Ask HN: Which tools have made you a much better programmer? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Which tools have made you a much better programmer?

#201

Post by jmchuster » Tue, Jun 09, 2020, 8:50 PM UTC

louib wrote: post #136

The vi mode for Bash. Blew my mind when I discovered it and it probably saved me hundreds of hours already. I used to have multiple copies of this cheatsheet [0] at my desk for every new developer I would see editing a terminal command with the left and right arrows. [0] https://catonmat.net/ftp/bash-vi-editing-mode-cheat-sheet.pd...

I dunno, I don't think it really gets you more than just adding some basic mappings

    # mappings for Ctrl-left-arrow and Ctrl-right-arrow for word moving
    "\e[1;5C": forward-word
    "\e[1;5D": backward-word
    "\e[5C": forward-word
    "\e[5D": backward-word
    "\e\e[C": forward-word
    "\e\e[D": backward-word

    ## arrow up
    "\e[A":history-search-backward
    ## arrow down
    "\e[B":history-search-forward

Re: Ask HN: Which tools have made you a much better programmer?

#202

Post by andreygrehov » Tue, Jun 09, 2020, 8:51 PM UTC

antirez wrote: post #74

Writing the overall design in plain English before writing the implementation. Not super detailed, but the main data structures and invariants and mechanisms that will make the implementation working. Then start the implementation refining such document as I discover new things.

I'm trying to be better at this. Any examples/recommendations you could share?

Re: Ask HN: Which tools have made you a much better programmer?

#203

Post by jschulenklopper » Tue, Jun 09, 2020, 8:51 PM UTC

Touch typing - learning it during this WFH phase, as much more communication is done typing.

Re: Ask HN: Which tools have made you a much better programmer?

#204

Post by dcchambers » Tue, Jun 09, 2020, 8:55 PM UTC

- git. Not just commit/push/pull on a single branch - but getting really good at using git is a game-changer.

- vim. I started off in linux sysadmin land before pivoting into more regular software engineering work, so I was very good as basic vi(m) stuff because it's ubiquitous in linux/unix servers. However I've learned its just as valuable as a full-blown IDE/dev environment if you're willing to invest in learning and configuring it. I think newer editors like Atom/VSCode/IntelliJ are still very valuable and great tools, but Vim really is incredible.

- An understanding of unix history. Maybe it's just the type of work I do, but knowing why things are the way they are is incredidbly valuable.

Re: Ask HN: Which tools have made you a much better programmer?

#205

Post by bconnorwhite » Tue, Jun 09, 2020, 8:58 PM UTC

Extra RAM for your brain - whiteboard film surface on your desk + 4 monitors.

Re: Ask HN: Which tools have made you a much better programmer?

#206

Post by rco8786 » Tue, Jun 09, 2020, 8:58 PM UTC

Read the docs!! Even the bad ones are better than none.

I can't count the amount of times I've been working with a more junior engineer and I'm just rattling off answers to their questions..then at the end I realize that I have 5-6+ tabs worth of documentation open that I've simply been referencing throughout our conversation but they think I'm some walking encyclopedia of knowledge.

Re: Ask HN: Which tools have made you a much better programmer?

#207

Post by sushshshsh » Tue, Jun 09, 2020, 9:01 PM UTC

Understanding that this whole industry is a giant house of cards, bs stacked on top of bs. Don't take anything personally, memorize the language needed to succeed

Re: Ask HN: Which tools have made you a much better programmer?

#208

Post by heleninboodler » Tue, Jun 09, 2020, 9:02 PM UTC

nh2 wrote: post #197

strace. Even after having learned many programming languages and contributed to various projects, it was only when I started using strace that I felt like truly, efficiently understand what any program does, and can reliably write programs that do things fast. I believe that "syscall oriented programming" (making your program emit exactly and only the right syscalls) results in clean, understandable software. Now I u…

strace is the first thing I skimmed down the thread for. You can learn a lot about how things work (or aren't working) by getting really familiar with an strace. Some of my coworkers give me grief for how easily I jump to "let me see an strace" but it works.

Re: Ask HN: Which tools have made you a much better programmer?

#209

Post by haidrali » Tue, Jun 09, 2020, 9:03 PM UTC

Rubocop made me a better programmer in terms of writing clean, readable, and consistent code.

Also at the organization level no it keeps codebase consistent no matter how many programmers work on the same codebase.

Re: Ask HN: Which tools have made you a much better programmer?

#210

Post by Agentlien » Tue, Jun 09, 2020, 9:05 PM UTC

Vim. I felt like I was slowly going crazy due to the friction between my thoughts and the commands needed to navigate through the code. I was just looking for a tool to solve that and happened upon an article about Vim. A teacher had tried to show me Vim in high school, but I slowly backed away from his crazed stare. But now, I came to it of my own volition. It's great. It feels like the one tool which allows me to freely express what I want without getting in the way. Add to this a suite of simple yet powerful tools, such as recursive macros, which mean I can usually automate tedious and repetitive tasks.