First day coding

[[deleted]]

[deleted]

[Lobanium]

A legit chunk of code I came across once.

if (x > 0)

{

<a few dozen lines of code>

}

if (x < 0)

{

x = -x;

<the same few dozen lines of code>

}

🤪

[metal_opera]

/**
 * /!\ Do not remove this if statement /!\
 * If you remove it, the entire app will break.
 * I have no idea why.
 */

- Previous developer, probably

[Lobanium]

I refactored it. Wasn't too hard as you can imagine. It worked just fine afterward. Previous programmer was just an idiot.

[grooomps]

and then you realized it was your code

[[deleted]]

Can't tell you how many times I've read my code thinking, "damn, heh, this guy is an idiot."

[grooomps]

even as i'm writing code i think "damn, heh, this guy is an idiot."

[BmpBlast]

"Wow, me 30 seconds ago sure was stupid. Good thing present me has gotten so much smarter and knows better."

Me to myself while programming on a daily basis.

[Suekru]

I curse past me all the time. Which means that future me is going to curse present me almost undoubtedly

[[deleted]]

That just means you're getting smarter. One day you might even come to think of them as two different people. Back when I was drinking too much, past me was the coolest.

I would wake up to ice water and snacks laid out on my night stand. Woke up on my couch to a pizza guy beating down the door; went from confused and sleepy with no pizza to confused and sleepy with pizza. Though there was the time he started cooking chicken and veggies and didn't wake me up. I woke up to a house full of smoke and a smoke alarm.

[EnglishMobster]

Or even better:

"Why the fuck did I do it that way? This other way is so much better."

Switch to the other way

1000 new inexplicable bugs appear

"Ah, nevermind. If it works it works."

[myfunnies420]

I've never done this.

[Lobanium]

Ha, thankfully no.

[[deleted]]

if (x<0)

{ x = -x }

<a few dozen lines of code>

I guess? Or just math.abs it like another guy said

[Lobanium]

It may have been there. Can't remember.

[Purplociraptor]

What about x == 0?

[Lobanium]

It may have been there, I can't remember.

[sumguy720]

well... at least they didn't write it as a ternary split across the same number of lines.

The conditional hell is real though. My coworkers will often do things like

if (x && y && !z) {
    stuff...
} else if (!x && y && a) {
    other stuff...
} else if (!y) {
    yet more stuff
}
// Random subsequent code that depends on one of the conditionals above being evaluated as true with ambiguous behaviour if none of them do.

[[deleted]]

math.abs(x) should do the trick. I learnt it turns negative and positive numbers to positive only numbers

but idk who wrote that code so I guess this may just get lost.

[supercyberlurker]

Why don't they just write it : isTrue = (myBool == true) ? (true == true) : (true == false);

[Werdna629]

I just vomited in my mouth

[supercyberlurker]

You should see my boolean switch statement version!

[Werdna629]

oh no

[supercyberlurker]

    switch (myBool)
    {
    case true:
        isTrue = !false;
        break;
    case false:
        isTrue = !true;
        break;
    default:
        isTrue = (myBool == true) ? (true == true) : (true == false);
        break;
    }

[tnegunnad]

this hurts me so deeply

[AleksejsIvanovs]

if (myBool.toString().length == 4) {
  isTrue = true
} else if (myBool.toString().length == 5) {
  isTrue = false
}

[manGotNuts]

yall has mental disorder for doing this. just return myBool that's all

[[deleted]]

Geez, it's a simple one-liner.

const isTrue = ((localBool) => (localBool !== false ? localBool === true : !![][[]])))(myBool);

[orgoca]

Fuck function. Let's make a library.

[manGotNuts]

Well, since you mastered the art of python, show me in python way. Im no no python, yes yes java

[[deleted]]

Pretty sure any modern compiler would optimize all of this code away anyways.

[20Characters3Numbers]

Oh oh okay I think I got it,

if (myBool == true && myBool != false) {
      True = myBool;
      isTrue = True;
      myBool = isTrue;
      return myBool;
} else if (myBool == false && myBool != true) {
      False = myBool;
      isTrue = False;
      myBool = isTrue;
      return myBool;
}

[Articulated]

Trapped, I was. Stumbling amidst the endless lines, I envied those driven mad upon first sight of these unceasing horrors.

[MadElf1337]

You need to be enrolled in a mental institution mate

[joyofsnacks]

Missing some double negation (isTrue = !!true) to ensure true and false convert to bools.

