Simple Code is the Best Code
🎁 Special edition: Insights from the LinkedIn Engineering community!
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Let’s get back to this week’s thought.
Intro
One of the best things I like to see as an engineering leader is: A simple solution to a complex problem. Anytime I see that, it really makes my day.
But how do we actually know what is a simple solution? How can we define simple?
This is what I like to say:
It's hard to define what simple looks like, but you just know it when you see it!
And it’s very true because simplicity has many different ingredients and can be defined in so many different ways.
The more experience you have in a certain field, the easier you spot simplicity because you can match it to certain practices that you find to be great and have worked well in your case.
But let’s take a step back and define why exactly simple code and overall simplicity is the way to go in the engineering industry.
The more complex a solution is, the more 💰costly it is for the business
With every line of code we create, someone needs to maintain it and the more complex the code is, the harder is going to be for people to understand it.
Therefore it will cost more to the business to ensure that it works correctly or to add additional functionalities.
I have made many mistakes in my career thinking that complexity is a good thing.
I did it both as an engineer and a manager as well, but now simplifying is my personal philosophy. I strongly believe in it not only professionally, but also personally.
Anything I put my mind into, I ask myself:
What would be the simplest solution for this?
If you wish to read about my mistakes and why simplifying as much as possible is the way to go in detail, you can read this article: Simplifying as much as possible is the way to go in the engineering industry (paid article).
Let’s get into why simplicity is not as easy as it seems.
Simplicity is hard
If you can make it simple, you truly understand it.
When we look at some of the most used products in the world → they are very simple to use. The companies behind them didn’t just make them simple on the first try.
It’s been years of continuous adjustments and making things better, so they came to the result that we know today.
The same is true with simple code. You need to really know what you are doing to make it as simple as possible. Plus your empathy needs to be on a very high level.
Empathy is what helps you write code in a way that others with zero context can easily understand it.
You can read more about why empathy is such a superpower here: Empathy is a superpower in the engineering industry (paid article).
So, how do we define simple code?
I have asked the LinkedIn Engineering community for their definition of simple code
There has been a LOT of really great answers and I am sharing some of them with you.
There are a lot of tips and insights here that I highly recommend you either note down somewhere or bookmark this article.