Mark Jordan recently posted about being careful when condemning how others go about coding something. I agree. I don't think I've ever finished a project without there being some piece of it that I would do differently if I had it to do over again.

Personally, if it wasn't that way, then there's something wrong. To me, that's becoming stagnant. If I don't learn something new, or a better way to do something, then I might as well retire. Plus, how many projects have you ever been on where every requirement is laid out ahead of time? Yeah, some may think they are, but once you dig in, something always comes up. If that doesn't happen to you, well, then I want to be on your projects and learn how you gather requirements! Those new requirements may lead you to want to do something another way, but the timeline may not allow it.

Yes, there are cases where certain types of code can be considered inexcusable, such as coding conventions - but even that relies on a team defining that ahead of time, and each developer being aware of it.

I do have one question for Mark though - does this mean you won't critique my code too harshly when you get into it?

For those who don't know - basically anyone other than Mark reading this, Mark is a coworker who was recently pulled onto my current project. So now he gets to get into the details of the monstrosity that I helped build. Let's just hope he doesn't register www.crappycode.net for the sole purpose of posting my code!