There's a particular exhaustion that comes from maintaining standards no one else seems to care about anymore.
It's the feeling of caring in an en...
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These hit hard.
People praise "detailing" and "precision" attitudes, but normally, they don't want to pursue them. It's too tiring. And precise people are the subjects of talking in the back, "that guy is always creating blockers, instead of delivering, no matter what".
Shipping quickly and getting visibility is the shortest path to getting promotions. So why bother about long-term maintainability and do things well? Once the "architect", or "staff", or even "distinguished" label is put before the name in LinkedIn, leave the company, and the rotten code will be a problem for others.
Now, with AI, I see the trend of these traits literally exploding.
So sad :(
This is so relatable right now. My current project just copy pastes code from the prototype into the prod due to stakeholders wanting to get the feature ASAP when there is no discernible reason to hurry in implementing it.
I'm feeling the burnt of wanting quality instead of just shipping it out. Hopefully I can still give a damn when tomorrow comes
From my experience, it is hard to keep that level of care when deadlines are tight, the client is pushing hard, and sometimes the project owner is not handling things well. But even then, I have learned that maintaining code quality still matters because once the pressure is gone, the code remains.
Agreed. A developer that cares about what the code is doing, how it's doing it, and understands what it should be doing is going to use more mental energy than one who regurgitates the wrong requirements into the code base with sole consideration of the happy path and what's for breakfast tomorrow. At the same time, it is the responsibility of these empaths to mentor and inspire the others to follow best practices and escalate recurring issues to management.
It boils down to how much fun you have while at it and how many fucks you are willing to give.
Wonderful article! Thanks
Resonates a lot! Thank you for this article :)
This article needs to be pinned everywhere! Its all TOO relatable, especially from when I was a junior developer.
I still care, if not even more, now but I speaking up WAY more about everything you just wrote.
Love this. GREAT article.
In most cases, the business requesting the code has a budget only for junior-level developers and requires deadlines within max 2 days of the request. Even if many are open to improving the codebase, the quality rests on the demands of the business and the ability of the lead dev to push back on them. Furthermore, even if you can get an extension of time, the fact that you're dealing with juniors devs means it'll most likely take more time to get them on the same page than it would just crank out more spaghetti. With teams spread throughout the world, this becomes even more difficult. The quality of the codebase is a representation of the quality of the company's system for managing work.
The way this was written is just stunning to me, absolutely fabulous. This also shows how much You care, while someone else just wouldn't. Just like in your article. Amazing article overall!
This is beautifully written a quiet masterpiece about the emotional weight of craftsmanship. The way you capture the fatigue of caring in apathetic environments feels deeply real. Integrity as the refusal to let care die quietly might be one of the truest lines about software development I’ve ever read.
This hits hard. It’s strange how caring about clean code or good patterns can start to feel like an uphill fight. But I guess that quiet persistence is what keeps projects alive long after the hype fades. I’ve been trying to build tools like Vezlo with that same mindset—make things a bit saner for devs who still care about the craft.
In my career I saw an army of developers who claim "Clean Code is a bunch of bsht". People who take that book literally instead of an inspiration for achieving a "good taste" for code.
The same use their claim to justify 10k long source files, just because: Clean Code is bsht and is good to do the opposite.
Literally how I approach my academics and everyday life. Very well said.
Nice Article!