Question

Aside from language-specific constructs, for someone who is programming in PHP, javascript, java, and python, what are the top 10 clean coding must-do’s? I would like to keep my code as clean as possible and as readable as possible. For example, what’s the take on placing the function body opening bracket on the same line as the function declaration vs a new line? Also, what’s the take on spacing between things for example (x==10) vs ( x == 10 )?
Any helpful hints for clean coding will be appreciated!

Answer 1

Here’s a few that may help:

1. Give intuitive names to variables and methods
2. Use your specific language coding style (e.g. in Java vs C++ you
   use different style on brackets; choose according to specific
   language conventions)
3. Always put comment on what/why something is happening.
4. But don’t pollute code with comments.
5. Try to integrate design patterns if you can. It helps in reusability
   and maintainance
6. Don’t put everything in one method. Each method should do one thing
   and do it really well (this also makes the method easier to read/understand/test/debug)
7. Don’t put hard-coded strings in your code
8. Separate application data and application code. I.e. try to not hard
   code configuration of your code.
9. Don’t try to be more clever than the compiler. Write code that other
   people can understand it as well and let the compiler do any
   optimizations
10. Write code in a way that shows your intentions. Write code keeping
    in the back of your head that in 7 months you may need to debug it,
    or someone else might need to fix/enhance it. It is impossible to
    remember why you did something after 7 months (and comments are
    good but sometimes not good enough). Let alone the poor guy trying
    to fix your code

I am sure there are a lot more but I believe these can be useful in any language