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> Most developers attribute their time loss to tech debt or insufficient documentation Ah the tech debt argument. Most likely it's true, but what developers re
by jameslk 2y ago
> Most developers attribute their time loss to tech debt or insufficient documentation
Ah the tech debt argument. Most likely it's true, but what developers really want to do is Rewrite The Whole Thing, often in something new. That's always a fun, career-advancing project. Being in the position of seeing others do this, and being the person who's wanted to do this before and has done this before, I can say it's not often a good outcome. Software development and UX are different skills and it's a rare developer that has both. This is otherwise known as Refucktoring. When the tech debt refactoring project is given to the wrong person, it's a good way to end up with even more tech debt and less willingness of leadership to try again.
- watwut 2y agoI think that is massive strawman. The push for complete rewrite from developers is super rare. Usually they want much smaller changes. When people talk about technical debt, it is usually in codebase with massive number of bugs and teams that are constantly under pressure.
- jameslk 2y agoSure, everyone's experience is subjective. A lot of the tech debt I've seen that ends up being true baggage for developer velocity is inherent to some core foundation of the codebase leading to large rewrites. Most teams I've worked in try to address the smaller tech debt while working on related features that otherwise would use the tech debt (i.e. "leave it better than you found it") but that I'm sure depends on the team and what pressures they face.