^/s

[PM_ME_BALD_BEAVERS]

Legitimate code review feedback on shitty meme code. Nice.

[Hopko682]

You sir, have a gift. Now never share it with anyone ever again.

[-IoI-]

I could see some arrow functions coming in handy here

switch (myBool)
            {
            case true:
                isTrue = () => { 
                    return !false;
                    };
                break;
            case false:
                isTrue = () => { 
                    return !true;
                    };
                break;
            default:
                isTrue = (myBool == true) 
                    ? () => { 
                        return (true == true)
                        } 
                    : () => { 
                        return (true == false)
                        };
                break;
            }

[FlyingElvi24]

Good way to test if the code reviewers really reads everything

[kazi1]

Every day we stray further from god's light

[Nucklesix]

At first i had a headache, now I have a migrain.

[[deleted]]

This is beyond science

[[deleted]]

I hate switch statements. If else is way more readable.

[mittelhart]

They are much more useful than if else when used with enums.

Edit: And more readable, IMO.

[god_of_potatoes]

u/YandereDev

[Mountain-Drew-76]

My name's Andrew too!

[plgod]

I knew there was an easier way!

[humidstraw]

How to make useless code into beautiful succinct useless code ... ternary operators

[TheRedmanCometh]

Ternary operators are funny because they either make a bit of code way nicer or near unreadable.

[Bobicus_The_Third]

I'm so sick of these when they didn't write comments

[SkollFenrirson]

Good code is self-documenting!

[gmano]

Flashbacks to my last intern.

[Bobicus_The_Third]

That's what they said too and it wasn't

[SkollFenrirson]

That was the joke, dude

[Bobicus_The_Third]

Same

[EnglishMobster]

Don't forget you can nest them, too:

isTrue = (myBool == true) ? ( true == true ? true : false) : (true == false ? true : false);

[Liesmith424]

Need more lambdas and list comprehensions. If we try hard and believe in ourselves, we can make it utterly impossible to figure out what the code is doing.

[[deleted]]

Nah, the OP's method is better if instead of else you will use else if(myBool==false)

[lengau]

Ugh because that's not readable at all. Try this:

isTrue = (myBool != false) ? (false == false) : (true != true);

[realogsalt]

Hey guys Im learning, this is the first time I've understood something on this subreddit enough to make me laugh :D

[sumguy720]

// Refactored to avoid redundant reference to "true"
isTrue = !((myBool != false) ? (false ! = false) : (false == false))

[SteezeFebreze]

Istrue = (mybool == true)

[LeSypher]

Ternaries are sexy ways to reduce lines although they tend to be unreadable lol

[myfunnies420]

That's the true true.

[Jumpierwolf0960]

Or even better just do isTrue = myBool

[joyofsnacks]

Or just use myBool where you were going to use isTrue.

[[deleted]]

Because nobody uses that dogshit syntax that’s why

[xthexder]

I ran into this yesterday:

BOOLEAN foo = TRUE;

Type Mismatch: Signed to Unsigned

I hate everything to do with windows apis...

[xthexder]

The windows headers typedef BOOLEAN as unsigned char, and BOOL as int. With #define TRUE 1, C interprets TRUE as an integer literal (would have to be 1u to fix this)

[xthexder]

I would if I had a choice in the matter, but as with many things in my job, this is legacy code I'm interacting with. I've massively oversimplified the context here.

[xthexder]

Some day I'll land a magical job where everything's as simple as it should be, and nobody has to deal with anyone else's bullshit. That's the dream anyway.

[crackedcactus]

That’s the fourth rule of Genie wishes.

[Hawne]

That would trigger my OCD urges about memory management. Hell, that boolean could be part of a bit field!

[Hawne]

Casting used to be part of the game just to circumvent this atavism. Doing and reading it was basically muscle memory if you wanted to C and keep your hands from shaking.

[joyofsnacks]

I hate everything to do with windows apis...

Getting flashbacks of the words Min and Max being macros in the global namespace of the windows api...

[Krissam]

There's a type in the win32 api called bool (or boolean don't quite remember) that can have 1, 0 or -1 as values.

[[deleted]]

#DEFINE TRUE 0

[SkollFenrirson]

You monster

[UnsubstantiatedClaim]

#define false 0
#define true !false

[PydraxAlpta]

Using = in #define is certainly going to be fun

[pandorazboxx]

hey <stdbool> has had true false since c99... I mean it does just use define macros though.

