Life Beyond Coding with Justin Chau

Being a developer is a lot more than just writing code. Justin and I discuss some of the hot topics for developers: marketing and building a brand, how to avoid burnout, creating content, how to learn, etc.

Connect with Justin Chau
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/chau_codes/

Twitter - https://twitter.com/chau_codes

Chau Apparely (dope swag!) - https://chauapparel.com/

00:00 - Welcome/Intro
01:38 - Justin Chau Intro
07:00 - Responsibilities in IT
10:00 - Why Change to Programming
17:22 - Inspiration to do Social Media and Build a Brand
26:00 - how do you deal with burnout
38:45 - Fan Girling over YouTubers in the chat
44:20 - Repurposing Content
45:23 - Future of the Chau Codes Podcast
1:00:02 - Memorizing vs Learning Concepts
1:06:00 - Life in Developer Relations
1:12:46 - Favorite YouTube Channels
1:17:40 - Blogging and Instagram
1:22:33 - Imposter Syndrome
1:26:00 - Accepting Feedback
1:28:00 - Self Confidence

#code #visual studio code #visual studio

What is GEEK

Buddha Community

Static Code Analysis: What It Is? How to Use It?

Static code analysis refers to the technique of approximating the runtime behavior of a program. In other words, it is the process of predicting the output of a program without actually executing it.

Lately, however, the term “Static Code Analysis” is more commonly used to refer to one of the applications of this technique rather than the technique itself — program comprehension — understanding the program and detecting issues in it (anything from syntax errors to type mismatches, performance hogs likely bugs, security loopholes, etc.). This is the usage we’d be referring to throughout this post.

“The refinement of techniques for the prompt discovery of error serves as well as any other as a hallmark of what we mean by science.”

• J. Robert Oppenheimer

Outline

We cover a lot of ground in this post. The aim is to build an understanding of static code analysis and to equip you with the basic theory, and the right tools so that you can write analyzers on your own.

We start our journey with laying down the essential parts of the pipeline which a compiler follows to understand what a piece of code does. We learn where to tap points in this pipeline to plug in our analyzers and extract meaningful information. In the latter half, we get our feet wet, and write four such static analyzers, completely from scratch, in Python.

Note that although the ideas here are discussed in light of Python, static code analyzers across all programming languages are carved out along similar lines. We chose Python because of the availability of an easy to use ast module, and wide adoption of the language itself.

How does it all work?

Before a computer can finally “understand” and execute a piece of code, it goes through a series of complicated transformations:

As you can see in the diagram (go ahead, zoom it!), the static analyzers feed on the output of these stages. To be able to better understand the static analysis techniques, let’s look at each of these steps in some more detail:

Scanning

The first thing that a compiler does when trying to understand a piece of code is to break it down into smaller chunks, also known as tokens. Tokens are akin to what words are in a language.

A token might consist of either a single character, like (, or literals (like integers, strings, e.g., 7, Bob, etc.), or reserved keywords of that language (e.g, def in Python). Characters which do not contribute towards the semantics of a program, like trailing whitespace, comments, etc. are often discarded by the scanner.

Python provides the tokenize module in its standard library to let you play around with tokens:

Python

1

import io

2

import tokenize

3

4

code = b"color = input('Enter your favourite color: ')"

5

6

for token in tokenize.tokenize(io.BytesIO(code).readline):

7

    print(token)

Python

1

TokenInfo(type=62 (ENCODING),  string='utf-8')

2

TokenInfo(type=1  (NAME),      string='color')

3

TokenInfo(type=54 (OP),        string='=')

4

TokenInfo(type=1  (NAME),      string='input')

5

TokenInfo(type=54 (OP),        string='(')

6

TokenInfo(type=3  (STRING),    string="'Enter your favourite color: '")

7

TokenInfo(type=54 (OP),        string=')')

8

TokenInfo(type=4  (NEWLINE),   string='')

9

TokenInfo(type=0  (ENDMARKER), string='')

(Note that for the sake of readability, I’ve omitted a few columns from the result above — metadata like starting index, ending index, a copy of the line on which a token occurs, etc.)

#code quality #code review #static analysis #static code analysis #code analysis #static analysis tools #code review tips #static code analyzer #static code analysis tool #static analyzer

Guidelines for Java Code Reviews

Get a jump-start on your next code review session with this list.

Having another pair of eyes scan your code is always useful and helps you spot mistakes before you break production. You need not be an expert to review someone’s code. Some experience with the programming language and a review checklist should help you get started. We’ve put together a list of things you should keep in mind when you’re reviewing Java code. Read on!

1. Follow Java Code Conventions

2. Replace Imperative Code With Lambdas and Streams

3. Beware of the NullPointerException

4. Directly Assigning References From Client Code to a Field

5. Handle Exceptions With Care

…

#java #code quality #java tutorial #code analysis #code reviews #code review tips #code analysis tools #java tutorial for beginners #java code review

How to Find the Stinky Parts of Your Code (Part II)

There are more code smells. Let’s keep changing the aromas. We see several symptoms and situations that make us doubt the quality of our development. Let’s look at some possible solutions.

