Code smells

A code smell is a feature of code that indicates something may need to be rewritten. Just as a smell in the refrigerator or pantry gives us a clue that something may have gone bad, a code smell tells us that the code may not be written as well as it perhaps should have been. Code smells are not errors as such, in that they don't mean the code functions incorrectly. Instead, they are indicators that the code might not be as flexible or easy to maintain as it could be, or even that it doesn't take advantage of language features that would make the code easier to understand and perform better. As I mentioned in the introduction to the chapter, all coding involves choices, and the choice to address a code smell is not always cut-and-dry. It may be that the code in question has needed no maintenance and is used infrequently, resulting in a questionable return on investment for fixing the code. It may be that the design of the code was specifically non-standard for some reason, whether...