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I hate to be that guy and I know this is not the point of the article but... > Pat is a programmer at a large software company. At best, he’s a middling perfor

I hate to be that guy and I know this is not the point of the article but... > Pat is a programmer at a large software company. At best, he’s a middling performer; his code is a mess (initializing variables that are never used, using variable names no one else understands, etc.), he takes longer than he should, and he doesn’t even remember his own code months later. Sounds like this large software company doesn't: 1. Know about/use linters that catch unused variables. 2. Have a code review process that would catch bad variable names that "no one else understands". 3. How many people actually remember their own code months later? That's the whole point of consistent design and good readability? Sounds like this large software company has some systemic problems (which may be caused by promoting people like Pat... which actually ties back to the point of the article I guess).

Taylor_OD 6y ago
> he takes longer than he should Ugh. I get that there are estimations for how long something will take but... Something takes as long as it takes. If consistently he takes longer to finish a task than estimated shouldnt the estimates be adjusted?
throwawayboise 6y ago
> How many people actually remember their own code months later? Certainly not me. Not only do I often not remember the code, but sometimes I don't even remember working on that particular problem/feature at all.
- tombert 6y ago
  Yeah, I thought it was a kind of strange point to prove that "Pat" is a bad programmer. I think most programmers, if they're being honest, would admit that they would have trouble recalling any kind of specifics about code that they wrote months before.
  - dhruvmittal 6y ago
    Write enough code and you're probably not going to have the headspace to remember it all...
- thisisbrians 6y ago
  Same. As tempting as it is to try and make code/documentation clear for others (which I do), I do it as much for 6-months-from-now me. This practice has saved me hours if not days over the last couple of years, and hopefully inspires other devs in my company to do the same.
deleted 6y ago
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jitendrac 6y ago
> How many people actually remember their own code months later? Certainly, I don't. After a month, I mostly think was this terrible/brilliant code really written by me. And then comments confirm it was me.

Taylor_OD 6y ago

> he takes longer than he should Ugh. I get that there are estimations for how long something will take but... Something takes as long as it takes. If consistently he takes longer to finish a task than estimated shouldnt the estimates be adjusted?

throwawayboise 6y ago

> How many people actually remember their own code months later? Certainly not me. Not only do I often not remember the code, but sometimes I don't even remember working on that particular problem/feature at all.

tombert 6y ago
Yeah, I thought it was a kind of strange point to prove that "Pat" is a bad programmer. I think most programmers, if they're being honest, would admit that they would have trouble recalling any kind of specifics about code that they wrote months before.
- dhruvmittal 6y ago
  Write enough code and you're probably not going to have the headspace to remember it all...
thisisbrians 6y ago
Same. As tempting as it is to try and make code/documentation clear for others (which I do), I do it as much for 6-months-from-now me. This practice has saved me hours if not days over the last couple of years, and hopefully inspires other devs in my company to do the same.

deleted 6y ago

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jitendrac 6y ago

> How many people actually remember their own code months later? Certainly, I don't. After a month, I mostly think was this terrible/brilliant code really written by me. And then comments confirm it was me.