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Yeah sometimes I feel like a unicorn because I don’t really care about code at all, so long as it conforms to decent standards and does what it needs to do. I h
by jama211 1y ago
Yeah sometimes I feel like a unicorn because I don’t really care about code at all, so long as it conforms to decent standards and does what it needs to do. I honestly believe engineers often overestimate the importance of elegance in code too, to the point of not realising the slow down of a project due to overly perfect code is genuinely not worth it.
- parpfish 1y agoi dont care if the code is elegant, i care that the code is consistent. do the same thing in the same way each time and it lets you chunk it up and skim it much easier. if there are little differences each time, you have to keep asking yourself "is it done differently here for a particular reason?"
- vanviegen 1y agoExactly! And besides that, new code being consistent with its surrounding code used to be a sign of careful craftsmanship (as opposed to spaghetti-against-the-wall style coding), giving me some confidence that the programmer may have considered at least the most important nasty edge cases. LLMs have rendered that signal mostly useless, of course.
- jama211 1y agoEhh, in my experience if you are using an LLM in context they are better these days at conforming to the code style around it, especially if you put it in your rules that you wish it to.
- jama211 1y agoAbsolutely fair, and a great method.