Xavier F. Gouchet
Staff Engineer…
@xgouchet
@datadoghq
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But not just that
Xavier F. Gouchet
Staff Engineer…
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About me…
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“I’m not a
creative person!”
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“Programming is a creative
art, where imagination and
problem-solving skills
come together.”
— Margaret Hamilton
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What is
Creativity?
And why it’s often
misunderstood…
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creativity
/krieɪtɪvəti/
The production of ideas and
objects that are novel or original,
and worthwhile or appropriate,
that
is, useful, attractive,
meaningful, or correct.
— https://www.oxfordreference.com/
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A lot of engineers used very creative solutions
for very pragmatic problems
Creativity is only
for artistic goals
0x5F3759DF
— Greg Walsh
0x30490610
— unknown
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Creativity is a skill that can be trained,
nourished and grown
Creativity is an
Innate Talent
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“If people knew how hard I had to work
to gain my mastery, it would not seem
so wonderful at all.”
— Michaelangelo
Creativity is easy
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“Substantially all ideas are second-hand,
consciously and unconsciously drawn from a
million outside sources […]”
— Mark Twain
Creativity equals
Originality
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The three kinds of
Creativity*
Combinatorial
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Combinatorial Creativity
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The three kinds of
Creativity*
Combinatorial Exploratory
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Exploratory Creativity
Eternal Ascend Challenge by @pwnisher
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Exploratory Creativity
Eternal Ascend Challenge by @pwnisher
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The three kinds of
Creativity*
Combinatorial Exploratory Transformational
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Transformational Creativity
Illustration by Benedikt Bitterli
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The three kinds of
Creativity*
Combinatorial Exploratory Transformational
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How does
it work?
Understanding the
Creative approach
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Hypothesis Design
(Procedure)
Question Research Experiment
The Scientific Method
Illustration by Sangharsh Lohakare (@sangharsh_l)
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Design
(RFC / ADR)
Implementation
Problem Research Requirements
The Engineering Approach
Photography by Christina Morillo (@wocintechchat)
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Preparation Illumination Evaluation
Incubation Elaboration
The Creative Process*
Photography by Lucas K (@aznbokchoy)
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Preparation Illumination Evaluation
Brainstorm Eureka Design
Incubation Elaboration
The Creative Process*
Photography by Lucas K (@aznbokchoy)
Implementation
Research
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Brainstorm Eureka Design
Design
(RFC / ADR)
Implementation
Hypothesis Design
(Procedure)
Research Implementation
The Creative Process*
Photography by Lucas K (@aznbokchoy)
Problem Research Requirements
Question Research Experiment
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Boosting
your Creativity
How to make the
spark happen?
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Photography by Kati Hoehl (@helenatheactress)
Learn the rules, break the rules
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Photography by Malcolm Lightbody (@mlightbody)
Master the tools
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Photography by Vlad Hilitanu (@vladhilitanu)
Collaborate with others
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Photography by Catherine Heath (@catherineheath)
Be curious
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Photography by Erik Witsoe (@ewitsoe)
Keep your brain healthy
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Photography by Priscilla Du Preez (@priscilladupreez)
Daydream
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Photography by Ashkan Forouzani (@ashkfor121)
Take a break from your screens
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Photography by Michael Dziedzic (@lazycreekimages)
Be ready for failures
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And in practice
Some concrete examples
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Hackathon
Innovation Week
Side Projects
Photography by Alex Kotliarskyi (@frantic)
Practice makes…
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Constraints
Requirements
Opportunities
Photography by Sandra Seitamaa (@seitamaaphotography)
Define the
problem
boundaries
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Brainstorming
Scamper
MacGyver
Photography by Simone van der Koelen (@simonevdk)
Generate ideas
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Photography by Theo Crazzolara (@theocrazzolara)
S · C · A · M · P · E · R
S
Substitute
C
Combine
A
Adapt
M
Modify
P
Put to
other use
E
Eliminate
R
Rearrange
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MacGyver Method
Photography by Nipun Haldar (@focusbreathing)
1.
Write a
question
2.
Incubation
activity
3.
Write the
answer
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Why should
we care?
Especially in 2024…
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Artificial Intelligence
vs
Human Creativity
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Photography by Erhan Astam (@vaultzero)
Code Whisperer
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TL;DR;
What’s a statistically probable next word?
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Photography by Patrick Tomasso (@impatrickt)
Input Output
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No Intent
Generated by Leonardo AI
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No sense of value
Generated by Leonardo AI
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No Semantics
Generated by Leonardo AI
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AI is a tool,
driven by
Human Creativity
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Photography by Towfiqu Barbhuiya (@towfiqu999999)
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Take aways
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“Programming is Art
built on top of Logic”
— Erika Heidi
Photography by Erika Heidi (@erikaheidi)
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Take aways
🎶 🎵
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In the chaos of Kotlin Lines,
Suspend functions tangled like vines
I need to come up with a plan,
To publish an app that will shine
I need to overcome so much :
Folded devices I can’t touch,
Deprecation of APIs,
Leacy code I don’t recognize…
🄏 🄏 🄏 CC BY-NC 4.0
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1… Gotta prepare my mind
2… Do research for a while
3… wait for a little tick,
Until the cogs in my brain can all click
4… Brainstorm the ideas,
put together all the pieces
5… That’s it! It’ll be the best…
Just have to write another test…
🄏 🄏 🄏 CC BY-NC 4.0
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I read the book that Chet has done
I booked tickets for Droidcon
Of course I watched all of the talks
And tried thinking outside the box
I learned about git hooks and hoops
Jetpack Compose internal loops
Android studio’s latest tricks
And Unix systems’ obscure tips
🄏 🄏 🄏 CC BY-NC 4.0
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1… Gotta prepare my mind
2… Do research for a while
3… wait for a little tick,
Until the cogs in my brain can all click
4… Brainstorm the ideas,
put together all the pieces
5… That’s it! It’ll be the best…
Just have to write another test…
🄏 🄏 🄏 CC BY-NC 4.0
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I learned to knit, to paint and bake,
Although you shouldn’t try that cake
I learned Python and Sign Language,
Just to see if I could manage
I turned my phone off for a day
Which turned out to be quite okay,
Wandered alone in the forest,
Played cards with my daughter and lost…
🄏 🄏 🄏 CC BY-NC 4.0
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1… Gotta prepare my mind
2… Do research for a while
3… wait for a little tick,
Until the cogs in my brain can all click
4… Brainstorm the ideas,
put together all the pieces
5… That’s it! It’ll be the best…
Just have to write another test…
🄏 🄏 🄏 CC BY-NC 4.0
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Thanks!
Any questions?
@xgouchet - @datadoghq
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References*
➔ Erika Heidi - The Art of Programming
➔ Corey Latislaw - The Creative Technologist
➔ Connie Biesalski - The Creative Process
➔ Unmistakable Creative - The 5 Stages of the Creative Process
➔ Marcus Du Sautoy - The Creativity Code - Three types of creativity
➔ Andreas Stöffelbauer - How LLMs work
➔ MindTools - Scamper
* Non exhaustive list
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Credits
Presentation template by SlidesCarnival
All credited photographs and illustration by their
respective authors on Unsplash
AI illustrations generated by Leonardo.ai
Song by Xavier F. Gouchet 🄏 🄏 🄏 CC BY-NC 4.0