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Dear junior developers, a rubber stamp code review is a waste of your time and mine, and since it counts as an approval in the build integration, it makes the c
by hirundo 3y ago
Dear junior developers, a rubber stamp code review is a waste of your time and mine, and since it counts as an approval in the build integration, it makes the code and product worse by taking the place of a real review.
Please instead flag things you don't understand and ask for an explanation. It's worth a senior developer's time to think about it, and either provide some useful training, or more often than they might be comfortable with, ask themselves some hard questions. Your fresh "junior" eyes are a feature as often as a bug, and see things that the seniors don't anymore.
I'd much rather have a junior give me a code review with, uh, less sophisticated criticisms, than one that assumes I know what I'm doing. It's at least a sign that they have paid attention.
- scastiel 3y agoThank you, your point is the exact one I argue against in my post, which makes me happy I wrote it. No, junior developer reviews AND approvals are not a waste of time. If your code can’t be understood by a junior, it shouldn’t be considered as good enough to be merged.
- hirundo 3y agoI'm all in favor of junior developer reviews and approvals. I completely agree that if they can't understand the code, it's frequently a problem with the code. I'm against rubber stamps, where there's no evidence that they've engaged with it. Unfortunately that's the rule rather than the exception in my current environment. If e.g. a developer hasn't made a comment in dozens of reviews, and just returns an approval in a few minutes, junior or not it's a problem. My code isn't that good. Here, it's an epidemic among the juniors.
- scastiel 3y agoOn this point I agree with you. And in my experience, it happens as often with seniors as with juniors. The famous “LGTM” on a 1000-line PR ;)