Another day, another piece of code to fix. Writing code is lots of fun -- maintaining it..bites. Why is that? Initially, I would guess that the challenge of writing/conjuring the code is what captures my attention as a programmer. I can't help but wonder, however, if the relative enjoyment of maintainence is directly correspondent to the tools which we have to work with. Personally, I would imagine that the overall experience would be significantly eased if a comprehensive & centralized set of tools were available that provided a structured environment for tracking bugs, revisions, design specs, etc.

It seems a large part of the problem with maintaining source code is the lack of structured, relational information about the code, modules, architecture, etc. Not only does the information need to be structured and interlinked, but it is also crucial that it be accessible. Of course, the Web provides a perfect medium for this representation.

Bah...rant must end.