Fixing Bugs
Brent Simmons discusses NetNewsWire 2.0 and mentions that he prefers fixing bugs:
This, luckily for me, is my favorite part of software development. I enjoy fixing bugs much more than I enjoy adding big new features, probably because I can fix a bunch of bugs in a few hours. It’s like eating chocolates throughout the day instead of eating one big steak once a week.
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Yeah, solving mysteries is fun, and it's certainly more scientific than writing new code. I think the dislike most programmers have for fixing bugs is not with the work itself, but that it seems like it shouldn't be necessary. If I had written it properly the first time, I wouldn't have to waste this time fixing it. If the OS/framework didn't have this bug, I could add a new feature instead of writing a workaround.
Does that make me weird?
Maybe it's because every bug is a different mystery to solve, and new features aren't mysteries at all -- they're architecture and code, which is fun in its own way, but ultimately not as much fun as solving the weird little mysteries that bugs are.
It's like playing Sherlock Holmes.