🧠10 engineering terms that will make you think like a senior
Bridge the gap between junior & senior engineers. Learn 10 key terms for anti-patterns and pitfalls to avoid costly project and code mistakes
What separates a senior engineer from a junior one?
It isn’t just knowing more frameworks or algorithms. It’s having a mental library of mistakes to avoid. They've seen many ways projects fail, and they know what causes them to fail.
They’ve given names to those scenarios, but most engineers still don’t know this unique vocabulary. Those who learn these terms can describe common pitfalls and anti-patterns to avoid them.
Instead of learning these lessons the hard way, you can learn to recognize them by name. Let’s explore 10 more concepts that will help you think, communicate, and build like a seasoned developer.
🪤 #1 Footgun
A footgun is a feature that makes it too easy for users or developers to shoot themselves in the foot.
Why it matters: Dangerous defaults or overly flexible tools can cause big mistakes fast.
Practical explanation: A CLI deletes production data by default unless you pass a --safe flag.
Strong defaults and guardrails are needed to protect teams from themselves.