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

• Cognitive Complexity docs
• Cognitive Complexity: A new way of measuring understandability

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

• Cognitive Complexity docs
• Cognitive Complexity: A new way of measuring understandability

Duplicated Code

Duplicated code can lead to software that is hard to understand and difficult to change. The Don't Repeat Yourself (DRY) principle states:

Every piece of knowledge must have a single, unambiguous, authoritative representation within a system.

When you violate DRY, bugs and maintenance problems are sure to follow. Duplicated code has a tendency to both continue to replicate and also to diverge (leaving bugs as two similar implementations differ in subtle ways).

Tuning

This issue has a mass of 62.

We set useful threshold defaults for the languages we support but you may want to adjust these settings based on your project guidelines.

The threshold configuration represents the minimum mass a code block must have to be analyzed for duplication. The lower the threshold, the more fine-grained the comparison.

If the engine is too easily reporting duplication, try raising the threshold. If you suspect that the engine isn't catching enough duplication, try lowering the threshold. The best setting tends to differ from language to language.

See codeclimate-duplication's documentation for more information about tuning the mass threshold in your .codeclimate.yml.

Refactorings

• Extract Method
• Extract Class
• Form Template Method
• Introduce Null Object
• Pull Up Method
• Pull Up Field
• Substitute Algorithm

Further Reading

• Don't Repeat Yourself on the C2 Wiki
• Duplicated Code on SourceMaking
• Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code by Martin Fowler. Duplicated Code, p76

Duplicated Code

Duplicated code can lead to software that is hard to understand and difficult to change. The Don't Repeat Yourself (DRY) principle states:

Every piece of knowledge must have a single, unambiguous, authoritative representation within a system.

When you violate DRY, bugs and maintenance problems are sure to follow. Duplicated code has a tendency to both continue to replicate and also to diverge (leaving bugs as two similar implementations differ in subtle ways).

Tuning

This issue has a mass of 62.

We set useful threshold defaults for the languages we support but you may want to adjust these settings based on your project guidelines.

The threshold configuration represents the minimum mass a code block must have to be analyzed for duplication. The lower the threshold, the more fine-grained the comparison.

If the engine is too easily reporting duplication, try raising the threshold. If you suspect that the engine isn't catching enough duplication, try lowering the threshold. The best setting tends to differ from language to language.

See codeclimate-duplication's documentation for more information about tuning the mass threshold in your .codeclimate.yml.

Refactorings

• Extract Method
• Extract Class
• Form Template Method
• Introduce Null Object
• Pull Up Method
• Pull Up Field
• Substitute Algorithm

Further Reading

• Don't Repeat Yourself on the C2 Wiki
• Duplicated Code on SourceMaking
• Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code by Martin Fowler. Duplicated Code, p76

Utility classes, which are collections of static members, are not meant to be instantiated. Even abstract utility classes, which can be extended, should not have public constructors.

Java adds an implicit public constructor to every class which does not define at least one explicitly. Hence, at least one non-public constructor should be defined.

Noncompliant Code Example

class StringUtils { // Noncompliant

  public static String concatenate(String s1, String s2) {
    return s1 + s2;
  }

}

Compliant Solution

class StringUtils { // Compliant

  private StringUtils() {
    throw new IllegalStateException("Utility class");
  }

  public static String concatenate(String s1, String s2) {
    return s1 + s2;
  }

}

Exceptions

When class contains public static void main(String[] args) method it is not considered as utility class and will be ignored by this rule.

Cognitive Complexity is a measure of how hard the control flow of a method is to understand. Methods with high Cognitive Complexity will be difficult to maintain.

See

• Cognitive Complexity

Merging collapsible if statements increases the code's readability.

Noncompliant Code Example

if (file != null) {
  if (file.isFile() || file.isDirectory()) {
    /* ... */
  }
}

Compliant Solution

if (file != null && isFileOrDirectory(file)) {
  /* ... */
}

private static boolean isFileOrDirectory(File file) {
  return file.isFile() || file.isDirectory();
}

Cognitive Complexity is a measure of how hard the control flow of a method is to understand. Methods with high Cognitive Complexity will be difficult to maintain.

See

• Cognitive Complexity

Duplicated string literals make the process of refactoring error-prone, since you must be sure to update all occurrences.

On the other hand, constants can be referenced from many places, but only need to be updated in a single place.

