(meaning crap coding in Swedish)
After a decade of industry experience, I tend to struggle with tinkering on my spare time without feeling the guilt of not writing clean code. Code that is not written in a TDD way, code that is not readable by everyone, code that is not tested by rigorous methodologies with unit, component, end to end, contract, property-based testing, fuzzers, insert fancy testing technique, code that would make Dijkstra turn in his grave, code that doesn't try to solve the MVP or to prove if a hypothesis is correct.
Code that is simply written to get that piece of hardware to blink or communicate with a system in the quickest way for me to observe how that thing works to figure out what to play with next.
Instead of treating the code as an artefact of engineering, treat it more as a rusty old broken Volvo that you're trying to get going again!
These rules are a reminder for me to not get stuck in the fringes and instead focus on what's important when tinkering to gain as much happy time as possible!
- Only write tests for what you think would make the tinkering easier
- You're the audience, not anyone else
- It only needs to work
- You don't need to document anything
And most importantly
- Does it make you smile?
If so, congratulations, you've achieved the task of SKITKODA.