The best code I’ve written is the code I deleted.
There’s something deeply satisfying about removing complexity — watching a tangled mess of abstractions collapse into something clear and obvious. A 200-line module becomes 40 lines. A clever solution becomes a boring one. And boring, in software, is often a compliment.
We tend to add before we subtract. It feels productive. A new utility function, another layer of abstraction, one more configuration option. Each addition makes sense in isolation. But complexity compounds. Every line of code is a liability. Every abstraction is a promise you’ll have to keep.
I’ve been thinking about this while working on trading systems. When milliseconds matter, you can’t afford accidental complexity. Every unnecessary layer is latency. Every clever trick is a debugging session waiting to happen.
The skill isn’t in writing code. It’s in knowing when less is the answer.
function simplify(code: string): string {
// Remove accidental complexity
return code.trim();
}