As a software engineer, you want to create high-quality, maintainable, and reliable software that meets the needs of your clients and users. But how can you ensure that you’re following the best practices in your field and avoiding common pitfalls and mistakes? Here are some tips to help you improve your skills and processes as a software engineer.
A coding standard is a set of rules and guidelines for writing and formatting your code. It helps you maintain consistency, readability, and clarity in your code, as well as avoid errors and bugs. A coding standard can cover aspects such as naming conventions, indentation, comments, documentation, error handling, and testing. You can use an existing coding standard, such as PEP 8 for Python or Google Java Style Guide, or create your own based on your preferences and project requirements. The important thing is to follow it consistently and enforce it with tools such as code linters and formatters.
Bullet points: 1. Keep yourself updated with market and tech-stacks. 2. Follow guidelines that are already out there. Believe me, they are well thought through and then standardized. For example: SOLID design principles. 3. Be ready to take feed-backs and participate in healthy discussions. It's the two way communication that would take you to your next step. 4. You should be clear with what you want rather someone else deciding for you. Some may like DevOps, others may go with Management skills. 5. Never stop learning. Make sure you learn something new everyday. 6. Contribute. Examples are GitHub, Medium, Stackoverflow etc.
I'm constantly doing research about how to do the thing in the better way possible, following the best standards. The most common thing I do is reading post and watch videos, then I look for good GitHub repos with examples.
Version control is a system that tracks and manages the changes in your code over time. It allows you to save, restore, compare, and merge different versions of your code, as well as collaborate with other developers and share your work. Version control also helps you prevent data loss, resolve conflicts, and undo mistakes. Some of the most popular version control systems are Git, Subversion, and Mercurial. You can use a hosted service, such as GitHub or Bitbucket, or set up your own server to host your repositories.
Early on, I collaborated on a school project with a team of 4 people. We would share our code by sending zipped folders back and forth. This was inefficient because the code wouldn't always work for everyone, and it was difficult to merge changes made by multiple people. We also wasted time excluding large files to keep the folders small. Looking back, using a version control system like Git would have saved us a lot of trouble. Git allows for features like resolving conflicts, discussing changes through pull requests, and working on isolated branches without affecting the main code. Now, I can't imagine working on a project, even a solo project, without using version control. It's an essential tool for any programmer or development team.
Clean and modular code is code that is easy to understand, modify, and reuse. It follows the principles of simplicity, clarity, and cohesion. It avoids unnecessary complexity, duplication, and coupling. It is divided into small and independent units, such as functions, classes, and modules, that perform a single responsibility and communicate with each other through well-defined interfaces. To write clean and modular code, you should use descriptive and consistent names, follow the single responsibility principle, adhere to the DRY (Don't Repeat Yourself) principle, and apply the SOLID principles of object-oriented design.
Testing your code is essential to ensure that it works as expected, meets the specifications, and satisfies the quality standards. Testing your code can help you detect and fix errors, bugs, and vulnerabilities before they cause problems or damage. Testing your code can also help you improve your code design, performance, and maintainability. There are different types of testing, such as unit testing, integration testing, functional testing, and regression testing, that cover different aspects and levels of your code. You should use a testing framework, such as JUnit for Java or Pytest for Python, to automate and organize your tests.
As a Software Engineer, once the code is developed, the code must be tested to detect and fix errors, bugs and vulnerabilities before they cause problems or issues. Testing your code can also help you improve your code design, performance, and maintainability.
Documenting your code is the process of adding comments, annotations, and descriptions to your code that explain what it does, how it works, and why it is written in a certain way. Documenting your code can help you and other developers understand, maintain, and modify your code. It can also help you generate user manuals, API references, and other documentation for your software. Documenting your code can be done at different levels, such as inline comments, docstrings, and external documents. You should use a standard format, such as Javadoc for Java or Sphinx for Python, to write and generate your documentation.
Recently I have seen many arguments against adding documentation about what the code does. It resonates with me, since a well written, clean code is readable and self explanatory. That means, the what the code does part is covered by the code itself. The name of the namespace or library, the class, the functions and variables shall provide an insight on their purpose. To enhance this, further conventions can be adopted, like naming the functions in verb-noun phrases, as in the case of PowerShell scripts.
Learning from others is one of the best ways to improve your skills and knowledge as a software engineer. You can learn from others by reading books, blogs, articles, and tutorials on software engineering topics and best practices. You can also learn from others by watching videos, podcasts, webinars, and courses on software engineering. You can also learn from others by joining online or offline communities, forums, groups, and events where you can ask questions, share ideas, and get feedback from other software engineers. You can also learn from others by reviewing, contributing, and collaborating on open source projects and code repositories.
Eu come?ei vendo videos no youtube no canal da upinside, eu aprendi bastante, e foi com eles que eu aprendi a amar a área. E esse passo foi muito importante para ingressar na minha atual carreira.
What might be an often overlooked part of software development is the process documentation. Actually a good, maintainable software starts with a great process documentation. Clear processes make it easy to check the consistency, maintain the code readability and adhere to the chosen conventions. Process can cover everything above, and can provide checklists and gates in advancing the software lifecycle. It might also be worth using an issue tracking or ALM (application lifecycle management) tool to organize the tasks and keep the development driven towards the goal and well focused. Often times context switching (jumping from one task to another without finishing them) can be a productivity killer.