--- title: Stop Reading Your New Codebase. Start Exploring It description: A Wix engineer frames onboarding onto a new codebase as exploring an open world rather than reading it top to bottom. Shahar Mayzel suggests starting with... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/stop-reading-your-new-codebase-start-exploring-it-tchnc44eo twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: Stop Reading Your New Codebase. Start Exploring It | daily.dev og:description: A Wix engineer frames onboarding onto a new codebase as exploring an open world rather than reading it top to bottom. Shahar Mayzel suggests starting with... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/stop-reading-your-new-codebase-start-exploring-it-tchnc44eo og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/TchNC44eo.png og:image:alt: Stop Reading Your New Codebase. Start Exploring It og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Stop Reading Your New Codebase. Start Exploring It **[Wix Engineering](https://daily.dev/sources/wix_eng)** · 9 min read · 1 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary A Wix engineer frames onboarding onto a new codebase as exploring an open world rather than reading it top to bottom. Shahar Mayzel suggests starting with whatever is most relevant to your first ticket and letting a mental map build as you trace one end-to-end flow. He treats AI tools with MCP integrations as a 'sidekick' that can query PRs, Grafana dashboards, logs and Slack history in seconds to explain services, flag cross-repo risks, and surface past incidents. For high-stakes 'boss fight' changes like auth or payment code, he recommends gathering context, talking to owners, reviewing history, and testing safely before editing. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Questions this post answers ### How can I use AI and MCP tools to help onboard onto a new codebase faster? AI tools connected via MCP integrations can query GitHub PRs, Grafana dashboards, logs, Slack discussions and incident reports simultaneously, answering questions like what changed in a service when a metric spiked. Useful prompts include asking for a microservice's main responsibility and data flow, or whether cross-repo consumers would be affected by a data format change, giving a structural baseline in seconds instead of hours of manual tracing. _Engineers ramping up on unfamiliar systems follow practical AI-onboarding workflows like this on daily.dev._ ### What's a good approach for making risky changes to unfamiliar, high-stakes code like an authentication or payment flow? Prepare deliberately before touching the code: gather context by reading the PRs that introduced the feature, talk to the owners since five minutes of conversation can save hours of reading, review the system's history to see what broke before, and confirm you can test safely using feature flags, staging environments and rollback plans. _Developers preparing for high-stakes changes compare onboarding and safety practices like these on daily.dev._ ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [Reading code with AI, not generating it](https://daily.dev/posts/reading-code-with-ai-not-generating-it-7otemlaph) · FREEK.DEV · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [You're Not Paid to Write Code](https://daily.dev/posts/you-re-not-paid-to-write-code-v90betmzy) · Tech World With Milan · 289 upvotes · 26 comments - [Accelerating legacy systems onboarding with AI](https://daily.dev/posts/accelerating-legacy-systems-onboarding-with-ai-ljstds3pz) · RUBYLAND · 0 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#productivity](https://daily.dev/tags/productivity), [#ai-coding](https://daily.dev/tags/ai-coding), [#mcp](https://daily.dev/tags/mcp) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/stop-reading-your-new-codebase-start-exploring-it-tchnc44eo) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"Stop Reading Your New Codebase. Start Exploring It","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/stop-reading-your-new-codebase-start-exploring-it-tchnc44eo","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/stop-reading-your-new-codebase-start-exploring-it-tchnc44eo"},"datePublished":"2026-10-25T08:21:22.426Z","dateModified":"2026-10-25T08:23:37.764Z","description":"A Wix engineer frames onboarding onto a new codebase as exploring an open world rather than reading it top to bottom. Shahar Mayzel suggests starting with...","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/83870113de60c9de292516a82afb3178?_a=AQAEuop","thumbnailUrl":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/83870113de60c9de292516a82afb3178?_a=AQAEuop","isAccessibleForFree":true,"articleSection":"Wix Engineering","inLanguage":"en","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180}},"author":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Wix Engineering","logo":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/t_logo,f_auto/v1/logos/5a14a3f3d2a14128bcb9a084fb2ebadf","url":"https://daily.dev/sources/wix_eng"},"commentCount":0,"discussionUrl":"https://daily.dev/posts/stop-reading-your-new-codebase-start-exploring-it-tchnc44eo","interactionStatistic":[{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":1},{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"CommentAction"},"userInteractionCount":0}],"keywords":"productivity,ai-coding,mcp","timeRequired":"PT9M"} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https://daily.dev"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Wix Engineering","item":"https://daily.dev/sources/wix_eng"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"Stop Reading Your New Codebase. Start Exploring It"}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"FAQPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/stop-reading-your-new-codebase-start-exploring-it-tchnc44eo#faq","mainEntity":[{"@type":"Question","name":"How can I use AI and MCP tools to help onboard onto a new codebase faster?","acceptedAnswer":{"@type":"Answer","text":"AI tools connected via MCP integrations can query GitHub PRs, Grafana dashboards, logs, Slack discussions and incident reports simultaneously, answering questions like what changed in a service when a metric spiked. Useful prompts include asking for a microservice's main responsibility and data flow, or whether cross-repo consumers would be affected by a data format change, giving a structural baseline in seconds instead of hours of manual tracing. Engineers ramping up on unfamiliar systems follow practical AI-onboarding workflows like this on daily.dev."}},{"@type":"Question","name":"What's a good approach for making risky changes to unfamiliar, high-stakes code like an authentication or payment flow?","acceptedAnswer":{"@type":"Answer","text":"Prepare deliberately before touching the code: gather context by reading the PRs that introduced the feature, talk to the owners since five minutes of conversation can save hours of reading, review the system's history to see what broke before, and confirm you can test safely using feature flags, staging environments and rollback plans. Developers preparing for high-stakes changes compare onboarding and safety practices like these on daily.dev."}}]} ```