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Comment by quelsolaar | Hacker News Reader

I actively try to avoid to do anything the easy way, because I know ill get bored if do. Motivation is the most valuable resource in programming. I rather do something over engineered that I find interesting, then something simple and boring. Even if it takes 3 times the effort, I know ill put more than 3 times the effort in if I'm motivated, and ill end up learning something and ill end up with something I'm proud of, something worth talking about.

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Sounds like you’ll end up with something 3x as hard for future engineers to maintain also.

(Or yourself to maintain in a year's time)

Beats not doing it at all.

... but also 3x the job security, perhaps?

Why? You were given no suggestion in which dimenension the complexity was introduced in. Frequently, the better design requires the additional effort.

Its the quick hacks and shortcuts that accumulate debt fastest.

I can't tell if this is sarcasm or not. If serious ...

This seems like a reckless way of regulating your motivation at work IMO. I don't mean to be snarky. But it really does put a lot of risk and cost on your colleagues, doubly so if you're leading a team, /and/ puts a lot of risk on your own career and reputation.

If you need to over-engineer everything to stay motivated, you need a different job. A job where the _problems_ are hard and the challenge is to find simple solutions to them, instead of the other way around.

Who said i don't already have that job?

You said it.

"My job doesn't stretch me."

"Why don't you get a job which stretches you?"

"Who said I don't have a job which stretches me?"

Please don't do things like this, it makes it harder for your team. Find the challenge outside your work if you need it. Just do it the straightforward way.

Agreed. I often see this kind of work from some developers and I always have to send it back. People who think the best way to fix a minor bug is to rewrite the whole system or to stick on a second system that duplicates loads of logic.

Sure, if the task is to rip the system to shreds and improve it, go ahead. But often I look in to it and see the problem can be solved by fixing a single line that was wrong.

Sounds like you need to be more picky, to get the jobs that genuinely require that level of engineering. I’d find it hollow to add all that complexity when not needed.

> Motivation is the most valuable resource in programming

I've never seen it phrased like this before, but I like it and there's truth to it.

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