> <i>the code is usually not particularly shit</i><p>I'm sorry, but yes, it usually is. I've been in this business for over 25 years, and I'm one of the few people that actually enjoys the challenge of dealing with legacy code.<p>But most of the code I've seen is shit. The answer to the question <i>"could it have been done better"</i> is usually <i>"yes, if it had been done by someone who understood the basic principles of the paradigm they were developing in and the tools they were using to do it, and actually gave crap"</i>.<p>The difference between shit code written by shit coders and less than optimal code written by good coders dealing with constraints is quite clear.<p>I completely agree with the point the author is trying to make about the attitude problem, especially amongst coworkers, but let's not gloss over the fact that halfway decent code written by competent developers is still very, very rare.<p>Most code out there is shit code. Denying it is not going to help either.
A factor I think the article doesn't point out clearly enough is how the main attraction of dissing code is that it serves as an ego-defense mechanism. Understanding code is, almost without exception, challenging. It's much easier on our self image if we believe the code is to blame, rather than us.<p>An unfortunate side effect is that this perceived badness of the code is then often used as an excuse to not really try and understand it at all ("let's rewrite!" or "we don't touch that anymore").
Some years ago I was doing paid for code reviews. I learned many things but one particularly relevant to this article is: You can only tell if code is shit after you have dug through it for at least a few days.<p>Sure there are the obvious mistakes like non-idiomatic code style. But that's easy to spot. But for anything that is related to the problem domain and not the language itself you need to dig deeper. Because there might be a very good reason why something is done the way it is done. And later you might think: Hey, that's actually a pretty good solution.<p>Wading through piles of code by dozens of different developers made me humble and nowadays I think twice before calling something bad.
Behold, the aftermath of the brogrammer.<p>What was seen here is a particularly insidious, caustic and ultimately, demoralizing and self-defeating attitude from your colleague (and something I've seen routinely on HN). I don't particularly think he was in any way truly convinced that it was deserving of it, however it must be thrashed in accordance with a self selected pecking order in order to assert his dominance.<p>This "politeness is rubbish" attitude which also applies to common niceties in communication will one day be the death of us all.[1]<p>There is <i>truly</i> awful code out there and it doesn't deserve commentary or any other sort of attention. Just a yanking and replacement with good code.<p>[1] Politeness devoid of sincerity is not politeness. It is in fact the worst of all forms of rudeness.
How about a culture of "stop fucking up". (I admit I stole this from Ted Dziuba, but it has stuck with me.) People who are willing to call things "shit" instead of being nicey-nice at least give a shit. But it is important to be intellectually honest, and not be egotistical about one's own code, which could be shit just like anyone else's.
Point taken - it's very easy to feel like someone else's code is bad if it's hard to understand or does something in a way you think isn't the best, or even good. Maybe being nice is helpful sometimes.<p>On the other hand, sometimes code really is just shit. Being positive and saying "this is a good start, let's go through it and see if we can improve upon it" might be a massive waste of time if it's really shit. Sometimes holding people to high standards is necessary so the whole team doesn't get held back.
<i>...when I asked my coworker to explain...why is the code shit, I couldn't get a straight answer.</i><p>Maybe because there are only so many straight answers and we get tired of repeating them so often...<p>Class A: It's too difficult for the next programmer to understand this<p><pre><code> - poor (or horrible) variable naming
- poor (or horrible) function naming
- repeated repeated repeated repeated code
- comments don't match code
- comments needed but not there
- comments needed by unintelligible
- unbalanced structure
- poor (or horrible) choices for iterations
- poor (or horrible) choices for conditionals
- poor (or horrible) choices for data design/storage
- poorly maintained by Programmers #2 thru x, who didn't understand it
- etc., etc., etc.
</code></pre>
Class B: Poor machine performance, not by 10%, but by 10000%, because of extremely poor design and development choices.<p>Class C: It's broken. Insufficiently tested & broken in production.
