Clean Code: A Good Habit

Bad Code: Just Laziness or a Curse?

Code, write it well that your application work smoothly writes it poorly, and be ready for bugs. Writing clean code is difficult that’s the reason everyone does not write it.

Writing clean code is not associated with just a single language, it is something which every developer should follow in order to make robust and easy to maintain code. Developers are authors, authors of their own code, and as we do not like to read a book which is complex for us to understand, the same happens with code.

“Any fool can write code that a computer can understand. Good programmers write code that humans understand.” – Martin Fowler. We know quality matters, not quantity.

What is the Clean Code?

Code which is not just lines of instructions but something which can be understood by the developer without asking for documentation or reading code multiple times. “Measuring programming progress by lines of code is like measuring aircraft building progress by weight”. ― Bill Gates

Writing the number of lines of commenting is not we can call it a clean code, your code should be self-explanatory. “A long descriptive name is better than a short enigmatic name. A long descriptive name is better than a long descriptive comment.” ― Robert C. Martin

Why developers do not write clean code?

Writing clean code is not simple but it is an expensive task. Developers take years to develop clean code habits. It takes time for developers at initial state to thinking the right name for the variable, righting cleaner code and best practices, and normally developers work on hard deadlines. So in one phrase, I can say Lack of time in the initial phase is a boundary, but long term return is great. Lack of motivation also plays a vital role in developing this habit. Developers work in a team and it may happen that only one person is writing clean code and others are not following that, which is frustrating. Writing clean code is not an individual’s job, it is teamwork.

Why Clean Code is important?

You cannot achieve your goal in one day, it takes time. Writing bad code is faster at the start but it may give issues later. Instead, clean code works as an investment, which is slow at the start, but the return is good. You may not have to work on documentation if your code is self-explanatory. If you do not want to explain to people what you have written, then in that case also writing clean code works as a boom. Many times I have seen people say that “Oh!! It’s his/her code. It will be complex” or “You are writing code like him/her”. Set examples but an incorrect way.

How to Write Clean Code?

There are no hard and fast rules for writing clean code, but we develop this habit by gulping a few practices.

DRY: Do not repeat yourself. For the same logic do not write code multiple times, reuse code. It will be useful for long term maintenance.

Keep It Simple: Writing simple code, will make it easy for others and even you to understand after few days to understand code. “It is not the language that makes programs appear simple. It is the programmer that make the language appear simple!” ― Robert C. Martin

Design Pattern: Follow the design pattern so that coding can be standardized. Design patterns already exist, you just have to find which will suit your application best. E.g. Singleton, MVC, Repository, or any other.

Coding Standard: Follow standard coding practices and naming conventions. Naming conventions are the key that will be useful for making other developers know why and what is written without documentation.

Remove Dead Code and add appropriate white spaces: Keeping dead and not reachable code only increased number of lines in code, so if those are not used then try to remove and make your code look cleaner. Writing the entire code in a single line is also not good, you are making your code with less line on the cost of creating a complex line for other developers to understand. Try to remove commented code, variables that are not being used, unnecessary comments.

SOLID: Design principles. Master it and it will help us in a tremendous way.

Use appropriate Tool: Sometimes we stick to a tool or a technology for implementation due to biased nature but identifying the right tool for development is key for any software. You can say that tool is a basic skeleton and if the skeleton is not right then how can your software provide a solution.

Reuse what is already present: Instead of developing different code for which libraries already exists, use libraries as those are tested by many. E.g. For responsive UI use bootstrap, that is already built and tested.

Summary

Clean code is an art and a habit, which cannot be developed in a night. It takes years of practice and improvements. A habit that will give long term output to your application, with fewer bugs and minimum documentation.

“Programming is the art of telling another human what one wants the computer to do.” – Donald Kunth. Writing clean code gives easy maintenance and bug-prone applications. With the help of clean code overhead of documentation and time invested on KT can be minimized. Clean gives reduces code reading time so that other developers can adapt code in lessor time and with minimum guidance.