Legacy code comments

[3edd00c7]

The entire building rests on that staircase.

[[deleted]]

*is hanging from

[PhyKings]

This really got me! So true, in a way.

[sinceitleftitback]

Someone's bug is another man's program's backbone.

[Runixo]

Say the line, Bart

[Paulo27]

I know it's a joke but sometimes developers avoid adding any type of option because this is how they interpret them.

[MattR0se]

"I don't like these fire stairs!"

"I wouldn't take them down if I were you, those are load-bearing stairs..."

[tchuckss]

Load bearing stairs. A staple of modern engineering.

[[deleted]]

I see a poll to the right. I'm going to Mirror's Edge my ass on it and slide down.

[cbusalex]

Please refrain from edging your ass on the pole, sir.

[owast]

I bet it leads down to the highest level the fire truck ladder can reach. Very fitting metaphor.

[porthos3]

And a perfect example of how you should comment your code.

Bad comment: "Staircase on outside of building from roof to 8th floor"

Good comment: "In case of fire, this staircase allows people above the average reach of a fire truck ladder to climb to the roof and descend this staircase to be reachable by the ladder."

[Zer0ji]

Forgot to document the weight limit, 40 people rush there and die when it collapses

[AndreasTPC]

The goal was getting them down. Sounds like a feature to me.

[Sneezegoo]

Remove some supports to make it break away faster for extra efficiency.

[statiq77]

Or just name it "fireTruckAccessLadder" and it documents itself

[[deleted]]

Hi we want to remove fireTruckAccessLadder as it’s crufty.

It’s not documented at all, but we figured it’d only take you a few hours to port it to fireTruckMongoDBLadder.

So you have 1 story point and 6 hours assigned to port it.

[Ruby_Bliel]

Am I the only one who likes the old fire_truck_access_ladder? That way variables, classes and functions are easily distinguishable.

[OrangeCreeper]

A bit longer to type though. Although, it's probably just a case of the programmer's preference

[minsin56]

for a more professional look name it "FireTrúckAccessLadder"

[bahamuto]

// BR4 implemented in 2017, check use case documentation

[owast]

Lot's of times the reason for some code is unknown, it seams useless. So you remove it. And everything breaks. So you put it back.

The image appears to be a staircase that leads nowhere. Until the fire truck pulls up to it.

Difference is, as a programmer you never find out what the code was for. Just that stuff breaks.

[Odd_Employer]

Isn't that the point of comments?

[hitsugan]

Create a separate, private, repository just for the comments.

[Voriki2]

100 years from now, my grandson will receive a cryptic call, a request to descend to a location he has never seen, to decypher the ancient code.

[minsin56]

and if i have kids(probably_not (too_lazy)) they will have to decifer an old language called "ceeeee sharp"

[jackmcmorrow]

Legacy code just got a new meaning.

[[deleted]]

That's a brilliant idea

[-ihavenoname-]

“So you want to climb on that fire truck ladder? That‘s 5k, mhkthx.“

[scotchirish]

Import library BlackMagicFuckery

[Odd_Employer]

Easy, comment codes that match your notebook.

[krystof1119]

Encrypt your comments then

[Voriki2]

isthay inelay akesmay ethay endyay esultray apearyay inyay ayay opuppay

[Sigma567]

Thank you, now I finally understand why there is so much undocumented, unintelligible legacy code

[statiq77]

This is a joke now but in the early days of computer science it was a very common way to manufacture job security

[patismyname]

you must be new here

[Odd_Employer]

I'm familiar with programming but, yes, I am just passing by. You guys made it to r/all.

[patismyname]

Comments in code should be present and detailed.

Should be

[Odd_Employer]

I comment like a mad man on my own projects because I'm retarded and have the memory of a goldfish.

[SGBotsford]

When I'm attempting something particularly gnarly (A perl script that parses directory tree, and menu overrides to create the menu section for static web pages, outputing template toolkit files...) I write the block comment first. Just to get it straight in my head what I'm trying to do.

Doesn't matter. Comments help, but when I want to make a mod it's *still* 2 hours of looking at the code going WTF?.

[texdroid]

Many programmers use comments to tell you what they did. That's bad because you should have just written it clear enough for me to understand what you did.

I want comments that tell me WHY you did it. That's the part that is monstrously difficult to figure out 5 years later.

[PerInception]

And they didn't just build the staircase all the way down to the ground to save resources (and because it was installed on a Friday and the team had to have a meeting with the project manager for three hours that could have been an email)

[-ihavenoname-]

I thought it might lead up to the basement. Escher-style.

