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In all seriousness, I've been told I'm good before, but I figure as long as there is room for improvement I'd rather think of myself as still learning - I've also been told that humility is the seed of wisdom. 
A lot of my code is pretty lean though, and sometimes elegant. My documentation is spotty when left to my own devices but I'm getting better about it (again).
That's not to say I haven't written a lot of WTF code. In fact, my first attempt at doing anything non-trivial in terms of an application is often garbage. I even plan for that. I consider my first attempt a draft. It's that bad sometimes.
Real programmers use butterflies
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honey the codewitch wrote: I consider my first attempt a draft.
The legendary Fred Brooks, in The Mythical Man-Month (1975), p116: The management question, therefore, is not whether to build a pilot system and throw it away. You will do that. The only question is whether to plan in advance to build a throwaway, or to promise to deliver the throwaway to customers. Seen this way, the answer is much clearer. Delivering that throwaway to customers buys time, but it only does so at the cost of agony for the user, distraction for the builders while they do the redesign, and a bad reputation for the product that the best redesign will find hard to live down.
Hence, plan to throw one away; you will, anyhow.
Ain't that the truth!
Software rusts. Simon Stephenson, ca 1994. So does this signature. me, 2012
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I used to have a copy of that book.
Real programmers use butterflies
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Many times I've really got into programming with C# Linq or TSQL and then later wondered what the heck it all does.
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No. It is senile dementia.
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I have done this many times and am glad to see someone else post the same scenario. I've been utterly amazed looking back that I was able to be "in the zone" as you say, and whip out something so complex.
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For sure. This is a joy. For me, it is usually the things that took months that I did by myself, products of immersion.
The other side of this is when someone asks me about something that I did 8 years ago with the expectation that I understand it like I wrote it yesterday. Suddenly I feel like a newbie in my own world, but then it comes flowing back.
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Yep, been there. Months later - years later as well. And yes, you wonder what kind of zone you were in, and whether you can be there again. To me, that was one of the greatest feelings (I’m retired now).
Cheers!
Time is the differentiation of eternity devised by man to measure the passage of human events.
- Manly P. Hall
Mark
Just another cog in the wheel
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I've made it a habit to explain every non-trivial part of my code in detail, using very_long_expressive_names, and multiline comments to explain how I arrived at the algorithm or formula. I do that for my future self, most of all, but occasionally my coworkers benefit from it, too. For that reason, most of the time, it is my future me who thanks my past self for spending that extra time when I have to look at that code months or years later!
With a sufficient level of explanation, that work looks a lot less like magic, so I typically end up with 'what the hell was I thinking?' more often than 'boy, what a brilliant idea' 
GOTOs are a bit like wire coat hangers: they tend to breed in the darkness, such that where there once were few, eventually there are many, and the program's architecture collapses beneath them. (Fran Poretto)
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I have been able to maintain the thing after picking it up 7 months later, so I'm able to understand it.
Real programmers use butterflies
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the zone is a real thing. I've also produced some amazing things in a short amount of time when in the zone. I still have some of that code running 20 years later
But the opposite happens once in awhile, and I'm like WTF did I write? it works, but it shouldn't.
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No it's not fun for me, especially since most of the code I revisit was done more than 7 years ago, was in C++ or assembler and if I don't remember everything based on the comments, then it was badly commented.
Considering the uncountable number of hacks that went into game engines of that period, astonishment is quite frequent but it's also like going back and judging yourself from experience (you've since figured out more elegant algorithms or hacks)
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Citrus fruits – Lime sorry I hurt your peelings.
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
"Common sense is so rare these days, it should be classified as a super power" - Random T-shirt
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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That's pretty good, but I bet MichelTangelo could do better. I'm outta here before this turns Ugli.
"the debugger doesn't tell me anything because this code compiles just fine" - random QA comment
"Facebook is where you tell lies to your friends. Twitter is where you tell the truth to strangers." - chriselst
"I don't drink any more... then again, I don't drink any less." - Mike Mullikins uncle
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You have a certain zest for this.
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Go Mango
I'm not sure how many cookies it makes to be happy, but so far it's not 27.
JaxCoder.com
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You have to be thick-skinned to handle this. To get to the core of it.
- I would love to change the world, but they won’t give me the source code.
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Why I darrion reply to this post, even against my core values, pits me against common sense. Still, it's not time to gripe about rancid puns.
| Ravings en masse^ |
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| "The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein | | "If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010 |
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Ahhh! Puns with a peel. I seed what you did there!
If you can't laugh at yourself - ask me and I will do it for you.
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That is citron-ly the worst lemon I have ever seen. Or it this just sour grape-fruits?
Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows.
-- 6079 Smith W.
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The National Ripped CD to PC (windows media player)
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4'33" By John Cage (performed by The BBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Lawrence Foster live at the Barbican).
YouTube[^]
Don't forget to turn it up to Eleven!
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
"Common sense is so rare these days, it should be classified as a super power" - Random T-shirt
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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that's rather cool music! (I know that the composer denies it, though.)
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I first heard that years ago on Radio 3 while driving to work; a quite fascinating piece.
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Blimey! You could give us a warning next time, that almost burst my eardrums!
“That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.”
― Christopher Hitchens
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