--- title: The best code is the one you shift+delete | daily.dev description: A developer shares how AI coding models change the economics of writing throwaway scaffolding code. Rather than focusing on code generation speed, the real... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/the-best-code-is-the-one-you-shift-delete-l1afkrk4h twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: The best code is the one you shift+delete | daily.dev og:description: A developer shares how AI coding models change the economics of writing throwaway scaffolding code. Rather than focusing on code generation speed, the real... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/the-best-code-is-the-one-you-shift-delete-l1afkrk4h og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/l1AfKrK4h.png og:image:alt: The best code is the one you shift+delete 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. # The best code is the one you shift+delete **[Ayende @ Rahien](https://daily.dev/sources/ayende)** · 8 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary A developer shares how AI coding models change the economics of writing throwaway scaffolding code. Rather than focusing on code generation speed, the real value is in enabling disposable scripts and harnesses that would previously be too expensive to bother writing. Three real examples are covered: an AI-assisted log analyzer for a production incident, a comparison harness for a major query engine refactor in RavenDB's Corax, and introspection hooks for query plan visualization. The key insight is that cheap scaffolding lowers the cost of understanding complex systems, while production code still demands full author ownership and discipline — including tests and line-by-line review. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [Simon Willison’s Weblog](https://daily.dev/posts/simon-willison-s-weblog-ypcurxob3) · Hacker News · 1 upvotes · 1 comments --- Tags: [#ai-coding](https://daily.dev/tags/ai-coding), [#ravendb](https://daily.dev/tags/ravendb) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/the-best-code-is-the-one-you-shift-delete-l1afkrk4h) ```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":"The best code is the one you shift+delete","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/the-best-code-is-the-one-you-shift-delete-l1afkrk4h","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/the-best-code-is-the-one-you-shift-delete-l1afkrk4h"},"datePublished":"2026-07-03T12:42:54.919Z","dateModified":"2026-07-03T15:19:26.351Z","description":"A developer shares how AI coding models change the economics of writing throwaway scaffolding code. 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