Writing code that is easy to understand and maintain is essential for long-term project success. Here are the core principles of Clean Code.
Clean Code Principles
Code is Read More Than Written
We spend 80% of our time reading code and only 20% writing it. Therefore, optimizing for readability is not just a nice-to-have—it's an economic necessity for any software team.
Meaningful Names
Variables should reveal intent. let d; // elapsed time in days is bad. let daysSinceModification; is good.
Functions Should Do One Thing
The Single Responsibility Principle (SRP) applies to functions too. If your function is doing "User registration AND email notification", it's doing too much.
Comments are a Code Smell
Ideally, your code should be self-documenting. If you feel the need to write a comment to explain what the code is doing, try refactoring the code to be clearer instead.
"Any fool can write code that a computer can understand. Good programmers write code that humans can understand." - Martin Fowler
Adopting these habits takes discipline, but the payoff in maintainability is immense.
