Still can't get over how I used to code

Back in 2018 I'd write everything in Notepad and hope it compiled, now I have VS Code with like 20 extensions running and I still mess up simple stuff. Anyone else feel like the tools got way better but your skills stayed the same?

3 comments

3 Comments

wyatt1351mo agoTop Commenter

Man I feel this, used to pound out PHP in plain old Notepad back in 2014 and now I've got a full IDE setup and still forget how to close a bracket sometimes. It's weird how the tools got smarter but we stayed the same dumb coders at heart.

the_drew1mo agoMost Upvoted

Wait, does using a basic text editor really make you a better coder though? I think it just made me slower and more frustrated when I'd spend an hour chasing a missing semicolon. VS Code's autocomplete doesn't do the thinking for me, it just stops me from looking up the same stupid syntax on Google every five minutes. The real skill is figuring out what to build and how to structure it, not memorizing every function name. Tools let me focus on the hard parts instead of the busywork.

mark_ward1mo ago

Notepad at least forced you to be careful. Now auto-complete does half the work and you forget the basics.