Most of these smells are just hints of something that might be wrong. They are not rigid rules.

This is part II. Part I can be found here.

Code Smell 06 - Too Clever Programmer

The code is difficult to read, there are tricky with names without semantics. Sometimes using language’s accidental complexity.

_Image Source: NeONBRAND on _Unsplash

Problems

• Readability
• Maintainability
• Code Quality
• Premature Optimization

Solutions

1. Refactor the code
2. Use better names

Examples

• Optimized loops

Exceptions

• Optimized code for low-level operations.

Sample Code

Wrong

function primeFactors(n){
	  var f = [],  i = 0, d = 2;  

	  for (i = 0; n >= 2; ) {
	     if(n % d == 0){
	       f[i++]=(d); 
	       n /= d;
	    }
	    else{
	      d++;
	    }     
	  }
	  return f;
	}

Right

function primeFactors(numberToFactor){
	  var factors = [], 
	      divisor = 2,
	      remainder = numberToFactor;

	  while(remainder>=2){
	    if(remainder % divisor === 0){
	       factors.push(divisor); 
	       remainder = remainder/ divisor;
	    }
	    else{
	      divisor++;
	    }     
	  }
	  return factors;
	}

Detection

Automatic detection is possible in some languages. Watch some warnings related to complexity, bad names, post increment variables, etc.

#pixel-face #code-smells #clean-code #stinky-code-parts #refactor-legacy-code #refactoring #stinky-code #common-code-smells

Life Beyond Coding with Justin Chau

Being a developer is a lot more than just writing code. Justin and I discuss some of the hot topics for developers: marketing and building a brand, how to avoid burnout, creating content, how to learn, etc.

Connect with Justin Chau
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/chau_codes/

Twitter - https://twitter.com/chau_codes

Chau Apparely (dope swag!) - https://chauapparel.com/

00:00 - Welcome/Intro
01:38 - Justin Chau Intro
07:00 - Responsibilities in IT
10:00 - Why Change to Programming
17:22 - Inspiration to do Social Media and Build a Brand
26:00 - how do you deal with burnout
38:45 - Fan Girling over YouTubers in the chat
44:20 - Repurposing Content
45:23 - Future of the Chau Codes Podcast
1:00:02 - Memorizing vs Learning Concepts
1:06:00 - Life in Developer Relations
1:12:46 - Favorite YouTube Channels
1:17:40 - Blogging and Instagram
1:22:33 - Imposter Syndrome
1:26:00 - Accepting Feedback
1:28:00 - Self Confidence

#code #visual studio code #visual studio

Code Trashing Symptom

There are a set of skills and qualities which make the ideal software

developer we are all searching to be or searching for to employ. However, right now I am going to emphasize the importance of a quality that is mostly found in senior developers.

As a beginner, I remember the enthusiasm when I implemented my first app. It was in VisualBasic v6.0 with very basic UI and logic. From there on,

it was very hard to leave the keyboard without writing code daily. At

first, it was VB, then some HTML, JavaScript (when it was very buggy),

Java, and sometime later I became a true working developer/team-leader

for many years.

Reliving those days when I was an enthusiast developer, I remember the powerful feeling that kept me on my path. I was (and still) addicted to code. But it is not code I was after. It is the vast feeling of creating something your own. Creating something from within. This strong feeling of a new creation is addictive.

The problem with addiction is that you don’t recognize the limits of

yourself and your creations. Consequently, you are not guided by your

consciousness.

As a leader of development teams in different projects, I came across a

variety of situations with different developers. But this same question I kept hearing from time to time, “This is a great piece of code, do you really want me to remove it?”, and it is really a great piece of code with the ultimate design.

But what you shouldn’t forget that you and your team are here to accomplish something meaningful for your clients and users! Thus writing a greatly designed code with low correlation to requirements isn’t going to change anything.

When I moved to my current team and project, I found out that the project’s code was written beautifully and well designed. But it was insignificant to our client’s future requirements.

One of the best decisions I made was to gradually re-implement (remove old code and write a new one without reference nor copy-pasting any parts). The reason being the already written code was a big hurdle to bend to any new requirements we received

Sometimes it’ll be hard to ask for, especially when you’re asking the original author of the code. But always remind him of these facts: your main focus is your clients; if you miss your code, Github will always remember it for you.

Acknowledging your addiction to code is your first step to overcoming your unconscious desire to create worthless stuff that no one will use (and believe me, it hurts more to find out that your code is useless than

removing a code you’ve written).

Final Thoughts

From my personal experience, when you implement something hard to solve the first time, most of your energy and thoughts are invested in solving the problem and not in the most relevant design for the given requirements.

Rewriting the same code a second time gives you a second chance to spend your time (almost solely) in design (since the problem is already

solved).

The best design is a design made for the current (known) requirements and not future mystic stuff that we just came up with.

**Remember: **Refactor! Don’t predict!

#clean-code #best-practices #programming #development #refactoring #coding #coding-skills #coding-life