Why Software Is Different

Software systems are much easier to design than hardware systems of the same number of components. For example, a program of 100,000 components might be 50,000 lines long and could be written by two good programmers in a year. The equipment needed for this costs less than $10,000; the only other cost would be the programmers' own living expenses while doing the job. The total investment would be less than a $100,000. If done commercially in a large company, it might cost twice that. By contrast, an automobile typically contains under 100,000 components; it requires a large team and costs tens of millions of dollars to design.

And software is also much cheaper to manufacture: copies can be made easily on an ordinary workstation costing under ten thousand dollars. To produce a complex hardware system often requires a factory costing tens of millions of dollars.

Why is this? A hardware system has to be designed using real components. They have varying costs; they have limits of operation; they may be sensitive to temperature, vibration or humidity; they may generate noise; they drain power; they may fail either momentarily or permanently. They must be physically assembled in their proper places, and they must be accessible for replacement in case they fail.

Moreover, each of the components in a hardware design is likely to affect the behavior of many others. This greatly complicates the task of determining what a hardware design will do: mathematical modeling may prove wrong when the design is built.

By contrast, a computer program is built out of ideal mathematical objects whose behavior is defined, not modeled approximately, by abstract rules. When an if-statement follows a while-statement, there is no need to study whether the if-statement will draw power from the while-statement and thereby distort its output, nor whether it could overstress the while-statement and make it fail.

Despite being built from simple parts, computer programs are incredibly complex. The program with 100,000 parts is as complex as an automobile, though far easier to design.

While programs cost substantially less to write, market and sell than automobiles, the cost of dealing with the patent system will not be less. The same number of components will, on the average, involve the same number techniques that might be patented.


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