In my time as a professional programmer I've come to notice a trend. It's true that there is a lot of bad code in the world and much of it is worthy of derision. That said, time after time I've noticed that when confronted with a smelly codebase junior and/or less-skilled programmers are quick to blame the code and the person who wrote it while more senior and/or highly-skilled programmers will start by placing the blame on <i>their own</i> lack of understanding.
I've always tried to go the opposite route when reading code from others. I'm the first (well maybe not the first but I'm at least close enough up the front of the line to see the first) to admit when I don't understand it, and when I go ask the guys who wrote it, I make this clear.<p>Usually I find talking like this helps people admit when code is just bad or they try to clarify it. I've found it makes asking whether it's ok to do complete rewrites a lot simpler.
I think the problem is an unwillingness(don't want to insult a co worker's code) or inability to form real criticism. If you can't pull the code base apart and say "this worked well" and "this part made too many assumptions to ever work right" or "is overly complicated for the task at hand" then you haven't taken enough time to understand the code in front of you.<p>This hits at one of my least favorite memes around here. The whole all the code I wrote six month ago is shit, and I will think that about the code I am writing now in six months. Yep, if you haven't developed the skills to determine what is good or bad about the code you wrote six months ago then A) It probably was middling code B) You aren't getting any better because you are unwilling to honestly critique your own work to look for areas that need improvement.
This is similar to the discussion around "legacy code", which in many ways is corporate speak for "shit code". In his book "Working Effectively with Legacy Code", Michael Feathers provides an interesting definition of legacy code. He defines legacy code as code that is not under test. The idea is that if code is under test then it is easier to improve/refactor.<p>Maybe instead of saying that code is "shitty", we should retrain ourselves to say that "this code has no tests." It's more productive and points us to a direction out of the situation and prevents us from getting in the situation to begin with.<p>I suppose some might argue that shit code is not necessarily legacy code or vice-versa. Perhaps, but in either case the first step in improving it is to get it under test.
I imagine anyone who's been around for long at all has written what someone would call "shit code."<p>Hindsight is 20/20. Imagine auto makers comparing product today with those from 50 years ago? That's about how far we've progressed in 10-15 years in this industry. Were those guys whose contemporaries were able to send people to the moon on CNC-less machine tools and computers with 4K RAM somehow doing "shit engineering?"<p>Imagine if what someone sees as "shit code" ultimately made yesterday's coder $1000/line because it got done while there was an opportunity to sell it. Is it still "shit code?" You're not being asked to be a music critic here. Most code is written as part of a business.<p>That said, code reviews are a great way to learn from and align with your team!
A toilet that doesn't flush correctly isn't a reason to complain if you're a plumber; it's your raison d'etre. And, although many don't want to recognize it, a good number of software developers are modern day plumbers.<p>For many developers, imperfect code, which is often more likely to be result of circumstances beyond the control of the person who wrote it than downright incompetence, is the gift that keeps on giving. If business and functional requirements were always well-defined and never evolved, clients/business stakeholders completely sane, deadlines realistic, resources plentiful and "scope creep" a rare phenomenon, a lot of software developers would be unemployed, and employed ones would be more frequently undervalued.
As developers we might need to work on not taking bugs and criticism of our code too personal. I know I feel that way sometimes, when bugs or bad design is found in my work it is easy to get defensive and take it is a personal attack - which usually is not a constructive approach.
The other, darker side of this culture is that you're not calling the code shit, you're actually calling out the author of that code as shit.<p>Sometimes, it is not really in the code or in the design. Some people are just downright evil.
