Things You Should Never Do by Joel Spolsky
Hacker ApprovedShares rank 8 of 60 articles by recommenders
Widely recommended essay arguing against rewriting software from scratch, with its advice still cited as relevant. Critics say parts of it are dated.
Widely recommended essay arguing against rewriting software from scratch, with its advice still cited as relevant. Critics say parts of it are dated.
12 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 10
- criticize it
- 2
- approval share
- 83%
Recommended in 7 of 13 months
- November 2025: recommended
- December 2025: not recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: not recommended
- April 2026: not recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: recommended
- July 2026: recommended
- August 2026: not recommended
- September 2026: recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it carries the badge
- 10 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 5 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 7 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Classic advice against rewriting software
“the single worst strategic mistake that any software company can make”
Comment from 7 Jan 2026 in “Opus 4.5 is going to change everything” “the perhaps canonical article on "don't rewrite" from 2000”
Comment from 3 Nov 2025 in “Why engineers can't be rational about programming languages” “I changed my thoughts on rewriting after reading this”
Comment from 21 Nov 2025 in “Android and iPhone users can now share files, starting with the Pixel 10” Advice still holds up
“All in all Joel's article held up pretty well”
Comment from 13 Jul 2026 in “Zig Creator Calls Spade a Spade, Anthropic Blows Smoke” “I think Joel is still correct up to today”
Comment from 14 Sep 2026 in “How to write an effective software design document” Influential, often-cited favorite post
“This Joel Sposky article is always my northstar”
Comment from 13 Jul 2026 in “Zig Creator Calls Spade a Spade, Anthropic Blows Smoke” “one of my all time favorite blog posts”
Comment from 25 Jan 2026 in “Scaling long-running autonomous coding” “Somebody's not reading enough Spolsky.”
Comment from 24 Feb 2026 in “Anthropic: AI helps break the cost barrier to COBOL modernization” Go-to reference cited in discussions
“This is addressed by the classic article by Joel on Software (which is apt, as it's a classic mistake)”
Comment from 17 Jun 2026 in “From Chesterton's fence to Chesterton's gap” “Jarred must not have been aware about the Things You Should Never Do.”
Comment from 16 Jul 2026 in “What can we learn from Bun's rapid Rust rewrite with AI?”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Advice seen as outdated
“its apparent wisdom should have been reevaluated for at least the past two decades”
Comment from 13 Jul 2026 in “Zig Creator Calls Spade a Spade, Anthropic Blows Smoke” “I think the article is showing it's age. It's no longer true.”
Comment from 13 Jul 2026 in “Zig Creator Calls Spade a Spade, Anthropic Blows Smoke”
Other articles people recommend
The four most recommended other articles, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Programming as Theory Buildingby Peter Naur | 32 | 0 | 100% | 7 | — | Approved |
| Ur-Fascismby Umberto Eco | 18 | 2 | 90% | 8 | — | Approved |
| Politics and the English Languageby George Orwell | 14 | 0 | 100% | 5 | — | Approved |
| The Grug Brained Developer by Carson Gross | 13 | 1 | 93% | 9 | — | Approved |
| Things You Should Never Do by Joel SpolskyThis page | 10 | 2 | 83% | 7 | — | Approved |
What people said
12 of the 13 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“I think Joel is still correct up to today”
“Jarred must not have been aware about the Things You Should Never Do.”
“All in all Joel's article held up pretty well”
“its apparent wisdom should have been reevaluated for at least the past two decades”
“This Joel Sposky article is always my northstar”
“I think the article is showing it's age. It's no longer true.”
“This is addressed by the classic article by Joel on Software (which is apt, as it's a classic mistake)”
“Somebody's not reading enough Spolsky.”
“one of my all time favorite blog posts”
“the single worst strategic mistake that any software company can make”
“I changed my thoughts on rewriting after reading this”
“the perhaps canonical article on "don't rewrite" from 2000”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.