Comments on: It’s not about code reuse, it’s about maintenance http://www.losingfight.com/blog/2006/09/03/its-not-about-code-reuse-its-about-maintenance/ smarter than your average squirrel, on most non-acorn related topics Fri, 21 Nov 2008 07:15:59 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.5 By: John http://www.losingfight.com/blog/2006/09/03/its-not-about-code-reuse-its-about-maintenance/#comment-3598 John Fri, 26 Jan 2007 03:23:21 +0000 http://www.losingfight.com/blog/2006/09/03/its-not-about-code-reuse-its-about-maintenance/#comment-3598 "High cohesion means you don’t have to go searching everywhere in the codebase to find everything about, say, vectors. Its all in one place." I don't think that's quite right. Low coupling means the relevant code is located in the minimum number of different classes/modules, so one doesn't have to go searching all over the codebase to find it. What high cohesion means is that there's nothing in those classes/modules except what's relevant to the task at hand. “High cohesion means you don’t have to go searching everywhere in the codebase to find everything about, say, vectors. Its all in one place.”

I don’t think that’s quite right.

Low coupling means the relevant code is located in the minimum number of different classes/modules, so one doesn’t have to go searching all over the codebase to find it. What high cohesion means is that there’s nothing in those classes/modules except what’s relevant to the task at hand.

]]> By: Uli Kusterer http://www.losingfight.com/blog/2006/09/03/its-not-about-code-reuse-its-about-maintenance/#comment-375 Uli Kusterer Sat, 30 Sep 2006 15:12:20 +0000 http://www.losingfight.com/blog/2006/09/03/its-not-about-code-reuse-its-about-maintenance/#comment-375 Andy, I've revised my article a little. I agree that the actual goal is maintainability, not just reuse. Reuse is simply one of the main tools for making code maintainable. That said, I don't really have "sample code". Most of this code is actual code I developed for this or that project, and I think that it's suitable as sample code proves that with proper encapsulation, you can make code easy to understand while it's still useful. I usually don't upload code I haven't used in at least two projects (well, except for those actually labelled as "samples" or "studies"). Hence, I don't agree with your thesis that one shouldn't reuse the code in the SVG viewer and editor. Yes, you have to take care that you don't design for a hypothetical reuse case, because then you'll over-engineer, which used to be the main criticism against C++ applications. But that's due to not identifying the requirements, not due to reuse itself being bad. But we agree that reuse shouldn't be done to save time typing, but rather to save time debugging. Less code is often better because there's less opportunity for bugs. Andy, I’ve revised my article a little. I agree that the actual goal is maintainability, not just reuse. Reuse is simply one of the main tools for making code maintainable.

That said, I don’t really have “sample code”. Most of this code is actual code I developed for this or that project, and I think that it’s suitable as sample code proves that with proper encapsulation, you can make code easy to understand while it’s still useful. I usually don’t upload code I haven’t used in at least two projects (well, except for those actually labelled as “samples” or “studies”).

Hence, I don’t agree with your thesis that one shouldn’t reuse the code in the SVG viewer and editor. Yes, you have to take care that you don’t design for a hypothetical reuse case, because then you’ll over-engineer, which used to be the main criticism against C++ applications. But that’s due to not identifying the requirements, not due to reuse itself being bad.

But we agree that reuse shouldn’t be done to save time typing, but rather to save time debugging. Less code is often better because there’s less opportunity for bugs.

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