or even inevitable on a schedule) and what kind of changes are possible but unlikely.
For example, you may know for sure that some invariant is true in your market but not globally, so you know in advance that when(if!) your company expands, you'll need to change that thing in a specific way - but not in an arbitrary direction, that change is knowable even if you haven't yet spent the effort to know about its details.
This is an interesting perspective and will take me some more time to apply to my understanding (see what I did there?). A first thought is how this condemns designing and architecting for an unknown future.