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> Who else has had to deal with idiots who froth at the mouth when you exceed an 80 line character margin? Honestly, no better indication of a very mediocre de

> Who else has had to deal with idiots who froth at the mouth when you exceed an 80 line character margin? Honestly, no better indication of a very mediocre developer

einpoklum 2y ago
My experience is that being fastidious about code formatting is independent of one's ability as a developer. i.e. not a good indicator either way.
- bena 2y ago
  I’ve noticed the worse someone is in a language, the worse they format it. People then develop fastidious code formatting rules because they realize well formatted code is easier to read and extend. Then people realize it’s the organization of the code, not the rules themselves. They have preferences, but don’t treat those preferences as “the one true way”. So people with fastidious rules are in that middle ground of becoming less bad, and that’s a wide swath of abilities.
  - raverbashing 2y ago
    > Then people realize it’s the organization of the code, not the rules themselves. They have preferences, but don’t treat those preferences as “the one true way”. Yup, I agree with this It's not about, let's say, where your curly braces stay, but being consistent Though in some cases I'd argue that things like a very strict 80 character limit actually results in worse code (or at least worse to read code)
  - ninetyninenine 2y ago
    Disagree. Highly disagree. Smarter people write shittier code. Clean code is for stupider people. Think about it. It’s because smart people don’t need clean code. It’s so trivial to them and so readable that they really don’t need things to be ultra clean and well formatted. So the tendency to have this ocd need to write clean code among smart people is random. They either have it or they don’t give a shit. But among stupid people it’s not random. They need clean code because they are not smart enough to understand code that isn’t clean.
    - holoduke 2y ago
      Reality is that you have to work with different levels of intelligence. Your stack must be understandable also for the "common" programmer. Otherwise goodluck finding people.
      - ninetyninenine 2y ago
        True. But what I said is still true. The tendency exists. Smart people don’t often know how smart they are and don’t realize how unreadable their code is until code review time and the stupid person points out what the smart person considered “obvious”
    - Ma8ee 2y ago
      Or maybe the smartest people understand that it is as important that less smart/experienced people than them can work with the code.
      - ninetyninenine 2y ago
        [flagged]
        jjj123 2y ago
        Okay so your definition of “smart” sounds different than the definition everyone else in this thread is using. Sounds more like you’re talking about “genius” to me, specifically in a savant type way where they are incapable of relating to average people.
        ninetyninenine 2y ago
        No. I’m talking about genius. Not savant. Savants likely can’t relate to your emotions. Geniuses can. The difference is just if it takes them 1 second to parse what takes you 5 minutes to do the same they often don’t realize this unless you tell them. That being said what I talk about lives on a gradient. The smarter you are the greater degree of tendency you have to write shitty code. The cleaner your code the higher possible chance you are stupider. It’s not a definitive sign but there is a correlation.
- ChrisMarshallNY 2y ago
  The best developer that I ever worked with, is "on the spectrum." His code was really anal. I have come to learn that there are no "rules," only heuristics.
- amoss 2y ago
  I can't remember the last time I worked on a team without automatic linting enforced on check-in. Why would people choose to waste time arguing over that can be automated?
- buttercraft 2y ago
  I've inherited many sloppily formatted code bases that all contained mistakes which blended into the mess. Consistently styled code has the nice property that certain types of mistakes stand out immediately. For example, there's a large chunk of code following an if statement, but it's indented the same as the body of the if. The dev overlooks the closing brace and puts the logic in the wrong place. Additionally, there is a nested if statement whose body is indented less than the surrounding code. It's hard to read, and error prone. I can't imagine a "good" developer putting up with that, although I admit you don't have to be "fastidious" to prevent this type of thing.

> Who else has had to deal with idiots who froth at the mouth when you exceed an 80 line character margin? Honestly, no better indication of a very mediocre developer

einpoklum 2y ago

My experience is that being fastidious about code formatting is independent of one's ability as a developer. i.e. not a good indicator either way.

bena 2y ago
I’ve noticed the worse someone is in a language, the worse they format it. People then develop fastidious code formatting rules because they realize well formatted code is easier to read and extend. Then people realize it’s the organization of the code, not the rules themselves. They have preferences, but don’t treat those preferences as “the one true way”. So people with fastidious rules are in that middle ground of becoming less bad, and that’s a wide swath of abilities.
- raverbashing 2y ago
  > Then people realize it’s the organization of the code, not the rules themselves. They have preferences, but don’t treat those preferences as “the one true way”. Yup, I agree with this It's not about, let's say, where your curly braces stay, but being consistent Though in some cases I'd argue that things like a very strict 80 character limit actually results in worse code (or at least worse to read code)
- ninetyninenine 2y ago
  Disagree. Highly disagree. Smarter people write shittier code. Clean code is for stupider people. Think about it. It’s because smart people don’t need clean code. It’s so trivial to them and so readable that they really don’t need things to be ultra clean and well formatted. So the tendency to have this ocd need to write clean code among smart people is random. They either have it or they don’t give a shit. But among stupid people it’s not random. They need clean code because they are not smart enough to understand code that isn’t clean.
  - holoduke 2y ago
    Reality is that you have to work with different levels of intelligence. Your stack must be understandable also for the "common" programmer. Otherwise goodluck finding people.
    - ninetyninenine 2y ago
      True. But what I said is still true. The tendency exists. Smart people don’t often know how smart they are and don’t realize how unreadable their code is until code review time and the stupid person points out what the smart person considered “obvious”
  - Ma8ee 2y ago
    Or maybe the smartest people understand that it is as important that less smart/experienced people than them can work with the code.
    - ninetyninenine 2y ago
      [flagged]
      - jjj123 2y ago
        Okay so your definition of “smart” sounds different than the definition everyone else in this thread is using. Sounds more like you’re talking about “genius” to me, specifically in a savant type way where they are incapable of relating to average people.
        ninetyninenine 2y ago
        No. I’m talking about genius. Not savant. Savants likely can’t relate to your emotions. Geniuses can. The difference is just if it takes them 1 second to parse what takes you 5 minutes to do the same they often don’t realize this unless you tell them. That being said what I talk about lives on a gradient. The smarter you are the greater degree of tendency you have to write shitty code. The cleaner your code the higher possible chance you are stupider. It’s not a definitive sign but there is a correlation.
ChrisMarshallNY 2y ago
The best developer that I ever worked with, is "on the spectrum." His code was really anal. I have come to learn that there are no "rules," only heuristics.
amoss 2y ago
I can't remember the last time I worked on a team without automatic linting enforced on check-in. Why would people choose to waste time arguing over that can be automated?
buttercraft 2y ago
I've inherited many sloppily formatted code bases that all contained mistakes which blended into the mess. Consistently styled code has the nice property that certain types of mistakes stand out immediately. For example, there's a large chunk of code following an if statement, but it's indented the same as the body of the if. The dev overlooks the closing brace and puts the logic in the wrong place. Additionally, there is a nested if statement whose body is indented less than the surrounding code. It's hard to read, and error prone. I can't imagine a "good" developer putting up with that, although I admit you don't have to be "fastidious" to prevent this type of thing.