The amateur software engineer is always in search of magic, some sensational method or tool whose application promises to render software development trivial. It is the mark of the professional software engineer to know that no such panacea exists. Amateurs often want to follow cookbook steps; professionals know that such approaches to development usually lead to inept design products, born of a progression of lies, and behind which developers can shield themselves from accepting responsibility for earlier misguided decisions. The amateur software engineer either ignores documentation altogether or follows a process that is documentation-driven, worrying more about how these paper products look to the customer than about the substance they contain. The professional acknowledges the importance of creating certain documents but never does so at the expense of making sensible architectural innovations.

业余软件工程师总是在寻找神奇的、轰动一时的方法或工具，这些方法和工具承诺用了它们就能让软件开发很轻松。专业软件工程师的标志是知道不存在这样的万能药。业余软件工程师常常希望按照一本指南的步骤去做，专业软件工程师知道这样的开发方式通常会得到设计不当的产品，滋生进度谎言，开发者躲在后面，不愿为早期被误导的决策承担责任。业余软件工程师要么完全忽略文档，要么遵循一个文档驱动的过程，更关心这些文档产品带给用户的观感，而不太关心它们包含的实质内容。专业软件工程师承认创建某些文档很重要，但不会因为文档而放弃进行有意义的架构创新。