CSC/ECE 517 Fall 2009/wiki1a 8 rr

Categorization of code refactoring

What is Code Refactoring?

Code Refactoring is a technique of reorganization code to change its structure but at the same time preserving the basic functionality of the code. There are many kinds of code refactoring. This wiki tries to categorize these types of refactoring so that it's easy for people to learn these patterns and remember them.

Categories of Code refactoring

1. Improve readability and code reuse

| "Any fool can write code that a computer can understand. Good programmers write code that humans can understand." - Fowler

One of the major motivation for code refactoring is readability.

Improve names

• Renaming methods/variables etc to more meaningful names is a good practice. The method name should tell the reader what exactly the method does. Or a variable name should give a clear picture of what the variable stores.

 display()  => displayStudentNames()

• Extract a sub package depending on their gross dependencies or usages. This is to make the code more flexible. For example

interface org.davison.data.DataProvider
class org.davison.data.DataFactory
// Database classes
class org.davison.data.JDBCProvider
class org.davison.data.JDBCHelper 

Could be modified to

interface org.davison.data.DataProvider
class org.davison.data.DataFactory
// Database classes
class org.davison.data.jdbc.JDBCProvider
class org.davison.data.jdbc.JDBCHelper

This holds good for method/class/interface also

Change location of code

• Always try to keep the class in relevant package. If it does not fit into any existing package then create a new package. This starts to make sense when this part of the code gets re-used in other parts of the project. This applies to class/method/field

class org.davison.ui.TextThing
class org.davison.ui.TextProcessor
class org.davison.log.Logger
//depends on
class org.davison.ui.StringUtil

Could be modified to

class org.davison.ui.TextThing
class org.davison.ui.TextProcessor
class org.davison.log.Logger
//depends on
class org.davison.util.StringUtil

• Pull up or Push down (method/fields)

Pull the method/fields up to the superclass as shown in this example or push the method/fields to the subclass when needed as shown in this example.

• Some other methods include
  • Add parameter - The main motivation here is when the method needs more information by the caller. Also Remove parameter can be used to remove parameters which the function no longer wants.
  • Introduce explaining variable - This can be explained with the below example

if ((platform.toUpperCase().indexOf("MAC") > -1) && (browser.toUpperCase().indexOf("IE") > -1) && wasInitialized() && resize > 0 )
{
  // do something
}

Can be modified to

final boolean isMacOs     = platform.toUpperCase().indexOf("MAC") > -1;
final boolean isIEBrowser = browser.toUpperCase().indexOf("IE")  > -1;
final boolean wasResized  = resize > 0;
if (isMacOs && isIEBrowser && wasInitialized() && wasResized)
{
  // do something
}

2. Code management and restructuring

Consolidate Conditional Expressions

When there are a series of conditional statements to check and all these checks will finally boil down to the same action then all the conditional statements need to be combined into a single method. This action will replace the what you are doing with why you are doing. For Example

double disabilityAmount() {
   if (_seniority < 2) return 0;
   if (_monthsDisabled > 12) return 0;
   if (_isPartTime) return 0;
   // compute the disability amount

Can be modified to

double disabilityAmount() {
   if (isNotEligableForDisability()) return 0;
// compute the disability amount

References

1. Martin Fowler's homepage about refactoring
2. Smells to Refactorings Quick Reference Guide
3. Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code by Martin Fowler available at Google Books
4. Refactoring with Martin Fowler