Ask HN: How to be productive with big existing code base
My #1 rule for existing codebases: Just because you wouldn't have done it the way they did doesn't mean they did it wrong.I think it's developer nature to look at a huge pile of code that someone else wrote and immediately think: "This is a pile of crap.  I can do better, so the first thing to do is rewrite all of this, my way (which just so happens to be _The Right Way_)."Figure out what you're trying to do, and what is keeping you from doing it.  Take an iterative approach to get things done.  Realize that after 3 years, they have hopefully fixed a lot of bugs and got to a solution that is somewhat mature and better than you can do in a week.