Just hit 1000 lines of code in my first project and it feels weird

I was cleaning up my project folder and decided to run a line counter on my main script. The number that popped up was 1003. I stared at it for a solid minute. Three months ago, I was struggling to write ten lines that actually worked. This is just a dumb little text-based game, but seeing that number made it feel real in a way finishing a tutorial never did. It's mostly messy, with a bunch of comments and probably a lot of bad habits, but it's mine. I built a thing that exists. Has anyone else had a moment where a simple number made all the grind feel worth it?

4 comments

4 Comments

ryan7932mo ago

Lines of code is a funny way to measure a project. A shorter, clean script can be way better than a long messy one. The real win is that you made something that works.

mila2782mo ago

Look at it from the manager's side though, @ryan793. They often don't know the code, they just see a number going up. The real work is invisible, like fixing a design or finding a better way. Explaining that is just another part of the job, sadly. You're right about clean code, but convincing people is the extra unpaid task.

grant3472mo ago

Tell that to my manager who keeps asking for "progress metrics." He saw my 50-line script and asked if I was slacking off all week. Had to explain that deleting 500 messy lines actually took three days of hard work.

keith27419d ago

Admit I used to think more lines meant more progress too, back when I was new to coding. But maintaining a bloated mess taught me the hard way that clean, short code is way harder to produce. Your manager probably won't get it until they see the next person who inherits that script breeze through changes without breaking anything.