So, I spent some time recently messing around with this thing called ‘m.w. lee’. Heard about it from an old forum post, sounded kinda intriguing in its, well, simplicity. Like, ridiculously simple. Figured I’d take it for a spin on a little utility I was hacking together.
Getting Started with It
First thing, I tried finding some solid docs. Good luck with that. Found basically a text file someone wrote. Seemed like the core idea was just a super minimal structure. I looked at my project folder, which was, admittedly, a bit of a jumble. Decided this was the perfect victim.
I started dragging folders and files around based on the ‘m.w. lee’ way. It boiled down to something like this:
- src: Where the main code lived. Flat structure inside, apparently.
- docs: For documentation, obviously.
- tests: Test files.
- etc: This was the weird one. Configs? Random bits? Who knows.
Spent a good few hours just reorganizing. Honestly felt like I was just shuffling deck chairs. Moved my Python scripts into src, the markdown notes into docs, and the few pytest files into tests. That etc folder? I threw a requirements file in there, felt kinda random.
The Rough Parts
Right away, ran into problems. Where do static assets go? Images, templates for this web thingy? The ‘m.w. lee’ notes were silent. I ended up just shoving them into a subfolder under src, which felt completely wrong. Like putting shoes in the fridge.
Build scripts? Helper tools? Again, total mystery. I just left them cluttering up the main project root directory. Hated doing that, looks messy as hell.
And the flatness inside src… man, that was tough. I like my neat little submodules, grouping related stuff. This ‘m.w. lee’ style seemed to push for one big pile of files. For this tiny project, it was manageable, barely. But I kept losing track of where I’d put specific functions.
So, What’s the Verdict?
After using it for about a week, I gotta say… it’s not for me. Not for anything serious, anyway. For this specific tiny utility? Okay, maybe it forced some discipline. Less clicking around, I guess?
But scaling this? Forget it. It would become an unmanageable mess on a real project with multiple features or components. It’s just too basic, leaves too many questions unanswered. Where does tooling config go? What about different types of source files? What if you have frontend and backend code?
It feels like one of those ultra-minimalist things that sounds cool in theory but falls apart in practice. Like those designers who make chairs that look amazing but are impossible to actually sit on.
So, yeah. Tried the ‘m.w. lee’ approach. Gave it a fair shot. It’s a thing that exists. But I’m switching back. My slightly chaotic, nested folders might not be perfectly ‘pure’, but they actually work for getting stuff done without making me scratch my head every five minutes wondering where things are supposed to live. It was an experiment, now it’s over. Back to reality.
