5 ms·

Is it common for programmers to dislike debugging? I'm stunned. I never considered the possibility, it's always been something I enjoyed. I don't believe it imp

by rabbyte 12y ago

Is it common for programmers to dislike debugging? I'm stunned. I never considered the possibility, it's always been something I enjoyed. I don't believe it impacts you either way in terms of capability but I imagine it impacts your desire to continue.

afarrell 12y ago
I enjoy debugging when I feel like I have some grasp on things. I hate it when I don't know where to look and don't have a good mental concept of the program in general.
- chippy 12y ago
  I actually like the lost feeling. Debugging is a learning experience for me, on the whole, it's investigating, tweaking, probing and testing. But one of the main things with debugging is identifying the actual bug. Once the bug is identified the challenge is partly gone, or changes.
WillNotDownvote 12y ago
It's my favorite part of programming, by a very long stretch. For me it's often a chance to really dig into understanding exactly how all the gears click together, which is my true joy. On a couple of teams I fell into the role of "team debugger", helping everyone with whatever was broken, and those have been my happiest times.
- eru 12y ago
  Seems like a great position to learn about everything the team does.
dm8 12y ago
If you are working on support/maintenance roles (in engineering) at big enterprise product company then debugging is major part of your job. I enjoy debugging as it is another way to solve problem. But for some people it gets repetitive (and boring) since you have to do that day in day out as a part of support roles.
- d357r0y3r 12y ago
  The guys in the trenches debugging are going to end up having a better overall understanding of the system. Not to mention they're going to be really good at debugging; if they decide to get into a more development-oriented role, that skillset is going to be a huge productivity booster.
- sounds 12y ago
  Another part of what makes debugging painful for a lot of people working in big enterprise ("small cog in a big machine") stems from bad management. Bad management -> bad design decision and poor resource allocation -> blame those lower on the org chart than you -> pressure to "just get this fixed and out the door" -> high levels of technical debt and programmer "burn-out"
mahyarm 12y ago
Well it can be frustrating in some cases, because you have to clean up other peoples messes. Then you run into bad design decisions, laziness, obvious non-caring about the code quality or other negative behaviors that angers you. And before you go into you don't understand their constraints and so on, this applies to people who you fully well know their design and time constraints, yet still do the wrong thing while you haven't under the same constraints. It's the whole 'hell is other people's code', and 'let's rewrite this piece of shit' tropes that programmers go through.
afarrell 12y ago
I enjoy debugging when I feel like I have some grasp on things. I hate it when I don't know where to look and don't have a good mental concept of the program in general.
paulvs 12y ago
For me it's refactoring. I'm in a lull at work so I decide to refactor some JavaScript, while at it I notice the CSS is all messy and has redundant code so I take care of that, then it's the HTML, etc. I enjoy it until the panic starts creeping in that I'm fiddling too much and could break something.
eropple 12y ago
I think it's common for people who are bad at it--who don't have the correct knowledge or skillset. I've been considered a wizard at jobs before because I knew how to read a JProfiler graph. And similarly, I hated, hated, hated debugging in Ruby until I learned about Pry and Byebug. Similarly, I love debugging in C#, because the tools are amazing. (I don't even hate debugging in C++ anymore, so long as it's on my Mac...)
nathan_f77 12y ago
I love it. It's often like figuring out a giant puzzle.
frevd 12y ago
My personal aversion: being forced to do unit testing. Compared to that, debugging is very enjoyable.
- eru 12y ago
  Try QuickCheck, it makes testing fun. (It originated in Haskell, but people have written versions of the library for other languages.)
tutufan 12y ago
It depends. I enjoy it as long as it's moving the ball forward. But if the people producing the stream of bugs won't take obvious steps to squelch the flow (or at least not stop me from doing so), it can be a maddening and Sisyphean task.

by rabbyte 12y ago

afarrell 12y ago

I enjoy debugging when I feel like I have some grasp on things. I hate it when I don't know where to look and don't have a good mental concept of the program in general.

chippy 12y ago
I actually like the lost feeling. Debugging is a learning experience for me, on the whole, it's investigating, tweaking, probing and testing. But one of the main things with debugging is identifying the actual bug. Once the bug is identified the challenge is partly gone, or changes.

WillNotDownvote 12y ago

It's my favorite part of programming, by a very long stretch. For me it's often a chance to really dig into understanding exactly how all the gears click together, which is my true joy. On a couple of teams I fell into the role of "team debugger", helping everyone with whatever was broken, and those have been my happiest times.

eru 12y ago
Seems like a great position to learn about everything the team does.

dm8 12y ago

If you are working on support/maintenance roles (in engineering) at big enterprise product company then debugging is major part of your job. I enjoy debugging as it is another way to solve problem. But for some people it gets repetitive (and boring) since you have to do that day in day out as a part of support roles.

d357r0y3r 12y ago
The guys in the trenches debugging are going to end up having a better overall understanding of the system. Not to mention they're going to be really good at debugging; if they decide to get into a more development-oriented role, that skillset is going to be a huge productivity booster.
sounds 12y ago
Another part of what makes debugging painful for a lot of people working in big enterprise ("small cog in a big machine") stems from bad management. Bad management -> bad design decision and poor resource allocation -> blame those lower on the org chart than you -> pressure to "just get this fixed and out the door" -> high levels of technical debt and programmer "burn-out"

mahyarm 12y ago

Well it can be frustrating in some cases, because you have to clean up other peoples messes. Then you run into bad design decisions, laziness, obvious non-caring about the code quality or other negative behaviors that angers you. And before you go into you don't understand their constraints and so on, this applies to people who you fully well know their design and time constraints, yet still do the wrong thing while you haven't under the same constraints. It's the whole 'hell is other people's code', and 'let's rewrite this piece of shit' tropes that programmers go through.

afarrell 12y ago

I enjoy debugging when I feel like I have some grasp on things. I hate it when I don't know where to look and don't have a good mental concept of the program in general.

paulvs 12y ago

For me it's refactoring. I'm in a lull at work so I decide to refactor some JavaScript, while at it I notice the CSS is all messy and has redundant code so I take care of that, then it's the HTML, etc. I enjoy it until the panic starts creeping in that I'm fiddling too much and could break something.

eropple 12y ago

I think it's common for people who are bad at it--who don't have the correct knowledge or skillset. I've been considered a wizard at jobs before because I knew how to read a JProfiler graph. And similarly, I hated, hated, hated debugging in Ruby until I learned about Pry and Byebug. Similarly, I love debugging in C#, because the tools are amazing. (I don't even hate debugging in C++ anymore, so long as it's on my Mac...)

nathan_f77 12y ago

I love it. It's often like figuring out a giant puzzle.

frevd 12y ago

My personal aversion: being forced to do unit testing. Compared to that, debugging is very enjoyable.

eru 12y ago
Try QuickCheck, it makes testing fun. (It originated in Haskell, but people have written versions of the library for other languages.)

tutufan 12y ago

It depends. I enjoy it as long as it's moving the ball forward. But if the people producing the stream of bugs won't take obvious steps to squelch the flow (or at least not stop me from doing so), it can be a maddening and Sisyphean task.