I at least:

Use CI results to control quality, no nitpicking style means easier review

Review tests one by one, to make sure I understand what the submitter is trying to test and if they actually did so

Check files off one-by-one, compartmentalizing understanding as I go

Complain loudly when PRs try to change too many subsystems or different functionality, especially if less related changes are not separated into standalone commits

I often have Claude make code walks specifically to present walls of code more sanely, add diagrams, bring in code context outside the diff, etc. This is one manifestation I made but I think there are many ways people are solving this (or roll your own tool!) https://github.com/jeffbaumes/code-walk

I mean if it's a code review, you gotta review the code.

I'm fully with you on this philosophy.

But the "make review easy" part is one where I'm failing (a bit) to keep up, I feel.

Also, what does "a final pass" look like to you? E.g. if a PR is 3000 lines... I'd guess one approach is enforce smaller PRs. I've opened a few, looked at the line count, and closed them, to be redone/broken into stacked PRs.

If I'm reviewing a PR that I'm familiar with the plan/work on, my "a final pass" is often just "read and suggest touch-ups of the docs". But that's really just the first step of a "full review" too, so it skips other stuff, and I know that isn't a proper review in the back of my head, but on to the next thing! :|

(Because of several factors including joining a much less mature org git-wise this year, I'm full of internal questions/dilemmas around PRs that I'm working on feasible solves for)

Code review complexity is always proportional to the associated work unit's complexity, not to some imaginary "keep PRs nice and small and nifty" complexity. I agree that consequences of bad SDLC ofter float up during code review, all the way up to formulating requirements and managing human resources.

There are only a handful of things you need and they’re all just CRUD

Idk why everyone says this. Yeah crud is tedious and common. No it is not the majority of my time spent, implementing, fixing, or reviewing.

I’m waiting to see someone who has any sort of reasonable way, but I have yet to see one. Code review was always a difficult part of the job. However, it was self regulating because the people who would do very large code dumps frequently were very very few high throughput individuals and they were either legitimately good and knew what they were doing, so you trusted them, or were quickly told to not do that. The process had natural breaks on it, and particularly large PR would be expected to take few days or week(s) to review.

This all has changed. I’ve only seen gaslighting (in the form of “of course we expect you to read the code LLMs is generating”), lying along the same lines, or the realistic people who acknowledge they don’t read any of it. The former camp is mostly traditional engineers, and the later is mostly new or traditional non-engineering roles like recent product management coding converts. I think it would help everyone if we just normalize the fact that no one if reading code much anymore. It’s just not feasible. Write a bunch of creative reviewing bots or SKILLs and just leave it at that. It’s not a great answer, but like I said I haven’t seen any alternatives.

> if you trust your CI to do its job and the developer to actually QA their own work.

I trust the CI, but the CI is doing what the CI is written to do. I don’t know how you can achieve the second part in a large team/corporate setting or an open source setting.

Wow