Readable code is not for maintenance only

giorgiosironi.blogspot.com

7 points·fogus··4 comments

I pity people with memory like this.

Unlike the author, I don't forget the code I wrote yesterday and can still explain and understand it. It takes several months for the meaning of my normal code to slip my mind. Maybe I'm just different ... but I even find that going back and relearning my code easy too.

(Not that I write particularly obtuse code, or never comment upon anything.)

I agree. Even when I had just started Pascal after early childhood years of ZX-Spectrum basic, even when I wrote a game that consisted of one huge block of code and the only reason I had to split it in 2 procedures called Dog1 and Dog2 is because Pascal compiler started to complain about main code block being to large - even then I was never puzzled by my own code.

Sadly I have lost the source now. I'm sure it's an epic and hilarious mess.

Some people write a LOT of code. I wouldn't think it possible to remember every piece of code written over, say, an 8 hour work day.

>> "Even your code, after six months, becomes a stranger to you. Especially if you have improved your coding skills meanwhile, the implementation will be very hard to grasp at a glance."

Maybe this is true when you're just starting out programming. In the early days when you're still discovering big things.

But once you've been doing it for years you're likely to change less, and have settled on styles that work for you.

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