This has also been my experience but I can understand that not all lone developers follow similar conventions.
It can take a while to get used to someone else's conventions, but once you do, the one advantage of a lone developer is that the conventions can be generally consistent. I say "can be" because that has been my experience in many cases, but not all – especially for long lived projects where the conventions evolved as the developer either gained experience or was influenced by other conventions. But, even then, their evolution still has personality to it, that is easy to perceive.
pd: Thinking about it, larger teams with conventions (when they're followed) sometimes achieve a similar consistency to lone developers. So: thank you to all those lone developers that have left their code in a state that has helped me thrive, not fail, :-)
It can take a while to get used to someone else's conventions, but once you do, the one advantage of a lone developer is that the conventions can be generally consistent. I say "can be" because that has been my experience in many cases, but not all – especially for long lived projects where the conventions evolved as the developer either gained experience or was influenced by other conventions. But, even then, their evolution still has personality to it, that is easy to perceive.
pd: Thinking about it, larger teams with conventions (when they're followed) sometimes achieve a similar consistency to lone developers. So: thank you to all those lone developers that have left their code in a state that has helped me thrive, not fail, :-)