>>http://techupdate.zdnet.com/techupdate/stories/main/Charles_Simonyi_creates_software_intentionally.html
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>I thought it was mediocre until I got to “Semiconductors didn't improve … performance by exhorting workers to do a better job, wash their hands more often or put in longer hours. It was accomplished by mechanizing a greater and greater portion of the process” – then I stopped reading.
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>When we get to the first factual piece of text and it is just plain wrong I found I lost all motivation to continue reading.
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>I was under the impression that increases in computing power were primarily a result of:
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> - Increased number of bits being processed concurrently, which in its simplest form can be thought of as the transition from 8 bit, through 16 and 32 to 64 bit computing
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> - Increases in clock frequency, which have been made possible by a combination of shortening the distances signals have to travel (by continuously reducing the size of components) and more sophisticated tools for managing component layout and interconnect.
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>In short, improvements in performance have been accomplished through ever increasing degrees of sophistication and not through mechanizing – and I’m guessing he actually meant automation.

I think he's discussing the production of silicon ingots/wafers. Further down he also discusses turbine blades which are "grown" using a similar process.

Regardless, I think his main point is valid - that if we want to have better software we have to get error-prone humans out of the loop as much as possible. As developers, we're in the translation business - translating business or other requirements into abstractions that can be manipulated on a computer. We need to automate that translation process as much as possible.