For the umpteenth time I have been asked, do you like refactoring? The answer yes I like doing it.
when reading books like Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship, The Clean Coder: A Code of Conduct for Professional Programmers and The Art of Readable Code it becomes clear that refactoring is a something you need to learn.
It’s not about the language specifics, any body can learn the language. Just read the book “Java in 21 days” take a sample test from Oracle. Changes are that you will pass that exam. Are you a good programmer by then. Don think so! Even after reading the all the books that are there on code quality it’s still hard.
Currently I am coaching a team of intermediate developers. After 7 months we all are still learning. Although I am the most senior developer i learn from them.
No not from the strange/sloppy/weird things they write.
At times I see strange code. But There is no comment to make on it. It works confirms or passes the automates quality, test coverage is up to par and the test actually do test if the functional requirements are implemented. And still the code smells.
The good part is that by now all are seeing that. When asked the others come up with various ideas to change the code. And each of them makes t code less smelly. When pointed out they do it, and the results are good.
Only problem yet is that do not do it by them selves. When I see some code that can use some deodorant I just do it. I general the smell reduces (although some times I revert all of it) . When done I have a good feeling. The code just got a bit better. (Better is always subjective but some people agree with me).
The good feeling and to some extent proud that a I crafted just an other piece of code.
Refactoring is fun, definitely YES
