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Most of the time ROI is not there just like with unit tests.

You don’t need 98% of commit messages ever again.

Yes when you need those 2% most likely it is for important reasons but usually not so important to make all the other mulled over.



I don't find commit messages useful for historical reasons (git log), I squash them anyway when merging PR. Commit messages are very helpful to a reviewer to get a necessary context and intent behind the change. Without it, I need to figure out it my self when reviewing. It is very easy to get a habit of committing often and in AI era i don't write commits anymore. So there is no excuse.


The 2% of cases when you need the commit log (or more importantly: someone else who inherits your code...) justifies writing good messages imho.

If you make a change to your codebase, normally you know what you want to achieve and why (otherwise... what are you even doing?). A commit message is just putting that in writing... that only takes a few seconds, often less than it takes to write the code.

So it's just a good habit to have. It forces you to think more about the changes you do & why, so it makes you a better software developer. Creating any new habit always takes some energy initially, but it's worth it.


You know prisoners dilemma - if we even never meet at all it makes even more sense for me to cut the corners.

If we work together for years it makes sense to cooperate.

Unfortunately most IT projects are set up in a way where you do it for 2 years and then you will never ever work on it again.




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