Development Principles

This is a collection of opinions I have about software development and design, written as more of a thought experiment than bible or manifesto. They are not in any particular order. Don't let dogma get in the way of getting things done, and there's no dogma like no dogma.

Don't lie:
Return correct HTTP error codes, throw exceptions when an operation isn't recoverable, etc.
Avoid unneeded verbosity:
Don't repeat yourself in comments, use language patterns where available to be concise.
Don't abstract prematurely:
This is a premature optimization. You will end up being tightly coupled to something at some point. Bad abstractions are worse than coupling.
Test coverage lies:
Don't blindly seek coverage. Evaluate what to cover and how to cover it. You will miss failure cases, but try and eliminate the dangerous ones.
Re-evaluate often:
If something is taking months to accomplish you might be using the wrong tool, or trying to solve the wrong problem.
Get to the root of requirements:
Acceptance criteria shouldn't tell you to use a database. You are paid to find solutions, not to blindly implement someone's requirements.
Convention over personal preference:
Follow shared conventions as much as possible. Challenge conventions when you have a disagreement, but accept the team's decision or move on.
Caching is dangerous:
Perfer fixing the upstream, over adding an external caching service, over adding caching to the application.
Avoid clverness:
Cleverness should be reserved for hard or difficult problems. The simplest solution is usually the best solution.
Don't write DSLs:
YAML + a templating engine should be all you need. Subset of avoiding cleverness.
Don't commit commented out code:
You have a VCS. Use it.
Avoid TODOs:
Use a ticketing system if you have one.
Make the code readable:
Avoid nested branching, long functionso, large classes. Follow style conventions and use good naming. See Robert Martin's Clean Code for a starting point. It's tightly coupled to Java conventions, but still helpful.

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