First, surrounding your code is other code that very probably have a clue on what you should do. You do not have to go at the definition to see what to do. Sec

First, surrounding your code is other code that very probably have a clue on what you should do. You do not have to go at the definition to see what to do. Second, for one written/changed line I have read, perhaps, couple of hundredths of lines of code. This results not in a "fBeggy is a field of a class CBaggy" kind of understanding, but "the general approach to solve problem like this one at hand will be such (see this part) and such (also see this part)." As a software support engineer, I have twice as low yearly output of (real) LOC (11.5K/y) than is expected from software engineers at, say, IBM. Mostly from the need to read substantial amount of code.