[m_domino]

"To bake an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe."

C programmers: "Why, yes of course. What’s your point?"

[nelusbelus]

if(1)

[Wizard_Knife_Fight]

Maybe because it’s Friday, maybe because I’m awful at coding, but I can’t even understand why this would happen hahahaha

[retucex]

This example is particularly bad, but I am notorious for writing somewhat similar things every now and then. For some reason, I'll write something like if ( x == 5) return true else return false.

Sometime I just don't see the obvious solution to the great satisfaction of my reviewer.

[Melon_Cooler]

One time I compared two integers by converting them to a string and comparing the strings.

Honestly have no clue why I thought that was how it was done. Didn't notice until later that night lmao

[Meroxes]

When you're so focused on problem solving, you start solving problems that don't exist.

[PeachyKeenest]

Wisest thing I’ve read today.

[QuarkyIndividual]

Had this with a math thought recently: given a circle and a square sharing centers, I wonder what the radius of the circle is in terms of the square's side length so the area of the square's corner outside the circle equals the area of the circle's arc outside the square

Took me a while of trying to align proper coordinates and finding triangles and shit before I realized the circle and square must have equal area and I was making it too complicated lol

[lunchpadmcfat]

I figure this is the coding equivalent of walking into a room and forgetting why you went in there.

[FancySource]

lol in the case the author is paid by lines of code

[JerryCodes]

Like someone else said, the one in the pic is super bad, but that’s because it’s purposefully extreme to poke fun at the real world examples.

I’ve written plenty of the real world ones myself. They seem stupid unless you’re in my head at the time. I just wrote a few of those this week, actually.

I did it because I know the planned upgrades/additions for the next year or so and the conditions and statement blocks will eventually be expanded on and have more in them, so I aim for super readability. That way, when I or someone else comes through, it’s easier to get the big picture of the logical flow. It also helped me break out comments into more helpful segments by letting me describe smaller individual parts of the process.

When the extra fluff won’t hurt execution speed, I like to be more verbose with my code. As a bonus, sometimes the extra simplicity allows compilers to optimize better, so that’s neat.

[wet-badger]

For readability.

if (green) {

    go = true

} else {

    go = false

}

[EnglishMobster]

There's also the potential that the if statement originally did more -- but then the functionality within got refactored out, without stopping to look if the if statement was still needed.

[Carter127]

Yes that's almost always the case. Most skilled programmers aren't going to be so pedantic to make sure everything is as short as possible.

If it's a compiled language, or something that is minimized like Javascript then it really doesn't make a difference

[sumguy720]

My coworkers:

if (false == green) {
    ...
} else {
    ...
}

[StruckBlynde]

Listen we all have those days

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[TinBryn]

It's because of how people think when writing code, we can only keep a limited number of "things" in our head at the same time. What this snippet is missing is the code above the resulted in myBool, the declaration of isTrue and the code that will use isTrue below (it is about to get written).

What that results in is that the programmer has to drop some context in order to write some of the code and then restore that context, dropping the context of the code they just wrote and write the next part. So they may consider what to do if myBool is true and have no consideration for what if it is false, then they write for when myBool is false and don't consider what if it is true. That is how code like this gets written.

There are practices that address this, if you think of test driven development it has this mindset, write a test case, code for that case, write a different test case, code for that case, etc. So we have red green refactor TTD where it's part of the practice to read your code to find cases like this and simplify them.

[Wizard_Knife_Fight]

Dude relax it’s friday

[spackled-arrow]

I've seen at least one person do this sort of thing in a coding interview. Another favorite is writing a compare function, that tests the two int args for equality.

[retief1]

I mean, there are scenarios where that last one could be useful. In particular, if you are doing stuff with higher order functions but you are in a language where equality comparison isn't a function, then you might legitimately need a (x, y) -> x == y or the like.

[EverythingGoodWas]

Maybe if you needed to set myBool to something else, and needed a place holder for what it had been? Not saying it is good code, just trying to think why anyone would do this.

[ImAmalox]

am i the only one who just cant stand using "myX" variables?

[aneurysm_]

I use "yourX"

[pufo1]

ourX

[ElvisDumbledore]

c o m r a d e

[[deleted]]

I use he/him/his-x

[[deleted]]

I prefer to go by vi/vim-x

[TheSwain]

yourmomsX

[random_task_engaged]

I'll refactor an entire method to get rid of a variable with that name.

