The bad-code tag has no wiki summary.
21
votes
10answers
1k views
How to prove an application is built on a bad codebase?
I'm currently reviewing a system built by some developers that previously worked at my job. The system works pretty well from a user's point of view, but when delving into code review it's a utter ...
12
votes
3answers
482 views
At the end of my rope
I am a contractor to a big company. Currently, there are three developers on the project, myself included.
The problem is the other 2 developers don't really get it. By "it" i mean the following:
...
20
votes
9answers
665 views
Is it better to use pre-existing bad practices, or good practices that don't fit well with old code?
I was thinking of this because I was trying to write an extension for an existing 3rd party software, and their database is horribly denormalized. I needed to use their existing tables and add a bunch ...
15
votes
7answers
511 views
What can you do about the quality of existing integration and unit tests while being the new guy in a team ?
A recurring theme that I came across in my career is being the new developer to arrive in a team, and quickly having an inherent distrust of the existing unit and integration test suites.
During the ...
29
votes
14answers
2k views
Pointless Code In Your Source
I've heard stories of this from senior coders and I've seen some of it myself. It seems that there are more than a few instances of programmers writing pointless code. I will see things like:
...
15
votes
6answers
556 views
If a fluent coder disregards good practices, doesn't his fluency work against him?
I am working on a fairly large and buggy application - and due to the way it's written (I'll spare you details, but it violates rules in most areas you can think of), it is next to impossible ...
28
votes
3answers
723 views
Blaming the ills of today on the technical debt of yesterday
A surprising number of quality, scalability, and load problems have been occurring on an application I currently support that I did not originally write. Thankfully I have new projects that I have ...
2
votes
3answers
187 views
Refactoring Bittersweet PHP: How can I make this less painful?
I've just been assigned a large project. The client has had multiple developers across different companies working on their (intended to be) large, MySQL driven eCommerce site.
The DB schema is ...
21
votes
11answers
630 views
How do you stay productive when dealing with extremely badly written code?
I don't have much experience in working in software industry, being self-taught and having participated in open source before deciding to take a job. Now that I work for money, I also have to deal ...
16
votes
12answers
906 views
What design patterns are the worst or most narrowly defined?
For every programming project, Managers with past programming experience try to shine when they recommend some design patterns for your project. I like design patterns when they make sense or if you ...
21
votes
13answers
6k views
Worst practices in C++, common mistakes [closed]
After reading this famous rant by Linus Torvalds, I wondered what actually are all the bad things programmers might do in C++. I'm explicitly not referring to typography errors or bad program flow as ...
5
votes
7answers
669 views
What to watch out for when writing code at an Interview?
I have read that at a lot of companies you have to write code at an interview. On the one hand I see that it makes sense to ask for a work sample. On the other hand: What kind of code do you expect to ...
13
votes
6answers
486 views
How do you dive into a big ball of mud? [closed]
Possible Duplicate:
How do you dive into large code bases?
So there is a question about understanding code. Mine is a similar problem. It started when I joined my current org. and like I ...
12
votes
11answers
304 views
Should you fix preexisting defects while working on something else?
Conundrum: During the course of working on a new feature or fixing a defect, you find a legacy problem in code. What should you do? Fix it and risk altering the behavior of the code. It has either ...
8
votes
3answers
138 views
System Decoupled in the Wrong Places: Meta-Problem?
At a meta level, I often find that when I grow a codebase organically, parts of the system that I eventually find need to know about each other (at least through some interface) have been mercilessly ...
