Published by Addison-Wesley Professional (February 18, 2022) © 2022
Mark SeemannProduct Information
How to Reduce Code Complexity and Develop Software More Sustainably
Reflecting decades of experience helping software teams succeed, Mark Seemann guides you from zero (no code) to deployed features and shows how to maintain a good cruising speed as you add functionality, address cross-cutting concerns, troubleshoot, and optimize. You'll find valuable ideas, practices, and processes for key issues ranging from checklists to teamwork, encapsulation to decomposition, API design to unit testing.
Seemann illuminates his insights with code examples drawn from a complete sample project. Written in C#, they're designed to be clear and useful to anyone who uses any object-oriented language including Java , C++, and Python. To facilitate deeper exploration, all code and extensive commit messages are available for download.
Register your book for convenient access to downloads, updates, and/or corrections as they become available. See inside book for details.
"Mark Seemann is well known for explaining complex concepts clearly and thoroughly. In this book he condenses his wide-ranging software development experience into a set of practical, pragmatic techniques for writing sustainable and human-friendly code. This book will be a must-read for every programmer."Code That Fits in Your Head offers indispensable, practical advice for writing code at a sustainable pace and controlling the complexity that causes projects to spin out of control.
--Scott Wlaschin, author of Domain Modeling Made Functional
Reflecting decades of experience helping software teams succeed, Mark Seemann guides you from zero (no code) to deployed features and shows how to maintain a good cruising speed as you add functionality, address cross-cutting concerns, troubleshoot, and optimize. You'll find valuable ideas, practices, and processes for key issues ranging from checklists to teamwork, encapsulation to decomposition, API design to unit testing.
Seemann illuminates his insights with code examples drawn from a complete sample project. Written in C#, they're designed to be clear and useful to anyone who uses any object-oriented language including Java , C++, and Python. To facilitate deeper exploration, all code and extensive commit messages are available for download.
- Choose mindsets and processes that work, and escape bad metaphors that don't
- Use checklists to liberate yourself, improving outcomes with the skills you already have
- Get past “analysis paralysis” by creating and deploying a vertical slice of your application
- Counteract forces that lead to code rot and unnecessary complexity
- Master better techniques for changing code behavior
- Discover ways to solve code problems more quickly and effectively
- Think more productively about performance and security
Register your book for convenient access to downloads, updates, and/or corrections as they become available. See inside book for details.
Series Editor Foreword xix
Preface xxiii
About the Author xxix
Part I: Acceleration 1
Chapter 1: Art or Science? 3
1.1 Building a House 4
1.2 Growing a Garden 7
1.3 Towards Engineering 8
1.4 Conclusion 14
Chapter 2: Checklists 15
2.1 An Aid to Memory 15
2.2 Checklist for a New Code Base 17
2.3 Adding Checks to Existing Code Bases 29
2.4 Conclusion 32
Chapter 3: Tackling Complexity 33
3.1 Purpose 34
3.2 Why Programming Is Difficult 38
3.3 Towards Software Engineering 44
3.4 Conclusion 46
Chapter 4: Vertical Slice 49
4.1 Start with Working Software 50
4.2 Walking Skeleton 53
4.3 Outside-in 60
4.4 Complete the Slice 77
4.5 Conclusion 85
Chapter 5: Encapsulation 87
5.1 Save the Data 87
5.2 Validation 92
5.3 Protection of Invariants 105
5.4 Conclusion 108
Chapter 6: Triangulation 111
6.1 Short-Term versus Long-Term Memory 111
6.2 Capacity 114
6.3 Conclusion 127
Chapter 7: Decomposition 129
7.1 Code Rot 129
7.2 Code That Fits in Your Brain 136
7.3 Conclusion 153
Chapter 8: API Design 155
8.1 Principles of API Design 156
8.2 API Design Example 168
8.3 Conclusion 176
Chapter 9: Teamwork 177
9.1 Git 178
9.2 Collective Code Ownership 187
9.3 Conclusion 199
Part II: Sustainability 201
Chapter 10: Augmenting Code 203
10.1 Feature Flags 204
10.2 The Strangler Pattern 209
10.3 Versioning 218
10.4 Conclusion 220
Chapter 11: Editing Unit Tests 223
