Whitespace ≤ Comments ＜＜ Code
summary
Claim: comments often do more harm than good when they duplicate or contradict code and they outlive fixes. Concrete rules: use assertions to record assumptions, rename identifiers instead of explaining names, split big functions into named helpers, and delete comments that add no new information. Rely on version control for authorship, reserve comments for unavoidable design rationale or kludges, and treat stale or apologetic comments as active bugs that mislead maintenance.
AI-written summary · about
chapters (8)
- 0:00Comment importance
- 1:50Comment value spectrum
- 3:14Bad comments harm
- 4:40Why bad comments persist
- 6:04Writing valuable comments
- 7:05Useless and harmful comments
- 9:03Absurd comment practices
- 10:06Cost of bad comments
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