Code Refactoring

Maintaining clean, efficient, and effective code is a crucial requirement for the long-term success of software development. As projects become larger, code can become messy and difficult to manage, increasing error vulnerability. This leads to an increase in technical debt and slower project development.

Therefore, to address these challenges, code refactoring has become an essential practice of software development.

What is Code Refactoring?

Code refactoring involves restructuring or redesigning the internal structure of the code without changing its external behavior. This improves the overall status of your code base in many ways, such as improving code quality, developer efficiency, code readability, and maintainability, as well as reducing technical debt.

Why is code refactoring necessary?

There can be several reasons for refactoring the code in a project, and some may be unique based on the software product. Here are some common reasons for code refactoring.

• Improve code quality: Properly structured or designed code is easier to read, and necessary changes can be made without wasting time and effort to understand.
• Preparing for future improvements: Refactoring prepares the codebase for the introduction of new features or bug fixes. Developers can more easily implement future changes without causing disruptions or introducing new issues.
• Reduce technical debt: Refactoring helps to reduce the cost of maintaining and modifying code, which accumulates over time when changes are made to it.
• Optimize performance: Refactoring the code with simpler and more effective methods, functions, and algorithms can lead to faster execution time.
• Improve collaboration: Following better code refactoring practices allows team members to make code changes more effectively and with better understanding.

How is Code Refactoring done?

The steps of code refactoring are based on the particular software product. Here are the common steps of code refactoring that can be followed.

1. Analyze the existing code base to discover areas that need to be refactored.
2. After identifying an area, define a clear objective of the refactoring process for that area of the code, such as enhancing readability or reducing complexity.
3. Then, select and apply the appropriate technique/method to refactor the code. It is better to make small changes while testing to ensure that the changes do not create new bugs in the system.

When should you do code refactoring?

As software developers, it is essential to know when to refactor the code. Here are some common scenarios for source code refactoring for any kind of software system.

1. Before implementing new functionalities: Refactoring helps to make the code more adaptable to the new functionalities.
2. When migrating to new technologies: Refactoring can help increase integration’s compatibility and smoothness.
3. When code smells: Refactoring can mitigate poor coding practices, such as larger classes, long methods, code duplication, or complex dependencies.

Refactoring Techniques/Methods

Several code refactoring techniques are used in software development. Here are some popular methods:

1. The Red-Green-Refactor

The red-green refactor approach is commonly used in test-driven development. It is a simple cycle that helps to enhance code quality. This method has three main stages.

• RED: In this stage, the developer needs to write a test case for the bug that needs to be fixed or a feature that needs to be added to the system. This test case will fail since the relevant code that makes it pass has not been implemented yet.
• GREEN: Here, the aim is to write relevant code that passes the above test case. There is no need to consider the code quality or clean process.
• REFACTOR: In this stage, while the code still passes the test case, the developer can improve the code quality to make it more readable.

This cycle can be repeated when a new feature is introduced, or a bug is fixed. Therefore, with this method, the code is continuously tested and refactored.

2. Refactoring by Abstraction

This method will help developers reduce code duplication by separating common code used in different parts into a separate class or interface. For example, when the same logic is implemented in two different parts of the code, the developer can create a separate class or interface for that logic and use it in the necessary parts without creating the logic again and again.

3. Composing Methods

This method aims to break the larger and more complex methods or classes into small, focused pieces that do one task. This makes the code easier to understand and maintain and facilitates adding new features to the system.

4. Simplifying Methods

This method focuses on reducing the complexity of the code by using various approaches, such as breaking down long methods, simplifying complex conditional logic, and reducing the input parameters of the methods.

Code Refactoring Tools

Code refactoring is easy with specialized tools and automation. Here are some tools for simplifying code refactoring.

1. Visual Studio: VS Code has built-in refactoring features, such as renaming variables and classes, splitting larger code segments into smaller ones, and auto-generating common functions.
2. Eclipse IDE: enables you to securely remove unneeded code and combine small methods into larger ones without breaking the code. It also offers automated refactoring methods such as extract, inline, and rename.
3. SonarQube: regularly checks for errors such as duplicated code, lengthy methods, and unnecessary variables and gives suggestions on how to improve code quality.

Best Practices of Code Refactoring

Following best practices is essential for performing better and more effective code refactoring. Here are some common practices.

1. Automate the process: Automating the code refactoring process reduces the risk of introducing new errors and speeds up the process.
2. Refactor in small steps: Focusing on one change at a time also helps reduce the introduction of new bugs or errors into the system, making it easier to identify and fix issues.
3. Keep functionality unchanged: Always ensure to check and test that the external behavior of functionality is not changed with the code rectification process.
4. Communicate with the team: Ensure team members are followed and aligned with the code refactoring changes to avoid conflicts.

Conclusion

Code refactoring is necessary for maintaining code cleanliness, efficiency, and manageability. Following best practices will reduce technical debt and thereby improve performance. Also, using the right tools to automate this process ensures smoother development in the future with fewer bugs and, therefore, improved collaboration on projects in the long term.