Hackers-IL: Shelf vs. Skycraper - Fortune

Hackers-IL: Shelf vs. Skycraper

> My personal advice and preferences:
> Don't bother with advice about understanding 50-line code blocks.
> Advise how to make 10,000,000 line code base easier to understand.

Your advice is similar to going to a guy explaining home-improvement on TV and showing how to build a shelf (or whatever) well, and telling him: "don't bother with advice about building a shelf - advise how to build a 150 story sky-scraper!". True, if a someone is about to build a sky-scraper, they should not bother with the details on how to make a shelf (they'll hire someone to do that), but most people will never need to build a sky-scraper in their lives, while building shelves is a useful skill.

Similarly, most hobbyist (or even most professional) programmers will benefit more from advice on writing 10,000 line programs than from advice on how to write 10,000,000 lines.

Author Nadav Har’El
Work Hackers-IL Message No 1,222