Code Review: Why Is It Important?
To resolve potential quality issues, a simple review of a source code is done by programmers to determine any inconsistencies that can cause serious issues if left unattended. This process is called code review, and it helps developers learn the codebase. Additionally, it lets them learn new tech and techniques that expand their skill sets.
What Is Code Review?
Code review is a systematic review process wherein a senior or a peer examines a developer’s code. Code reviews can become great tools to discover bugs quickly when done carefully. This also helps reduce the effort needed to optimize the code in further stages.
Code review is a crucial part of the DevOps cycles in the IT infrastructure services companies. This makes the code as clean as possible from the very first stage of development. Code review is one of the many tests every developer should run before passing on their code to the head branch.
When reviewing a code, the following parameters are generally verified by the reviewer:
- Code Design: Is the code well designed?
- Naming Conventions: Has the developer used readable names for classes, variables, and methods for better understanding?
- Comments: Are the words clear and easy to understand?
- Complexity: Can the code be any simpler? Will it be simple for future developers to understand the code?
- Tests: Does the code include all necessary tests, and are those well-crafted?
What Are the Benefits of Code Review?
However, one might consider a code review to be just another scheduled check for identifying general bugs, which is not true. A code review has many more benefits than mere bug identification.
Following are some of the benefits achieved by the process of code review:
Ensure a Consistent Design And Implementation
In the case of more significant projects, there are a lot of developers involved. Every programmer has a unique coding style, and if they continue to go with it during the development phase, it will hamper collaboration and impede overall progress. The code review process ensures that developers follow specific coding trends throughout the development phase. This approach makes the source code standard and much more convenient for all developers, including newbies, to understand easily. Code review is a useful process in the long run as the team continues to change its composition.
Furthermore, maintaining this regular pattern can help new developers spend more time developing new features rather than wasting time analyzing the existing code.
Optimize the Code to Perform Better
Code review helps younger developers recognize the areas where they need improvement in code optimization. Since younger developers lack experience, they are unaware of specific coding optimization techniques that can help them write bug-free codes. When they get a code review from a senior, this may help them learn new strategies for developing code and hone their coding skills. Furthermore, it assists them in recognizing the critical mistakes or errors in their code, which may turn into serious bugs. Since programming tends to be monotonous, even the most experienced developers overlook mistakes at times.
Code reviews help reduce such mistakes before it becomes a bigger obstruction in the later phases. All errors can be eliminated from a code since a new person reviews it every time.
Sharing New Techniques Through Collaboration
Code reviews save time and money and give a human-based Return Of Interest. Programmers write most of their code individually. However, when practices like code reviews are put to use, it necessitates collaborations between developers and reviewers. Developers need to interact with each other about their programs and exchange their thoughts. Furthermore, it cultivates mutual trust amongst them and teaches them to work as a team. This helps members enhance their skills by gaining peer-to-peer knowledge and updates regarding the latest development in their field.
Keeping an Eye on Project Requirements And Quality
Each project has a well-defined scope and has specific requirements regarding the same. Additionally, each developer is assigned designated features to develop as per the requirements. However, there is a possibility that a developer may misinterpret a particular need and might end up developing a feature that is of no use.
The practice of code reviews helps handle such scenarios as it validates the feature developed against the expected framework. Thus, this process serves as a validation for the features under development. Hence, it ensures that teams do not miss out on essential parameters and eliminates misinterpretations.
Code reviews may sound simple and might feel like just another regular check. But, it helps teams achieve a lot more than merely identifying bugs. Therefore, one can infer the value that code reviews add to the development pathway for delivering quality end products.
The Bottom Line
Code reviews not only help remove bugs but also enhance collaboration, improve learning, timely verifications of the developed code, and streamline the development of code. It also helps younger program developers sharpen their skills to become IT infrastructure project management professionals. Code review as a process is simple and has a lot more advantages than it seems. Considering this upside and the minimal investment and resources they take, the method is worth adding to organizations’ general modus operandi.
