Optimizing code

Code optimization is both an art and a science. This means that there is no deterministic way to help you optimize your code and that you should use your brain and try many things if you want to make your code faster. However, the general principle regarding code optimization is first make it correct, then make it fast. Always remember what Donald Knuth said about optimization:

"The real problem is that programmers have spent far too much time worrying about efficiency in the wrong places and at the wrong times; premature optimization is the root of all evil (or at least most of it) in programming."

Also, remember what the late Joe Armstrong, one of the developers of Erlang, said about optimization:

"Make it work, then make it beautiful, then if you really, really have to, make it fast. 90 percent of the time, if you make it beautiful, it will already be fast. So really, just make it beautiful!"

If you are really into code optimization...