Every large old piece of code is "bad engineering" to the next generation that looks at it. I'm pretty sure this is only true to undergrads in the dorms (and p

Every large old piece of code is "bad engineering" to the next generation that looks at it. I'm pretty sure this is only true to undergrads in the dorms (and people who still think like them). Computer Science has its own form of Medical Students Disease[1]. NIH Syndrome[2] is also more prevalent than it might appear. it seems like a real stretch to say that Google secretly has a bunch of unskilled hacks working there it's even weirder to suggest that if Google is secretly a den of incompetence Nobody said these things, but to address the hypotheticals, a) there is a difference between unskilled and ignorant ("prone to ignore the existence of useful concepts," let's say); b) are there any other forms of competence that might address the ability to launch something impressive that does not fly? Couldn't they be partly incompetent? After all, pobody's nerfect. We talk about Louis Bleriot much more than Percy Pilcher, and to continue the analogy I'd say Google has gotten very very good at making Gee Bees[3]. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_students%27_disease https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_students%27_disease 2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_invented_here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_invented_here 3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gee_Bee_Model_R https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gee_Bee_Model_R