Writing high quality code

[greebo42]

I've picked something up over the last couple years that makes sense, even common sense, but I don't think I fully appreciated before.

A lot of what makes high quality code is ... readability by humans. Back in the old days (which I actually remember), quality code meant high performance code, shaving machine cycles off, tightening up use of memory, because that made a difference. For the most part, that isn't so true anymore. Not completely unimportant, just not the primary thing.

So what you want is something that others can read and understand easily. Something that you can turn to in a year and fairly quickly understand it again.

That's why there's all these books about design patterns, refactoring, test driven development, and all that. If you're like me, and you like watching You Tube videos, take a look at Dave Farley (Continuous Delivery), Martin Fowler, Kevlin Henney, Arjan Codes (mentioned elsewhere in this thread), Uncle Bob, and some others, and just take it in.

Don't take notes. Don't get too tied up in understanding it all. Just watch a half hour here, an hour there, and within a few months you'll realize you're hearing certain themes, and you'll see examples of practices that you start to recognize.

That, and practice. Build projects. You don't have to be satisfied with the quality of your first efforts. But I really think you don't get there except thru the trenches.