Leave cowboys to Hollywood movies
TL;DR: Write code as a team programmer
Problems
Readability
Unreliable code
People Management Issues
Lack of coordination
Solutions
Write professional code
Use declarative non-cryptic names
Context
Cowboy coders don't follow best practices.
They don't follow team suggestions.
Cowboy coding is generally considered an unprofessional and risky approach to software development because it can lead to code that is hard to maintain and prone to errors.
Cowboy Programmers are good people; however, they cannot work in a group.
Sample Code
Wrong
# Very simple example
# Compute the sum of two numbers without any structure or best practices.
num1 = input("Enter the first number: ")
num2 = input("Enter the second number: ")
# WARNNING!!!! Don't remove the line below !!!!!
# (Unpleasant comment)
res = num1 + num2 # (No data type checking or error handling)
print("The sum is: " + result) # (No validation or formatting)
# (No good names, no functions, no error handling, no testing,
# no version control, and no structure.)
Right
def add_numbers():
try:
firstAddend = float(input("Enter the first number: "))
secondAddend = float(input("Enter the second number: "))
sum = firstAddend + secondAddend
return sum
except ValueError:
print("Invalid input. Please enter valid numbers.")
return None
def main():
sum = add_numbers()
if sum is not None:
print("The sum is: {:.2f}".format(sum))
if __name__ == "__main__":
main()
Detection
[X] Manual
You can set environmental rules to prevent these coding practices and enforce team building.
Exceptions
- Very small personal projects
Tags
- Declarative
Conclusion
Software development is teamwork.
Relations
More Info
Disclaimer
Code Smells are my opinion.
Credits
Photo by Taylor Brandon on Unsplash
The danger from computers is not that they will eventually get as smart as men, but that we will meanwhile agree to meet them halfway.
Bernard Avishai
This article is part of the CodeSmell Series.
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