Noncompliant Code Example

With the default threshold of 3:

public void run() {
  prepare("action1");                              // Noncompliant - "action1" is duplicated 3 times
  execute("action1");
  release("action1");
}

@SuppressWarning("all")                            // Compliant - annotations are excluded
private void method1() { /* ... */ }
@SuppressWarning("all")
private void method2() { /* ... */ }

public String method3(String a) {
  System.out.println("'" + a + "'");               // Compliant - literal "'" has less than 5 characters and is excluded
  return "";                                       // Compliant - literal "" has less than 5 characters and is excluded
}

Compliant Solution

private static final String ACTION_1 = "action1";  // Compliant

public void run() {
  prepare(ACTION_1);                               // Compliant
  execute(ACTION_1);
  release(ACTION_1);
}

Exceptions

To prevent generating some false-positives, literals having less than 5 characters are excluded.

Assigning a value to a static field in a constructor could cause unreliable behavior at runtime since it will change the value for all instances of the class.

Instead remove the field's static modifier, or initialize it statically.

Noncompliant Code Example

public class Person {
  static Date dateOfBirth;
  static int expectedFingers;

  public Person(date birthday) {
    dateOfBirth = birthday;  // Noncompliant; now everyone has this birthday
    expectedFingers = 10;  // Noncompliant
  }
}

Compliant Solution

public class Person {
  Date dateOfBirth;
  static int expectedFingers = 10;

  public Person(date birthday) {
    dateOfBirth = birthday;
  }
}

Merging collapsible if statements increases the code's readability.

Noncompliant Code Example

if (file != null) {
  if (file.isFile() || file.isDirectory()) {
    /* ... */
  }
}

Compliant Solution

if (file != null && isFileOrDirectory(file)) {
  /* ... */
}

private static boolean isFileOrDirectory(File file) {
  return file.isFile() || file.isDirectory();
}

Duplicated string literals make the process of refactoring error-prone, since you must be sure to update all occurrences.

On the other hand, constants can be referenced from many places, but only need to be updated in a single place.

Noncompliant Code Example

With the default threshold of 3:

public void run() {
  prepare("action1");                              // Noncompliant - "action1" is duplicated 3 times
  execute("action1");
  release("action1");
}

@SuppressWarning("all")                            // Compliant - annotations are excluded
private void method1() { /* ... */ }
@SuppressWarning("all")
private void method2() { /* ... */ }

public String method3(String a) {
  System.out.println("'" + a + "'");               // Compliant - literal "'" has less than 5 characters and is excluded
  return "";                                       // Compliant - literal "" has less than 5 characters and is excluded
}

Compliant Solution

private static final String ACTION_1 = "action1";  // Compliant

public void run() {
  prepare(ACTION_1);                               // Compliant
  execute(ACTION_1);
  release(ACTION_1);
}

Exceptions

To prevent generating some false-positives, literals having less than 5 characters are excluded.

Merging collapsible if statements increases the code's readability.

Noncompliant Code Example

if (file != null) {
  if (file.isFile() || file.isDirectory()) {
    /* ... */
  }
}

Compliant Solution

if (file != null && isFileOrDirectory(file)) {
  /* ... */
}

private static boolean isFileOrDirectory(File file) {
  return file.isFile() || file.isDirectory();
}

Merging collapsible if statements increases the code's readability.

Noncompliant Code Example

if (file != null) {
  if (file.isFile() || file.isDirectory()) {
    /* ... */
  }
}

Compliant Solution

if (file != null && isFileOrDirectory(file)) {
  /* ... */
}

private static boolean isFileOrDirectory(File file) {
  return file.isFile() || file.isDirectory();
}

If a boolean expression doesn't change the evaluation of the condition, then it is entirely unnecessary, and can be removed. If it is gratuitous because it does not match the programmer's intent, then it's a bug and the expression should be fixed.

Noncompliant Code Example

a = true;
if (a) { // Noncompliant
  doSomething();
}

if (b && a) { // Noncompliant; "a" is always "true"
  doSomething();
}

if (c || !a) { // Noncompliant; "!a" is always "false"
  doSomething();
}

Compliant Solution

a = true;
if (foo(a)) {
  doSomething();
}

if (b) {
  doSomething();
}

if (c) {
  doSomething();
}

See

• MITRE, CWE-571 - Expression is Always True
• MITRE, CWE-570 - Expression is Always False