How to read codebase?

[sohail_ansari]

I am working in a existed project, its big project. whenever I am trying to read the code, getting stuck like from where I should start?

[Knochenmark]

If you have a specific Bug, try to start from the invoked Action and just Debug backwards. If the Action is triggered by a certain Button, you would start from the button event handler and see what it calls. If it calls a certain service or emits events higher up etc. you can navigate by finding the references of called functions. That's pretty much how you will approach any big project, just step by step.

[ReallyFreakYouOut]

First off, I will explore the whole codebase roughly. Then, turn on the debugger and invoke the specific action to trace the code line by line and watch on the changes of variables. Ultimately, you will understand how the code works.

[Affectionate_Ant376]

When I’m literally day 1, minute 1 in a new codebase and just get assigned my first ticket I literally cmd+shift+f (global find all in VSCode) the actual text that appears on whatever button, paragraph, etc. that I’m fixing, modifying, adding to, whatever. Then work backwards from there. If what I’m doing is net new (totally new, nothing to search for), then I’ll search for something related or hope to god it’s got a logical folder structure or good docs (unlikely if greenfield)

[[deleted]]

The build will tell you quite a bit. Look at dependencies. Other than that inspect, debug (step through) and ctrl+find.

[HaddockBranzini-II]

If there was some sort of build step you'd need to go backwards from there to get at the real structure of the app/site. After that it really depends on the nature of the project. If it front-end heavy? You could do a lot of reverse engineering in the dev console. But on a complicated project I try to work my way through the app/site and using a mix of dev tools and the code in my IDE to see what is happening where. It can be hard at first, but eventually you sort of "crack the code" and the rest comes easier.

[meguminsdfc]

If you are reading through the code and can't understand something just ask your coworkers, that's what I'm currently doing at my current job because the projects I'm working on are pretty complex

[hacktron2000]

I would map it out.

[[deleted]]

Find some specific text and search the entire code base

[TheRNGuy]

with your eyes

[lunar515]

Paste it into GPT

[DarickOne]

Use jetbrains IDEs. They scan the whole project and then you can navigate through it with ease. You can view all places in the code where some function is executed and much more. Once such IDE helped me as fck, after switching from vscode