Signs of an Inexperienced Programmer

Experience in software engineering comes with the number of years you are in the profession. The statement is true to a certain extent. However, the number of years in a job does not make you gain the right experience by default.

I have seen people be…

Experience in software engineering comes with the number of years you are in the profession. The statement is true to a certain extent. However, the number of years in a job does not make you gain the right experience by default.

I have seen people behave amateur like, even after working in their job for a good number of years. They hardly learn the basics of software development. Their growth stagnates after an initial couple of years, but they do not understand what they are doing wrong.

At the same time, I have worked with developers with just a couple of years of experience who show an incredible amount of growth potential. They possess the right attitude and know-how to avoid incompetent behavior.

Based on certain traits developers exhibit, you can easily find out who is experienced and who is not. Let’s dive into seven signs of an inexperienced programmer that every software engineer should be aware of to avoid making similar mistakes that can hinder their career progression.



1. Creates large pull requests

Have you ever got a code review request with so many changes in it that you don’t feel like reviewing it? Yes, that’s precisely what inexperienced developers do. They will bunch together a lot of changes in one single pull request. On top of that, they will expect you to prioritize their code review.

I have seen this habit of creating big pull requests with many senior developers too. They will code for days without feedback. When you finally review their code, they would have already built the whole functionality around it. Thus any review comment you give necessitates significant changes.

When I get such pull requests, my first reaction is to return it to the developer to break it down into smaller, logically divided PRs. I often just put comments in the first issue I find and send it back to the developer. If I feel incredibly generous, I will ask them to set up a call and review the code live.
What you can do:
Create smaller pull requests. As a good practice, never leave a day’s work without checking it in.
Never check-in code that does not compile or breaks the build.



2. Writes spaghetti code

Inexperienced developers write the exact opposite of beautiful code. Their code will be all tangled and scattered across all over the place in the codebase.

If you ever try to read the spaghetti code, you will constantly get lost in it. You will forget where you started, what you are looking for, and what exactly the code is trying to do.

With experience, the developer should know how to plan their coding. Unless it is a straightforward functionality, put your understanding and the flow on a paper first. Do a dry run to visualize it end to end. Once you are crystal clear about the changes, then start on the implementation part.

If you do not follow the above process, you will have pain reading your own code. It will be hard for yourself and the whole team to troubleshoot or enhance the piece of the puzzle you wrote as code.
What you can do:
Have a clear understanding of the feature before you start to implement it. You can ask as many questions as you want to have a clear idea of the requirement.
Keep your code simple and well structured. Your teammates should be able to read the code and understand the intended use of it.

Read More :: https://cmsinstallation.blogspot.com/2021/04/top-7-signs-of-inexperienced-programmer.html


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