3 ms·
I think the author is referring to the mentality of "I wrote my way into this mess and dammit I'll write my way out!" That is to say, novices can tend to pile
by jayd16 5y ago
I think the author is referring to the mentality of "I wrote my way into this mess and dammit I'll write my way out!"
That is to say, novices can tend to pile onto a solution with hacks and special cases instead of examining why their abstraction requires so much special casing.
I think the code golf you're talking about is a different (but not exclusive) thing.
- Jtsummers 5y agoYep. It's an interesting dichotomy with new hires. They can write some of the tersest code once they learn some new thing ("Wait, C# lets me use LINQ and lambdas. I can turn this entire thing into 3 lines of code!") and some of the most convoluted messes when they run into an issue. I call the latter the epicycle approach [0]. A simple model that doesn't quite work, but they can't let go of, is complicated by adding more and more "simple" extensions but it produces a convoluted mess that is nigh impossible to maintain or sustain. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deferent_and_epicycle#/media/File:Cassini_apparent.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deferent_and_epicycle#/media/F... : Demonstrating the complexity needed to maintain a geocentric model and account for the movement of celestial bodies.