[canuckistani]

...and, yes there is a legacy problem with old code bases, but one trade-off for interns, contributors, junior developers is that you get to make an impact on a codebase used in a commercial project by hundreds of millions of people. Terrible tools written in anger in 2003 are still in use, sure, and terrible architectural decisions have been made, re-made, then made again over the years. It's the kind of messy any codebase eventually gets to.

This codebase still has life in it though, and the proof is in how far Gecko has come in the last year. Go run Nightly for a bit, compare it to Chrome or current Firefox. It's a big deal.

[k__]

> Terrible tools written in anger in 2003

lolwat?

[k__]

Seriously, what was happening in 2003 that made Mozilla employees angry?

[kbrosnan]

Nothing specific. It is being used to convey that the code was written at an emotional high or low maybe when the author was tired or under time pressure to get something that worked.