creeping featurism

/kreeping feechrizm/ , n. [common] 1. Describes a systematic tendency to
load more chrome and features onto systems at the expense of whatever
elegance they may have possessed when originally designed. See also feeping
creaturism. You know, the main problem with BSD Unix has always been
creeping featurism. 2. More generally, the tendency for anything complicated
to become even more complicated because people keep saying Gee, it would be
even better if it had this feature too. (See feature. ) The result is
usually a patchwork because it grew one ad-hoc step at a time, rather than
being planned. Planning is a lot of work, but it's easy to add just one
extra little feature to help someone. .. and then another. .. and
another.... When creeping featurism gets out of hand, it's like a cancer.
The GNU hello program, intended to illustrate GNU command-line switch and
coding conventions, is also a wonderful parody of creeping featurism; the
distribution changelog is particularly funny. Usually this term is used to
describe computer programs, but it could also be said of the federal
government, the IRS 1040 form, and new cars. A similar phenomenon sometimes
afflicts conscious redesigns; see second-system effect. See also creeping
elegance.
