Your Code as a Crime Scene

Complexity by the Visual Shape of Programs

A few years ago, I used to commute to work by train. Since I went to the station at about the same time each day, I soon recognized my fellow commuters. One man used to code on his laptop during the ride. I don’t know whether he wrote Java, C++, or C#, but even with just a hurried glance, I knew his software was complex.

You’ve probably done the same. Isn’t it fascinating that we can form an impression of something as intricate as software by a quick look?

Humans are visual creatures. Our brain processes a tremendous amount of visual information in a single glance. As programmers, when we glimpse code, we automatically compare the code’s shape—how the code looks visually—against other code we’ve seen. ...