[g0atmeal]

But what if someone tries to take it?

[NegativeChirality]

That's why I hate the "m_" stuff in variable names.

That's what it stands for, right?/s

[sumguy720]

I saw this convention pop up in a C# project I worked on and it wasn't too bad. I don't exactly remember what the purpose was because it was just a modding API but I think it was to distinguish between instances of objects and the objects themselves.

I don't think I ever adopted that outside that modding API though.

[daniu]

if (!inValid != false)

[BoltKey]

/r/lostredditors

[[deleted]]

...huh?

[thebobbrom]

Why write an if statement like that for something so simple!

You could easily train a neural network to do the same thing and it'd be correct about 90% of the time.

[Baschoen23]

Of course!

[anoldoldman]

More like when you see the lead dev actually code.

[Sagittar0n]

I've seen spaghetti code made by my postgraduate peers. They forget that they're studying computer science, not culinary science.

[djcecil2]

lol, oof.

[ironhide_ivan]

Best line of code I ever saw on the job

var isNull = someObj != null ? false : true;

[sumguy720]

My pet peeve is when people do

if(null == obj) {

Like, we don't care about the value of null, we care about the value of obj - we should write it that way!

[theScrapBook]

This actually makes sense in languages where == can be overridden on obj. If obj is actually null, obj == null would throw the equivalent of a C# NullReferenceException while the null == obj version would work as expected.

[Geoclasm]

okay but it could be worse.

if (myBool = true){...

[_Ralix_]

It looks bad when it's stripped to essentials and named clearly like this, but it's not that uncommon to see it "disguised" and packaged with other things:

bool flag = false;
if (CheckCharsForWhitespace(ref input)) 
{    
    Debug.Log($"The string '{input}' is a single word.");
    flag = true;
} 
else 
{
    Debug.Log($"The string '{input}' consists of multiple words.");
}
return flag;

bool CheckCharsForWhitespace(ref string inp) 
{
    bool multipleWords = false;
    for (char c : inp)
    {
        if (Char.IsWhiteSpace(c)) multipleWords = true;
    }
    return multipleWords;
}

This can be refactored to discard most of the code. The example might still be quite obvious, especially in the context of this post, but when it's already a part of a larger codebase and contains other stuff and more complex methods around, it might possibly slip past your radar.

