A small win: My messy code actually taught me something.

Refactoring it helped me see patterns I missed before.

3 comments

3 Comments

Exactly, it's like your past self left behind a puzzle that teaches present you how to think. I've noticed the messy, functional code I wrote years ago actually documents my problem-solving evolution better than any textbook. That ugly first draft is where real craftsmanship gets learned.

karenmorgan4h ago

Last week, I spent three hours refactoring a 200-line function I wrote six months ago. It was so convoluted that I almost impressed myself with how creatively bad it was. In my experience, that kind of messy code is like a time capsule of my past confusion. Refactoring it forced me to understand my own thought process, or lack thereof, and spot recurring anti-patterns. Your mileage may vary, but I find the cringe factor of revisiting old code is a powerful teacher. Honestly, my best lessons often come from cleaning up my own digital crime scenes.

emery6801h ago

Have you seen that essay by Peter Norvig on learning programming? He argues that writing bad code first is part of the process.