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Discussion on: Why Should You Refactor Your Code?

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kwstannard profile image
Kelly Stannard

I have a few real-world refactoring stories. The gist of each one take the following rough outline:

  • Realize doing something takes too long or is generating a lot of bugs.
  • Determine the source of the pain. This is usually an anti-pattern or just bad practice.
  • Remember the correct way to fix the pain.
  • Rewrite the part causing the pain with the correct fix.

For a real world example, I had been using the ClassyHash gem fairly extensively as part of a project. I needed to start extending it for more specific test cases than were possible by default with classy hash. I tried for a day to make my own extension and it was like pulling teeth. Realizing I was pulling teeth was step one.

Next I had seen that there was a giant conditional statement at the heart of ClassyHash. I know big conditionals are bad practice. I had found the source of the pain.

Third, I know that polymorphism is the fix for conditionals.

Finally, I rewrote the whole gem in the course of 4 hours including tests.

So, what did this gain me? After the re-write I could write an extension with tests in 10-20 minutes, an order of magnitude development speed increase.

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jamesmh profile image
James Hickey

Nice! It's an awesome feeling when you come back to that task you were trying so hard to pull-off, and it takes a fraction of the time to do and is just really simple and straightforward now. 🥳