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> Blacksmiths were one of the few professions who could make their own tools and consequently any experienced smith would likely have a wide range of tools produced to fit his needs and preferences.

Just like software engineering




But software engineering has an even more special characteristic: easy and accurate tool duplication. That's why our tools are so much less personal than those of a historical blacksmith. Combined with liberal licensing this ease of duplication easily makes software engineers less connected with the tooling they use than any tool user before them. Sometimes (often?) we wouldn't even know the exact version of the tool we are using (no, "latest stable" isn't an exact version)




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