Ugh. Another "let's-act-like-everything-is-happiness-and-rainbows" post.<p>In my experience, most of the time someone says "this is shit", it actually is, and it's indicative of serious failures in the hiring/training/code-review/management process.<p>The only ways that companies improve at those processes are by pointing out the shit, calling it by its name, and figuring out the best ways to keep it from happening again.<p>Having a "this is shit" culture can be GOOD -- it can hold people accountable and promote a culture of excellence.<p>> <i>In the end it is a culture that values negativity rather than focus on solutions.</i><p>That doesn't follow. Call it shit, <i>and then fix it</i>.<p>> <i>Start by understanding the code, and then find ways to improve upon it.</i><p>That means that, instead of fixing the underlying problem and making people accountable for their work, <i>you</i> take on the burden of cleaning after other people's shit? I don't think so.<p>The author is correct when they say:<p>> <i>Don't blurt out negative assessments of others code for no reason, and with no understanding. ...Start by understanding the code</i><p>But that goes without saying. Don't be too quick to judge when you don't have the facts. But once you're sure the code is shit, it's ultimately counterproductive to hide that. Most employees will only start writing better code once they're expected to, and strongly held accountable -- like most people's performance in any job.<p>PS: To be clear, I'm not talking about disagreements over coding styles, etc. I'm talking about code with obtuse function names and no comments. I'm talking about CSS that is hack upon hack upon hack filled with negative margins and !important's. I'm talking about JavaScript that pollutes the global namespace by programmers who refuse to use "var". Or CSS declarations like "div div span div span tr td span {color:red;}". And there's a tremendous amount of this stuff out there. Stuff that there's never an excuse for.
The shitty truth begins to appear when you've — way too many times, might I add — read the old code, thinking it makes sense and then feeling the pain of naivete shifting out as the code eventually turns out to make no sense.<p>Then begin to recognize potentially shit earlier in the process and while you do enough many rounds of that, confirming your expectations, you can just look at the code and say "this is shit" and be quite confident that you're right.<p>That's not to say that there wouldn't be a similar process working towards recognizing "When to rewrite this shit?" There is and the answer it gives is "Rarely".<p>A seasoned programmer will balance between "this is shit" and "not rewriting this shit". And there's nothing wrong with shit, because the shit is shipping and mostly works unlike the ultimate refactoring that nobody has time to write.<p>So it's the programmer's job to fix shit, and occasionally write new stuff that shall be deemed shit by a later fellow colleague.<p>Instead of pointing at the vague shitty attitudes towards shit, the author should probably just roll up his sleeves and start fixing the shit.
Kind of reminds me of a story from today. I have about a 70 page design document, laying out exactly how a new system i'm building will work. I've built something very similar in the past at a previous company, so this design is coming from a few years of learning what doesn't work.<p>As I was trying to explain some of my, well non conventional ideas, another coworker pokes his head over the cube, and calls the design crap. This of course is nothing new, its almost a game for this particular engineer. In the end, I walked away trying to avoid the conversation. It felt emotional though, and frankly hurt my confidence (while probably inflating his own)<p>It kind of made me think of the phrase "no one ever got fired for choosing IBM" I could have chosen the obvious design, and gone forward. No one would have debated it. However I've done that in the past, and I've seen the terrible problems that come from it. My new design is an attempt to avoid those problems. The attitude really pisses me off though, and I find it extremely counter productive.
"Psychological projection was conceptualized by Sigmund Freud in the 1890s as a defense mechanism in which a person unconsciously rejects his or her own unacceptable attributes by ascribing them to objects or persons in the outside world."<p>In other words, we think out own code is "shit" so instead of dealing with that, psychologically, we just attack others.
Relevant (not-XKCD) comic: <a href="http://www.osnews.com/story/19266/WTFs_m" rel="nofollow">http://www.osnews.com/story/19266/WTFs_m</a><p>I'm not opposed to calling out shit, even in my own work, but you ought to be able to explain the smell, even if it's something silly like curly brace location. (Ideally it's shit for a better reason... there usually is.) Besides if a rant doesn't immediately follow the declaration, you can't really claim to care all that much. If you're working on the Linux kernel and get flamed by Linus consider yourself lucky! It's because he cares. (And thinks there's still hope for you to do better.)
