Showing 5 of 5 total issues
Uuid#to_s has boolean parameter 'dashes' Open
def to_s(dashes = true)
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Boolean Parameter
is a special case of Control Couple
, where a method parameter is defaulted to true or false. A Boolean Parameter effectively permits a method's caller to decide which execution path to take. This is a case of bad cohesion. You're creating a dependency between methods that is not really necessary, thus increasing coupling.
Example
Given
class Dummy
def hit_the_switch(switch = true)
if switch
puts 'Hitting the switch'
# do other things...
else
puts 'Not hitting the switch'
# do other things...
end
end
end
Reek would emit the following warning:
test.rb -- 3 warnings:
[1]:Dummy#hit_the_switch has boolean parameter 'switch' (BooleanParameter)
[2]:Dummy#hit_the_switch is controlled by argument switch (ControlParameter)
Note that both smells are reported, Boolean Parameter
and Control Parameter
.
Getting rid of the smell
This is highly dependent on your exact architecture, but looking at the example above what you could do is:
- Move everything in the
if
branch into a separate method - Move everything in the
else
branch into a separate method - Get rid of the
hit_the_switch
method alltogether - Make the decision what method to call in the initial caller of
hit_the_switch
Uuid#to_s is controlled by argument 'dashes' Open
if dashes
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Control Parameter
is a special case of Control Couple
Example
A simple example would be the "quoted" parameter in the following method:
def write(quoted)
if quoted
write_quoted @value
else
write_unquoted @value
end
end
Fixing those problems is out of the scope of this document but an easy solution could be to remove the "write" method alltogether and to move the calls to "writequoted" / "writeunquoted" in the initial caller of "write".
Uuid#eql? refers to 'other' more than self (maybe move it to another class?) Open
other.is_a?(Uuid) && eq_packed(other.value)
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Feature Envy occurs when a code fragment references another object more often than it references itself, or when several clients do the same series of manipulations on a particular type of object.
Feature Envy reduces the code's ability to communicate intent: code that "belongs" on one class but which is located in another can be hard to find, and may upset the "System of Names" in the host class.
Feature Envy also affects the design's flexibility: A code fragment that is in the wrong class creates couplings that may not be natural within the application's domain, and creates a loss of cohesion in the unwilling host class.
Feature Envy often arises because it must manipulate other objects (usually its arguments) to get them into a useful form, and one force preventing them (the arguments) doing this themselves is that the common knowledge lives outside the arguments, or the arguments are of too basic a type to justify extending that type. Therefore there must be something which 'knows' about the contents or purposes of the arguments. That thing would have to be more than just a basic type, because the basic types are either containers which don't know about their contents, or they are single objects which can't capture their relationship with their fellows of the same type. So, this thing with the extra knowledge should be reified into a class, and the utility method will most likely belong there.
Example
Running Reek on:
class Warehouse
def sale_price(item)
(item.price - item.rebate) * @vat
end
end
would report:
Warehouse#total_price refers to item more than self (FeatureEnvy)
since this:
(item.price - item.rebate)
belongs to the Item class, not the Warehouse.
Method eq_packed
has a Cognitive Complexity of 6 (exceeds 5 allowed). Consider refactoring. Open
def eq_packed(value)
# Compare the bytes in each string.
# Byte comparison *must* be used, since == uses character comparison.
# Bytes != characters when encoding is involved.
@value.each_byte.with_index do |byte_a, index|
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Cognitive Complexity
Cognitive Complexity is a measure of how difficult a unit of code is to intuitively understand. Unlike Cyclomatic Complexity, which determines how difficult your code will be to test, Cognitive Complexity tells you how difficult your code will be to read and comprehend.
A method's cognitive complexity is based on a few simple rules:
- Code is not considered more complex when it uses shorthand that the language provides for collapsing multiple statements into one
- Code is considered more complex for each "break in the linear flow of the code"
- Code is considered more complex when "flow breaking structures are nested"
Further reading
Method cmp_packed
has a Cognitive Complexity of 6 (exceeds 5 allowed). Consider refactoring. Open
def cmp_packed(value)
# Compare the bytes in each string.
# Byte comparison *must* be used, since <=> uses character comparison.
# Bytes != characters when encoding is involved.
@value.bytes.each_with_index do |byte_a, index|
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Cognitive Complexity
Cognitive Complexity is a measure of how difficult a unit of code is to intuitively understand. Unlike Cyclomatic Complexity, which determines how difficult your code will be to test, Cognitive Complexity tells you how difficult your code will be to read and comprehend.
A method's cognitive complexity is based on a few simple rules:
- Code is not considered more complex when it uses shorthand that the language provides for collapsing multiple statements into one
- Code is considered more complex for each "break in the linear flow of the code"
- Code is considered more complex when "flow breaking structures are nested"