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by segmondy 1905 days ago
By running the code. Let's say the code is bad. The software will let you know if there's a logical error. The software will be hard to maintain when you want to update it, The software will be hard to use when users try it. There's no feedback like the one the software gives. The proof is in the pudding. If you're new to software and a junior developer, then outside feedback is much needed, but once you're experienced. The most useful feedback is going to be the one the software gives you.
3 comments
quickthrower2 1905 days ago
Not by a long shot! How is this going to teach you new patterns and practices, better ways of coding and structuring your code? At best this will find you easy to detect bugs.
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BearfootCoder 1905 days ago
There's a much quoted aphorism with regard to getting feed back on fiction:

"If five people tell you there's a problem, they're almost certainly right. If they tell you how to fix it they're almost certainly wrong."

Getting feedback from the compiler is like this in spades.

While the act of trying to change, or even understand code which you wrote a while ago, will very likely to reveal it to be overly-engineered, incomplete, confusing, or some combination of all of these, it's very unlikely to come with a message saying, "And if you change it like this, all of these problems will go away."

You only get that by reading design advice and trying to apply it to your own work, and by looking at code which turns out to be better than yours and working out where the differences lie.

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tonyedgecombe 1905 days ago
The most useful feedback will come from customers. If you have a bug or are missing a feature they will tell you.

What is harder is dealing with architectural issues but I'm not convinced they are that easy to avoid in a team environment either.

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afarrell 1905 days ago
> If you have a bug or are missing a feature they will tell you

Reporting a bug takes work. Doing it clearly takes more work. Some percentage of people will do work for free. Relying on it is a choice with tradeoffs.

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tonyedgecombe 1904 days ago
People don't report it for free, they are hoping for a fix in return.
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