I don't mind the rantless half-hearted calls of bullshit either; rather than leading to everyone feeling bad and trying to feel less bad by trying to make other people feel bad, I think it would sooner lead to more cynicism with insults and less taking offense and feeling bad.
asking people to be very specific is the first thing that should be done in any technical environment. "shit" is going down all over the place, please emphasize.<p>asking people to be nicer in a technical environment would require similar levels of education and understanding of the tools involved. you seem to be a person that makes other people get stomack aches from bad code, so maybe you should reconsider your abilities.<p>if you write overall good code it's inherently easier to find a bug in it than if you just stitch shit together. if you solve your problems with stackoverflow and/or huge books like "how to... in 21 days" you should maybe reconsider your career choices.<p>in code the attention to detail is always more important than the overall intention, so why not leave it at that?
<p><pre><code> $query = "SELECT " + $_POST["foo"] + "...";
db_run_whatever($query);
</code></pre>
What you call that depends on what you know about the situation and the bigger picture.<p>It doesn't change what it is, or what it implies.
In my experience average code quality has considerably improved in the last, say, 20 years, I'd guess because of open source and the internet spreading higher standards, hardware and systems improvement relaxing efficiency constraints, and better education that just takes time to spread. When I started my job after college, the first day they handed me a 20-page DOS batch file to modify, and yes, part of that's my career trajectory, but I think there's more to it. I didn't say so, but in my own head "this is shit" was among my reactions, and shit these days has to work to measure up.
It is a problem if programmers cannot give a reason why the code is shit. But most of the time they give reason, the reason is not good enough. However, I still think it is necessary to say "this is shit code".
I totally agree, somehow our alpha macho instinct likes to come up and show everyone else how much we know better. Worst of all, this attitude is well rewarded on some circles.<p>The above said, sometimes code is really shit!
If code is not clean we should be able to state for at least two reasons why. e.g. It breaks SRP, lacks dependency injection, not enough abstraction. Saying something is "s<i></i>t" usually means we lack the verbiage to describe it. Clean code is a continual process one that needs curation with care. There are times when we are reading code and it's just terrible to understand. No care was put into it. My frustration comes to when I don't see care in code. Code is not inheritedly careful. We have to make it that way.
There are also many other factors that come into play when developing code, particularly if it's as part of a team working to a schedule, that have nothing to do with technical competence. In agile development you always prize something working over something pretty and the business need is firmly in the former camp so the pressure to improve code existing is alway balanced against adding 'value'. None of which is visible when you are confronted by a snapshot of the code.<p>However, sometimes code is just shit.
Except usually the code is shit, and that's ok. Sometimes I'm even talking about my own code and that's ok too.<p>The first step to fixing a problem is admitting the problem exists. Attempting to cover it up it with words like, "well I'm sure there is a good reason for that" or "Hrm that could be better but I know we had crazy deadlines." Are just excuses and don't really help.<p>If looks like shit and smells like shit... well it's probably shit.<p>We are all big kids here, no need to sugar coat things.
Shit code is shit code no matter the circumstances surrounding its creation. The way I see it, the author got the solution to the problem all wrong. You should be able to criticize bad code, and if the criticism insults you, you should just swallow your pride. You aren't your code.<p>The problem, if any, isn't the criticism itself, but the lack of explanation. If you can argue for why a piece of code is shit in a way that will help other developers, please do!
I'd say most code is shit. However, I'm sure people don't deliver shit code by pure choice. Unclear function purposes, time constrains, bad days, etc. Or just the plain old, "quick hack it together" to get back to the code you where really working on. We should just not feel insulted about the fact we write shit code, this doesn't mean you are a shit programmer.
