Re^2: code-sharing at work.

[geekgrrl]

I totally agree that it is sometimes best to leave code alone. I've become much more "if it ain't broke" the longer I've been coding. I hate the idea of "starting from scratch." I know it is prone to failure and you have to refix all the bugs you spent hours fixing in the old version.

Of course, sometimes the code is just so clunky and horrendous, it needs refactoring NOW. I guess this would be the argument for maintainability.

But your method sounds pretty interesting - to add the new stuff, but leave the old alone. The dangerous thing is if someone else needs to update the code they have to update it in two different places or risk having different behaviors depending on which code they use. That of course depends a lot on communication, documentation and so forth. I guess I still am enough of a change-happy person to argue that the new code should replace the old as well.

rachel