Up to Standards

09 Feb 2023

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Great Ideas (That No One Can Read)

There are many ways to code. The way you see a problem may be different than how your friend does, and there is much to learn from different solutions of the same problem. Let’s say you’re working together with said friend to create a program together. Everything is going all well and good until you take a peek at what they’ve got so far – and you pause.

It’s like looking at an essay handwritten in the dark. You can’t make heads or tails of what’s going on in their code; the indentations are off, things are spaced strangely, you’re not sure if this chunk is supposed to be inside a loop or not. It’s a complete mess (yet runs just fine), and you have no idea what is going on.

Importance of ESLint

Perhaps an extreme example, sure, but that’s what I think ESLint is aimed at preventing. Having a common standard to which everyone formats their code makes it easier for everyone to be on the same page. And while it might be painful to do something as minor as delete a few spaces to fix the formatting, at the end of the day it’s for the greater good.

I think coding has a few similarities to essay-writing in this regard. You can have great individual points, but things like unreadable fonts or confusing order of your paragraphs can make it impossible for others to understand. This is why we’re taught the generic “Introduction -> Body -> Conclusion” sort of structuring, to make your essay cohesive and readable. However tedious it is to make your ideas conform to others’ standards, a few minutes of formatting can save hours of confusion down the road.