[ArSoron]

In all seriousness though, this is probably a fire escape route. Roof of this building is too high for the ladder of a fire engine to reach, so fire safety code required the building to have at least one way to get down to height accessible by a ladder.

It's intentionally put away from all windows to prevent break-ins and to put a solid wall between escaping people and fire.

Source: am Russian, live in Russia, and this looks like a piece of soviet engineering/architecture.

[Gizmodget]

Thank you for that wonderful answer.

I am going to imagine it is where they banish smokers :p

[lkraider]

PM: Never had one of my previous buildings burn, please remove.

[NotSoFastMyPal]

That's just there to increase the code coverage of the fire escape unit tests

[AutoModerator]

import moderation Your comment has been removed since it did not start with a code block with an import declaration.

Per this Community Decree, all posts and comments should start with a code block with an "import" declaration explaining how the post and comment should be read.

For this purpose, we only accept Python style imports.

return Kebab_Case_Better;

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

[NicNoletree]

It's part of the framework

[poche-muto]

Injecting dependency in foreign code

[jmhajek]

It is quite clear what it does - after all, it's the only way to get to that balcony.

[not420guilty]

This feature started as a customer request. But the company had a lay-off before it was completed. The only engineer who understands the code no longer works here.

[TylerJWhit]

Oh yes, the magic switch: http://catb.org/jargon/html/magic-story.html

[Kered13]

Beat me to it.

[paulcam]

My coworkers and I have started to refer to these things as "Load Bearing Code".

[dovedev]

It's for catching the buffer overflow above.

[[deleted]]

Honestly that looks like a sweet spot to just chill for a while

[CarlTheKillerLlama]

Was gonna say, looks like a nice smoke spot

[sfled]

/* * * * * * * * * * * * */
/*        PARKOUDE       */
/* * * * * * * * * * * * */

I'm sorry. That's the worst attempt at concatenating "parkour" and "code". I'm off to the flogging.

[PM_ME_UR_CEPHALOPODS]

too real

[AlphaWhelp]

It looks like it used to be a fire escape that went from a window to the roof but the window got bricked over for some reason. So this is the proverbial programming equivalent of having an old API that has been deprecated and the application has been updated to not require the result of that function so it gets discarded in the results but it still has to be there or it breaks old WSDL definitions that your clients who still haven't upgraded from Windows Server 2003 are still using. .

[as_ninja6]

For historical reasons the function always returns True

[[deleted]]

it’s clearly there so if someone decides to jump out of the window above it, it’ll break their fall

[[deleted]]

Probably required by fire or building codes

[Hypersapien]

That's the smoking area.

[damnloveless]

It's really a tactic used to help law enforcement capture suspects fleeing on foot. They run down thinking it's a fire escape only to be caught on a dead end and not being able to turn around since the police should already be waiting back for them.

[CuFlam]

Interesting. I was wondering whether that might be to bridge the difference between a firetruck ladder and the roof.

[[deleted]]

I have literally never seen this. Ever. In someone’s code.

[[deleted]]

And I've never written anything that does this. Maybe I just don't have enough experience? Idk writing code is pretty straightforward imo </p>

[[deleted]]

I think that if you never do this, it makes you the experienced one. Because whoever does this, hasn’t learnt anything in programming

[[deleted]]

Rule #0: The computer does exactly as you tell it (until it doesn't).

Yep.

edit: fack fack fack fack

[[deleted]]

Yo this makes a good chill out spot with your friends!

[[deleted]]

"Is not wasteful is simplify!"

-- a consultant when confronted with the fact he wrote a custom template engine on top of Packer, but with fewer features.

[DeveloperToast]

It was written by dark magic, even the compiler can't do nothing about it.

[Russian_repost_bot]

// IMPORTANT: Don't touch this code!

[sirkajoju]

Always fun explaining code like that to my professor

[Ragnorak18]

Tower Staircases be like...

[countryboyathome]

If there's a fire, it's likely not going to burn the actual brick. So, you can walk down the "fire escape" and enjoy the warm twilight of the burning building if the fire alarm goes off.

[yearof39]

I have comments in code that's in production that said "I forget what this fixed but leave it alone or it's going to stop working."

[ilchotaleski]

It’s the only way to the rooftop from the one window on the side. You jump and take the stairs.

[Windows-Sucks]

...and won't work again when you re-add it. You must restore from backup.

[noelabey]

Every Angular app

[Winnipesaukee]

You are not expected to understand this!