Programmers are critical thinkers, that's why we are good at what we do. That's why no code anyone writes including our own 4 or 5 years down the line meets even our own standards. You have to be a critical thinker to get coding, to want to do it. The only down side is so much critical thinking wears us down over time. If anything, we should force ourselves to take more vacations.
I don't see it as a code culture problem, or hell, even a problem in itself. It's a dude issue. Dudes can be judgmental, and if not held back by some corporate culture, if not applying filters of courteousness and being the better man, or by simply being in a certain environment where certain behaviour is frowned upon, things like this will appear.<p>On the one side, it's a bad thing. On the other, it's stereotypical dudely behavior, and should be made fun of. "This is shit!" is, from my point of view, a way to observe that code 'feels' off, and an exclamation of frustration in that the reader can't understand it right away - and apparently doesn't have or can't take the time needed to dig in and understand it deeper.<p>I often go for gut feelings in judging code (this is shit!) too, so I can understand. I can understand the frustration too when one can't spend the time to understand and fix it - besides, someone else wrote it, someone else should fix it.<p>tl;dr, it's complicated. If someone exclaims "this is shit", go and investigate. Sit / pair with the person, walk through the code - or even better, if possible, find the person that wrote it - and either make it unshit, or make the person making the observation understand why it's not shit.
A lot of is an age thing. I vaguely remember feeling like that but that was soo long ago. Of course there is a lot of truly crappy code but you're only allowed to complain about it if you write flawless code each time, every time out of the gate, e.g. never.<p>Also, whatever your favorite "technology" is today is probably a bad joke to the next guy.
I just give newish developers this link:<p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_smell" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_smell</a><p>And magically the number of "this is shit" comments decrease dramatically. The problem is that people don't like seeing easy to spot problems, but instead of giving people a guide, they complain.
I almost never look at somebodys code and think it's shit. Sometimes I think some ideas are not the best possible ones in given context. But I almost exclusively think "this is shit" while I'm looking at my own code. And I agree that that feeling is a problem as it often destroys my motivation to finish what I started.
Good article, couldn't agree more. Its about time someone spoke up about the extreme negativity that has become coding culture. I've worked in companies with very negative developer culture and more positive developer culture and found the latter to produce far superior software (on time, in budget, less bugs etc.).
60% shit removal! A review removes 60-80% shit, to remove more than 80% use compounded shit removal. Compound requirements, design and code reviews to get 99%+ shit removal. finding 60% shit is not hard, every time you spot a little shit spend 3mins thinking about how to create better next ti
It's not simply a code culture problem; there are tools like Programming Mess Detector, PHP Mess Detector, Findbugs etc that can quantifiably show just how crappy a lot of code is. See <a href="http://pmd.sourceforge.net/" rel="nofollow">http://pmd.sourceforge.net/</a>
From my personal experience, individuals who say "this code is shit" are often far removed from the process of writing code in the first place.<p>I wonder where the whole "Worse is Better" paradigm fits into the universe with good code, acceptable code, and "shit code".
This also seems like something you could get fired for. You are not just disrespecting your teammate's judgement but also your boss's judgement in hiring your teammate. Therefore you are not a team player and maybe shouldn't be on the team.
I think this is just a general reflection of modern (internet) culture. It's easier to get "internet points" (read: facebook likes, twitter retweets, etc) by being snarky than it is by being positive.
This piece reminds me of Linus Torvalds. He's the kind of guy that lives these truths. Always respectful and constructive, never saying code is shit, etc etc. We need more developers like him.
"If a tree falls in a forest" comes to mind.<p>If shit code is performant, correctly solves the intended problem, is well-tested and bug-free, is it really shit code?
my first instinct is to laugh this off because its talking about web developers... obviously all of the code is shit because its not hand optimised assembler!<p>not sure why i hold onto this 20 years out of date mentality..
Ultimately, code is like farts. It does stink, but passes with time. Also, stretching the fart analogy a bit more, as developers we always find the output of others (farts and code) to stink more than our own. Some even seem to like their own.