Business software has stagnated for three decades, stuck in a paradigm where objects and CRUD operations define our work. Despite massive computing advances, we've merely moved these object-manipulation interfaces to the cloud rather than fundamentally rethinking how software models business processes. This essay proposes Finite Object State Machines (FOSMs) as a transformative alternative. Unlike CRUD systems that allow arbitrary field edits, FOSMs model business entities as...

Business software has stagnated for three decades, stuck in a paradigm where objects and CRUD operations define our work. Despite massive computing advances, we've merely moved these object-manipulation interfaces to the cloud rather than fundamentally rethinking how software models business processes. This essay proposes Finite Object State Machines (FOSMs) as a transformative alternative. Unlike CRUD systems that allow arbitrary field edits, FOSMs model business entities as...