How I Learned to Smell Code

Renée De Voursney
July 14, 2011
ConferenciaRails
How I learned to smell code
Photo credit: http://www.vlib.us/medical/gaswar/Exp.%20Dog%20Mask,%20WWI.jpg

How many of you went to university for Computer Science?
How many have a background in business consulting or working in the Microsoft stack (C#)?
I will assume we all currently work with Rails.
How many have a main app that is Rails <= 2.0.5?
Rails 2.3.x?
Rails >= 3.0.x?
Who is out there?
Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/drachmann/327122302/sizes/l/in/photostream/

Who am I?
From the New York City Area
Lives in Seattle, Washington
A mountain and rock climber
Loves Building Systems for People
Loves Working in a Programming Language made for People
Likes Useful Frameworks and Gems
Strives to live up to the principles learned on
Renee’s Road to Scentless Code

A hound surrounded by wonderful smelling flowers, is to a developer working with:
Well documented code
A working application
Well designed and maintainable code
What I want
Photo credit: http://timesnow.info/Download/images/pet_animals/cute_puppies/spring_scents_basset_hound.jpg

Writing and then Maintaining Lots and Lots of stinky code!
How did I get there?
Renee’s Road to
Scentless Code
Photo credit: http://static.howstuffworks.com/gif/pug.jpg

Photo credit: http://www.vlib.us/medical/gaswar/Exp.%20Dog%20Mask,%20WWI.jpg

Basic Computer Science and Fun Algorithms/Data Structures I will never write again
Teaching someone else is the best way to learn and re-enforce your understanding of a concept
Objects, javadoc, and the JVM are really cool!
What Did I learn
Photo credit: http://www.mentalfloss.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/10/tongue_stuck_on_pole.jpg

Photo credit: http://i2.squidoocdn.com/resize/squidoo_images/250/draft_lens10490801module95270741photo_1271186415dog_sneeze.jpg

Consistent patterns help make code understandable and extensible for n00bs and all who follow behind
Single Responsibility
Abstractions
Positive Conditions, Always have an else….
What Did I learn
Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/sephiroty/320928712/sizes/z/in/photostream/

Photo credit: http://i1.squidoocdn.com/resize/squidoo_images/250/draft_lens10490801module95270731photo_1271186165dog_covering_eyes.jpg

What Did I learn
Think about the people who come behind you.
Add 80% of your estimated time for all new features estimates if you have to touch legacy code.
Delete and re-write code you can not understand in 5 minutes
Always leave things greener than you found them.
Photo credit: http://ihasahotdog.files.wordpress.com/2008/09/funny-dog-pictures-dog-blames-a-bad-smell-on-the-baby.jpg

Where am I now
I’ve learned Ruby
I’ve learned Rails
I’ve worked with lots of legacy RoR code
I’ve written both really bad and really good RoR code

Renée’s Suggestions for learning and fostering learning about how to deal with smelly code

Participate in the awesome program!
Teach people Rails!
YOU will learn something!
New Programmers can learn good patterns and practices for scentless code by following Rails Patterns.
Rails has excellent patterns for Beginners to follow (RESTful).
Suggestion 1:

You have been doing the same thing too long.
You don’t practice enough.
Change your perspective, try it another way, NEVER STOP LEARNING TO CODE!
Suggestion 2:

Suggestion 3:

Suggestion 4:

Suggestion 5:

Let other’s make mistakes and learn
Never be afraid to try something, even if it might be smelly
Always be willing to change your code!
Replace comments with method calls
Renee’s Road to
Scentless Code
Photo credit: http://timesnow.info/Download/images/pet_animals/cute_puppies/spring_scents_basset_hound.jpg

Thank You
for listening!
All photos not referenced are owned by the author.
Clean Code – Robert C. Martin – 2009 Pearson Education Inc.
The Pragmatic Programmer – Andrew Hunt, Dave Thomas – 2000 Addison-Wesley
References
Renée De Voursney
Twitter: @gigglegirl4e
Email: renee.devoursney@gmail.com
Special Thanks to Wayne Seguin and Sandi Metz
for helping prepare and inspire this talk.

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How I Learned to Smell Code

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