11.1 Refactoring Unit Tests 223
11.2 See Tests Fail 233
11.3 Conclusion 234
Chapter 12: Troubleshooting 235
12.1 Understanding 235
12.2 Defects 240
12.3 Bisection 250
12.4 Conclusion 255
Chapter 13: Separation of Concerns 257
13.1 Composition 258
13.2 Cross-Cutting Concerns 267
13.3 Conclusion 274
Chapter 14: Rhythm 275
14.1 Personal Rhythm 276
14.2 Team Rhythm 282
14.3 Conclusion 285
Chapter 15: The Usual Suspects 287
15.1 Performance 288
15.2 Security 292
15.3 Other Techniques 300
15.4 Conclusion 308
Chapter 16: Tour 309
16.1 Navigation 309
16.2 Architecture 318
16.3 Usage 323
16.4 Conclusion 326
Appendix A: List of Practices 329
A.1 The 50/72 Rule 329
A.2 The 80/24 Rule 330
A.3 Arrange Act Assert 330
A.4 Bisection 330
A.5 Checklist for A New Code Base 331
A.6 Command Query Separation 331
A.7 Count the Variables 331
A.8 Cyclomatic Complexity 331
A.9 Decorators for Cross-Cutting Concerns 332
A.10 Devil's Advocate 332
A.11 Feature Flag 332
A.12 Functional Core, Imperative Shell 333
A.13 Hierarchy of Communication 333
A.14 Justify Exceptions from the Rule 333
A.15 Parse, Don't Validate 334
A.16 Postel's Law 334
A.17 Red Green Refactor 334
A.18 Regularly Update Dependencies 335
A.19 Reproduce Defects as Tests 335
A.20 Review Code 335
A.21 Semantic Versioning 335
A.22 Separate Refactoring of Test and Production Code 335
A.23 Slice 336
A.24 Strangler 336
A.25 Threat-Model 337
A.26 Transformation Priority Premise 337
A.27 X-driven Development 337
A.28 X Out Names 338
Bibliography 339
Index 349
Preface xxiii
About the Author xxix
Part I: Acceleration 1
Chapter 1: Art or Science? 3
1.1 Building a House 4
1.2 Growing a Garden 7
1.3 Towards Engineering 8
1.4 Conclusion 14
Chapter 2: Checklists 15
2.1 An Aid to Memory 15
2.2 Checklist for a New Code Base 17
2.3 Adding Checks to Existing Code Bases 29
2.4 Conclusion 32
Chapter 3: Tackling Complexity 33
3.1 Purpose 34
3.2 Why Programming Is Difficult 38
3.3 Towards Software Engineering 44
3.4 Conclusion 46
Chapter 4: Vertical Slice 49
4.1 Start with Working Software 50
4.2 Walking Skeleton 53
4.3 Outside-in 60
4.4 Complete the Slice 77
4.5 Conclusion 85
Chapter 5: Encapsulation 87
5.1 Save the Data 87
5.2 Validation 92
5.3 Protection of Invariants 105
5.4 Conclusion 108
Chapter 6: Triangulation 111
6.1 Short-Term versus Long-Term Memory 111
6.2 Capacity 114
6.3 Conclusion 127
Chapter 7: Decomposition 129
7.1 Code Rot 129
7.2 Code That Fits in Your Brain 136
7.3 Conclusion 153
Chapter 8: API Design 155
8.1 Principles of API Design 156
8.2 API Design Example 168
8.3 Conclusion 176
Chapter 9: Teamwork 177
9.1 Git 178
9.2 Collective Code Ownership 187
9.3 Conclusion 199
Part II: Sustainability 201
Chapter 10: Augmenting Code 203
10.1 Feature Flags 204
10.2 The Strangler Pattern 209
10.3 Versioning 218
10.4 Conclusion 220
Chapter 11: Editing Unit Tests 223
11.1 Refactoring Unit Tests 223
11.2 See Tests Fail 233
11.3 Conclusion 234
Chapter 12: Troubleshooting 235
12.1 Understanding 235
12.2 Defects 240
12.3 Bisection 250
12.4 Conclusion 255
Chapter 13: Separation of Concerns 257
13.1 Composition 258
13.2 Cross-Cutting Concerns 267
13.3 Conclusion 274
Chapter 14: Rhythm 275
14.1 Personal Rhythm 276
14.2 Team Rhythm 282
14.3 Conclusion 285
Chapter 15: The Usual Suspects 287
15.1 Performance 288
15.2 Security 292
15.3 Other Techniques 300
15.4 Conclusion 308
Chapter 16: Tour 309
16.1 Navigation 309
16.2 Architecture 318
16.3 Usage 323
16.4 Conclusion 326
Appendix A: List of Practices 329
A.1 The 50/72 Rule 329
A.2 The 80/24 Rule 330
A.3 Arrange Act Assert 330
A.4 Bisection 330
A.5 Checklist for A New Code Base 331
A.6 Command Query Separation 331
A.7 Count the Variables 331
A.8 Cyclomatic Complexity 331
A.9 Decorators for Cross-Cutting Concerns 332
A.10 Devil's Advocate 332
A.11 Feature Flag 332
A.12 Functional Core, Imperative Shell 333
A.13 Hierarchy of Communication 333
A.14 Justify Exceptions from the Rule 333
A.15 Parse, Don't Validate 334
A.16 Postel's Law 334
A.17 Red Green Refactor 334
A.18 Regularly Update Dependencies 335
A.19 Reproduce Defects as Tests 335
A.20 Review Code 335
A.21 Semantic Versioning 335
A.22 Separate Refactoring of Test and Production Code 335
A.23 Slice 336
A.24 Strangler 336
A.25 Threat-Model 337
A.26 Transformation Priority Premise 337
A.27 X-driven Development 337
A.28 X Out Names 338
Bibliography 339
Index 349