His observations represent an epiphany for me as to why there’s sometimes an attitude in the industry that “coding” doesn’t involve designing, but is a grunt, junior level activity. It also explains why some people don’t understand my passion for this occupation and my desire to stay in it verses “rising up through the ranks.” They don’t see that there is important, challenging design work involved. It also might explain why I’ve seen so much poor quality code in my career. Maybe it’s because the industry doesn’t really give it the focus it deserves.

Another epiphany is that refactoring is not an activity seperate from design, and not optional from design if you want a well behaved product. This is so obvious when you consider other engineer disciplines, and his point was great. I’ve always been an addicted re-factorer, even before refactoring was a buzz word. I think early on I thought this revealed a weakness in my own design abilities (and sometimes it probably did), but really it’s par for the course for anyone who is serious about producing a quality product.