Reading Code is an Essential Skill | by Jeff Barr | Mar, 2025

I am not sure that our education system works a lot to teach this skill. Most of the time we are taught to start and build with an empty file. Imagine that if the ordinary CS 101 was just done in studying “classic” in the first weeks of the curriculum, students asked to detect the original organization, basic data structure and algorithm of the project. They should be instructed to pay attention to aesthetics – variable names, independent, commenting and so on.

The curriculum should also consider the date of the project over time, in some cases, once again the purpose of creating understanding, should also look at the committee by -commit.

Instead of studying the Idealized Sedo Code, there should be a production program worn in the classic war that the developers have developed over time, maintained, which is familiar with different levels of skills and code.

All this reading will give students a better feeling that after spending some time in the jungle, stains and all, it looks like a real world production code!

Only after reading many students will be allowed to write their code. With the help of great teachers and with carefully selected examples, they will be better equipped with highly capable developers.