Code should always by itself document the "how" of the code, otherwise the code most likely isn't good enough. Something the code can never do is explain the "why" of the code, something that a lot of programmers skip. If you ever find yourself explaining the "how" in the comments, maybe run through the code once more and see if something can be simplified or variables can get more descriptive names.

For me, that's what was originally meant with self-documenting code. A shame lazy programmers hijacked the term in order to avoid writing any documentation.

[–] ChickenLadyLovesLife@lemmy.world 0 points 2 years ago

lazy programmers

I don't think they're lazy, I think they're not good writers. Not being able to write well is very common among programmers (not having to communicate with written language is one reason a lot of people go into coding) and in my experience the Venn diagrams for "not a good writer" and "thinks comments are unnecessary" overlap perfectly.

[–] Vigge93@lemmy.world 0 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

Comment should describe "why?", not "how?", or "what?", and only when the "why?" is not intuitive.

The problem with comments arise when you update the code but not the comments. This leads to incorrect comments, which might do more harm than no comments at all.

E.g. Good comment: "This workaround is due to a bug in xyz"

Bad comment: "Set variable x to value y"

Note: this only concerns code comments, docstrings are still a good idea, as long as they are maintained