Dustin Boswell

This is an excellent book that focuses on one thing and describes it well. This book is not about grand methods of software engineering or code architecture. It is, as the title indicates, about writing readable code. Boswell and Foucher cover the small things that can be done to make code easier to read, and they discuss why their suggestions generally make code more readable.

The content here is not unique. Much of it can be found in [b:Code Complete|4845|Code Complete|Steve McConnell|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1328830405s/4845.jpg|8419] or [b:Clean Code|3735293|Clean Code A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship|Robert C. Martin|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1347436688s/3735293.jpg|3779106]. Rather, it is the narrow focus that makes this book valuable. It joins my short list of technical books that all programmers should read, even those who don't read technical books just for fun.… (lisätietoja)

I took this book to help me establish important habits of writing code. I would recommend this to anyone whose daily work involves programming or software development.

Let me try to summarize in few paragraphs:

The fundamental theorem of code is that it is code written must be easier to understand.

To make surface level improvements in our code, we want to define variables, functions with precise words, information packed comments and formatting in such a way that readability is easy.

We want to make sure to pack enough information to be clear, precise in naming variables i.e. Kill(), Pause() instead of Stop(). At times, other programmers might misconstrue names from our programs, we want to make sure we think of other programmers and how they would interpret our code.

Comments are invaluable and should be used only when it helps in understanding the code better. We follow standard left to right value variable while using control flow and minimize as much as possible for using deep nested loops. In case of complex expressions or giant expressions, as much as we can minimize mental stack for other programmers, it is easier to maintain, code is less likely to create bugs.

As much as possible, the essential functions can be implemented from pertinent programming library so that we write less code. Each function needs to contain one task at a time and organize as much modules, functions as possible.

I have a summary of entire book, if you do want it, PM me.

Deus Vult,
Gottfried… (lisätietoja)