How To Read Unfamiliar Code

Staring at a massive codebase can feel paralyzing — I’ve been there, and it’s no fun. Over the years, by mentoring younger members in my club, guiding interns at the startup, or simply by jumping into new projects, I’ve honed this simple approach to get unstuck.

Well, there’s Copilot and AI agents now, but don’t skip the fundamentals!

1. Start at the runtime: fire up the app and poke the area you care about.
2. Find the entry point: trace from route → handler → component → function.
3. Skim for intent: glance at high-level names and tests (if they exist) before diving line-by-line.
4. Trace one execution path with logging or a debugger.
5. Make a tiny change and run tests — seeing behavior shift teaches faster than staring at code.

Stuck? Jot a one-line summary of a file’s purpose in a note. If you can’t summarize it, you don’t get it yet.

Reading code gets easier with practice. Pairing for 30 minutes? That’s the fastest shortcut I’ve found.