Are Lazy Programmers The Best programmers?

“Lazy programmers are the best programmers!” You will often here this when someone automates a task that takes x time units spending y time units and obviously here x < y.

I personally find this a good joke if told once. However, this has been repeated so many times that I find it offensive. People who try automating their work/task are not lazy. They are trying to be efficient in a longer run.

If I have to repeatedly do the same work manually, I will probably never be able to do that. Instead, I will automate it. I can use the script over and over again without having to manually do that mundane task.

Similarly, I will spend time setting my IDE and spending time on fixing all issues before I first write a single line of code. Why? Because I need to use the IDE day-in and day-out to get things done. There is a reason why people are crazy about their dot files and Emacs configurations. The right settings makes your life easier.

Lazy programmers do nothing. Lazy programmers are not programmers!