Clean Code Principles

Essential principles for writing maintainable, readable code that your future self will thank you for.

Clean code is code that is easy to understand and easy to change. Here are the principles I follow.

Naming

Names should reveal intent:

# Bad
d = 86400

# Good
SECONDS_PER_DAY = 86400

Functions

Functions should do one thing and do it well:

# Bad: Does too many things
def process_user(user):
    validate(user)
    save_to_db(user)
    send_email(user)
    log_activity(user)

# Good: Single responsibility
def create_user(user_data):
    user = validate_user_data(user_data)
    return save_user(user)

Comments

Code should be self-documenting. Comments explain why, not what:

# Bad: Explains what (obvious from code)
# Increment counter by 1
counter += 1

# Good: Explains why
# Compensate for zero-indexing in legacy API
counter += 1

Error Handling

Don't ignore errors:

# Bad
try:
    do_something()
except:
    pass

# Good
try:
    do_something()
except SpecificError as e:
    logger.error(f"Failed to do something: {e}")
    raise

The Boy Scout Rule

Leave the code cleaner than you found it. Every commit should improve the codebase slightly.