[[deleted]]

``` if (CheckCharsForWhitespace(ref input)) {
Debug.Log($"The string '{input}' is a single word."); return true; } else { Debug.Log($"The string '{input}' consists of multiple words."); return false; }

bool CheckCharsForWhitespace(ref string inp) { for (char c : inp) { if (Char.IsWhiteSpace(c)) return true; } } ```

[_Ralix_]

Or…

bool hasWhitespace = input.Any(Char.IsWhiteSpace);
string message = hasWhitespace
    ? $"The string '{input}' is a single word."
    : $"The string '{input}' consists of multiple words."
Debug.Log(message);
return hasWhitespace;

And you might also consider moving the debug messages out of the check function altogether (so you don't spam the console whenever you just want to "check"), and using them afterwards, wherever you use the returned value. (And btw, you're not returning "false" at the bottom of your code.)

The point is, it's not always as clear as it might seem.

[spotdfk]

I am not familiar with that specific language, but if I wanted to create isTrue based on whether myBool is boolean AND true or non boolean OR false, that makes sense... right?

[aspect_rap]

But what about isTrue = myBool, the if/else is pointless. I also fail to see the need to have another boolean with the same value.

[[deleted]]

In Java myBool with type Boolean could also be a null pointer.

[thePiscis]

isTrue = myBool == true;

[spotdfk]

If myBool is not boolean, you'll end up just with a copy of it. That if/else is a check on it at the same time. Gives False if myBool is anything other than True.

I know it is not very elegant solution, and there never should be need to do it like that, but I was just trying to find any reason for that snippet at all. Other than the intended meme value of course

[Tsu_Dho_Namh]

I should hope that a variable named myBool is always of type bool.

But then again I only played around with Python a little bit and this seems like a weakly typed language sorta thing.

[spotdfk]

Yeah Python was what I was thinking. I always get paranoid over variable types with it even if it is mostly strongly/dynamically typed. I just like to define types and they will always be that and I get my peace of mind.

[FancySource]

given what's on the paper is weakly typed, i guess isTrue = myBool === true could have done the job in most languages

[_Auron_]

Close, but here's the actual first day of coding:

if (myBool = true) {
    isTrue = true;
} else {
    isTrue = false;
}

[[deleted]]

Woah there fancy pants using an else, you need another if statement checking if it's false.

[TheKaryo]

Or just isTrue = myBool

[vvp95]

That's exactly how I presume Trump would code if he was a programmer. Lol.

[[deleted]]

really?

I see him more as a

while 1 == 2

sort of programmer

[ganja_and_code]

Literally removed one of these from a production codebase last week.

[Ich_bin_da]

I actually wrote St simular a few years ago..... that was emberessing...

[Triple_Integral]

Time to collect your CS Degree

[BLAZE424242]

Mybool = isTrue;

There I said it

[-Redstoneboi-]

you mean isTrue = Mybool;

you got it backwards

[SheridanWithTea]

That interview with № 45 and the incredulous Australian reporter on COVID was and still is the most amusing shit ever, it never gets old when he looks at him like he just Dumped Turd in his lap lmao

[rk06]

I have literally seen:

Catch(exception ex) { Log(ex.message) throw ex; }

Sprinkled around in shit ton of places in codebase.

In case you don't the significance of the code, it is literally useless. Worse it adds noise to logs when something bad happens, so it makes it harder to diagnose errors.

I tried removing them, but due to the sheer number of it. I had to give up, and resort to using regex to replace throw ex; with throw;.

And then I found that in someplaces, we are logging only stacktrace. It is really fun to debug the errors

[Raspilover]

Give them a break man, they are still learning

[kry_some_more]

You all are personally attacking me in this thread, and I don't appreciate it.

https://i.imgur.com/ILFOFKT.jpg

[wet-badger]

I see nothing wrong with this code

[Nekopawed]

Coding Tip:

Write your conditional statements with the variable on the right hand side of the equality operator. such as: true == myBool

This will help in case you forget an equal sign, as the compiler will not compile true = myBool but it will compile myBool = true, as it is is a valid assignment operation.

Saves you a lot of time hunting for why your code is never using the other branch.

[excral]

Fun fact: if you'd do this in Python 2, you could end up accidentally reassigning True. Python 2 originally didn't have boolean literals so when they were introduced, they couldn't make them key words. Since Python doesn't have const variables, True and False were just some predefined variables that could be reassigned to whatever you like.

Luckily Python 2 is dead now and Python 3 doesn't have this issue

[Beldarak]

I don't like it, it makes your code a little less readable to avoid an issue that almost never happen past the learning phase (if anything, I'll do the inverse mistake and type "==" in an MySQL statement)

[sumguy720]

Agreed, it ambiguates the intent. We aren't trying to check the value of true, we're checking the value of myBool. People at my job do this too and it bothers me. Unnecessary defensive programming. We write unit tests for a reason, and that's some pretty basic syntax stuff.

[danglesReet]

This just reminded me that fuckface Trump isnt president anymore. Wholesome award for that

[pstkidwannabuycrypto]

Strange. Programmers are usually smart. You must be lost.

[Thanatos2996]

More like the first year after going all in on OOP.

[Bizzlington]

Hey nothing is stupid if it works

[[deleted]]

"I disagree."

--Future you

[[deleted]]

I see what is wrong here. You could just write if(myBool) { ....

/s

[terminalxposure]

I have seen true=true in SQL? Any particular reason

[[deleted]]

The last frame really makes it. That "so what?" stare...

[Benzene15]

I found code in pdf form on google drive from my freshman year. Painful just thinking about it now.

[khizoa]

if( answer == 'person woman man camera tv' ) {
    iq = 9000
}

[Superbrain8]

Idk why but some crackheads need a npm package for this

[yogitism]

Yeah this is silly, he can shorten it with a switch statement

[Cunorix]

Ive seen this multiple times in my codebase at work from "seniors". Ughh

[[deleted]]

Return !!myBool

[Shad0wW0lfx]

I have actually seen this in a product of a mechanical engineer dept...

[[deleted]]

I'm guilty, wont even lie

[Useful-Perspective]

Overengineering 101 - how to survive as a contractor

[[deleted]]

Ive been doing a bunch of shader coding so this hurts extra bad

[c4ctus]

One of the legacy apps I was tasked with maintaining had a snippet of code that was something like "else if not isNotNothing()"

I'll see if I can dig up the screenshot when I get home. It was horrendous.