I almost named this post "I haven't written a line of code in years!" but that would not literally be true.<br /><br />Actually I've written a lot of code, but probably as much (or more) has come to me through cut and paste from a Google search.<br /><br />It struck me that what started as a helpful but infrequent technique to augment my work, has become the work itself. &nbsp;At first it was a line of code, then entire methods. &nbsp;But now GitHub (and SourceForge) have made the cloning of entire applications not only easy but allowable (and fun).<br /><br />Not that there's anything wrong with that. &nbsp;Or is there?<br /><br />I could spend the time to derive from first principals everything that I need to code, but why?<br />There is nothing new under the sun. &nbsp;All code has already been written.<br /><br />And the code wants to be used. &nbsp;Coders themselves want their code to be used and re-used. &nbsp;It's why they post it. &nbsp;So there is no sin or crime&nbsp;committed.<br /><br />But a new set of skills must be developed. &nbsp;Searching in the right way. &nbsp;Recognizing the good sources like StackOverflow and also recognizing the bad sources, like BigResource that just seem to aggregate StackOverflow posts but without the valuable rating system. &nbsp;Maybe we should be training developers in search and not in programming.<br /><br />And where is the role of knowledge and memory? &nbsp;If we don't need to remember how to do anything - because we can look it up - then soon, we may be unable to remember, even when we wish to.<br /><br />But it is just too useful to avoid. &nbsp;And so the term "Coding By Google" seems appropriate and even though I thought that I coined the term, turns out that this too is not new. &nbsp;Here's the earliest reference I could find.<br /><br />&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;<a href="http://blog.glys.com/index.cgi?e=2006-26-02-coding-by-google">bert's blog - from 2006</a><br /><br />So go forth, code by Google, and be proud!<br /><br /><br /><br />