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Ask HN: Interesting resources about exploring codebases?

by strontian on 8/14/23, 2:22 AM with 3 comments

I explored a few codebases recently of public projects(tree-sitter, serenade, typescript). Does anyone know whether there is any high quality content out there related to exploring and understanding codebases?

  • by frfl on 8/14/23, 2:28 AM

    What I have noted

    - Ask HN: How do you learn new libraries without much documentation? - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23800590

    - Also see this comment on the previous post - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23800729

    - On navigating a large codebase - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26129190

  • by debo_ on 8/14/23, 8:32 PM

    Two things that helped me early in my career:

    - Going to open-source libraries I was relatively familiar with, looking at commit #1, and then moving forward in time. (This works best when the project started on GitHub, rather than the first commit being a giant single-commit import of a released version.)

    - Strangely, "Working Effectively With Legacy Code" gave me some generally useful tips on actively probing large codebases (instead of just trying to learn them by reading.)