What OOP refers to is not “writing code” but “designing the code.” Everyone can write a book. Even I can. It will be a fucking shitty book, because I don’t know how to create suspense, give depth to characters, or any of that stuff. But it’s still a book. Writing code is easy. Writing good code is hard. If you want a program to fetch the current outside temp from an API you could throw together random lines of code that vaguely does what you want that you found on stackoverflow and iterate until it works. Will it catch edge cases? No. Will it output in a pretty format? No. Will it be maintainable? No. Will it be the next Facebook? Hard no. But you did write code.
Writing code is easy. Writing good code is hard. And that is why we have door stoppers called “Clean Code” to help us on our way. You might notice that the “how to code” books aren’t much thicker than a a pamphlet. But if it ever as much as touches on the topic of good code it will make for a door stopper worthy of a nuclear bunker’s entrance.
I would also add, that the complexity of a project massively increases the skills needed to write good code. If you want to have a small little CLI tool, that does one thing, its way easier to write that one in a good way, than it is to build an entire ecosystem of tools all working together.
One thing to know about Clean Code is that the author is a hard right MAGA dickhead now, so if that is important to you then seek a more modern source of advice. A lot of the things he advocates for about code obviously aren’t dripping in right wing rhetoric, but if you look at his socials you might feel quite turned off.
Worth saying the comment I’m replying to is not wrong IMHO
What OOP refers to is not “writing code” but “designing the code.” Everyone can write a book. Even I can. It will be a fucking shitty book, because I don’t know how to create suspense, give depth to characters, or any of that stuff. But it’s still a book. Writing code is easy. Writing good code is hard. If you want a program to fetch the current outside temp from an API you could throw together random lines of code that vaguely does what you want that you found on stackoverflow and iterate until it works. Will it catch edge cases? No. Will it output in a pretty format? No. Will it be maintainable? No. Will it be the next Facebook? Hard no. But you did write code.
Writing code is easy. Writing good code is hard. And that is why we have door stoppers called “Clean Code” to help us on our way. You might notice that the “how to code” books aren’t much thicker than a a pamphlet. But if it ever as much as touches on the topic of good code it will make for a door stopper worthy of a nuclear bunker’s entrance.
I would also add, that the complexity of a project massively increases the skills needed to write good code. If you want to have a small little CLI tool, that does one thing, its way easier to write that one in a good way, than it is to build an entire ecosystem of tools all working together.
One thing to know about Clean Code is that the author is a hard right MAGA dickhead now, so if that is important to you then seek a more modern source of advice. A lot of the things he advocates for about code obviously aren’t dripping in right wing rhetoric, but if you look at his socials you might feel quite turned off.
Worth saying the comment I’m replying to is not wrong IMHO
The finer details of the coding advice in Clean Code is also insane. There’s a good summary of it but I forgor where
I have been happy to recommend Sandi Metz books instead.
99 Bottles of OOP and POODR are excellent books and include many of the same ideas.
the advice still checks out though imho. dont treat it as dogma, but as useful guidelines.
maybe dont buy the book though
I must pretty good at that, since I never know if my code is gonna crash until the very end :D
My code has that special slow burn where I realize just how terrible it was when a help ticket pops up a few weeks later.