Recognizing Code Refactoring: A Tester's Perspective

The expression 'Refactoring' is mainly utilize to signify demanded code clarification/redesign.

In this tutorial, we'll understand the definition of refactoring, discuss the need for code refactoring, and also review the impact of refactoring code on several different project team members. We will also talk about the answer for the most crucial question -- As a professional, why do you need to know about refactoring?

Introduction to Refactoring

To start with, let's understand, what actually refactoring is.

Refactoring is essentially a practice or procedure of enhancing the database or code while maintaining the current functionality. The notion is to change ineffective and also the over-complicated code into more effective, preferably simpler and easier code.

Refactoring of code has also picked up momentum with teams today by following this Agile Software Development approach. Project teams often have limited time to implement new or expand the functionality of the current attributes and code that is clean. The code which is not difficult to comprehend and maintain certainly goes a long way in fulfilling the iteration deadline.

Need for Code Refactoring

If we are maintaining the initial functionality of this application or module, then a question arises as Why do we even bother refactoring? Well, There are many reasons for which a particular module or piece of code may have to be refactored, such as:

l Code Colors

l Technical debt

l Agile software development strategy, etc..

We will discuss these points in detail in the following sections.

#1) Code Colors:

All of us can understand when the food begins to smell it suggests that it's probably turning bad -- this is true for code also! Code colors are indications a much serious problem may exist within the code.

Following are some Frequent code property:

• Presence of redundant or equal code.
• A announced variable that isn't used anywhere in the remaining part of the code.
• Over complicated code design.
• Code course that does too little and doesn't justify the occurrence of the class defined. Such classes are referred to as lazy class or freeloader.
• The existence of too many loops and conditions having the capability to be broken up and simplified.
• Code construct in a manner that a change in one portion of code demands that the change to be implemented in the other places as well.
• Code property become more obvious with passing moment. Since the program or system develops, finally these code aromas start affecting the code development, upkeep and even system the performance in extreme situations.

 

#2) Technical Debt:

While creating a program, during the limited time and resources readily available, often we may take shortcuts to accomplish the desired effects.

Think about a feature that has to be added to a current module. After discussion, the group narrows down two approaches to add this feature. Approach A, takes two sprints to send, are the approved long-term strategy. Strategy B takes just 5 days to send is a messy hard-coded hack that is intended to simply service the module at short term.

In case the team is under pressure to supply the characteristic within a restricted time, then they may agree to follow Procedure B for now and add Procedure A from the backlog for future. Using this method, this group just created the technical debt for themselves.

#3) Following Agile Software Development Approach:

Agile software development strategy advocates incremental improvement. Without clean, well-structured and easy to maintain code, it wouldn't be possible for groups to extend the present code with each iteration. If the code has been changed without proper refactoring, then it could bring about code smells or specialized debt.

Why a QA Must Know About Refactoring?

All we discussed until now in this tutorial appears to be associated with coding and resembles the kind of things a developer should worry about.

Subsequently, why are we discussing this unrelated theory in Software Testing? Read the rest of this tutorial to get the answer to this question.

#1) For Unit Testers/Developers

Even though refactoring the code, even as new code is being added, old courses are being upgraded, new classes have been added, and present Unit evaluations may now neglect. Additionally, for legacy systems, there may not be a unit tests employed in any respect. This new unit tests will need to be made and set up from scratch in the vast majority of cases.

#2) For Testers

When a feature is being refactored (considering we aren't adding any new operation ), the understanding is that following the required changes are completed, the majority of the operation for your end-user should stay the same.

As a tester, refactoring of code approximately equates to in-depth testing + regression testing. In-depth testing need to include all the current user flows to make sure that plugins are working as before.

Regression testing of the entire application (or impacted areas) is required to make sure that upgrading a module didn't unintentionally break the functionality of their other modules.

User acceptance tests will likely be important and these evaluations need to maneuver before the product can be declared ready for launch.

Also, another evaluation required such as load evaluations, safety evaluation etc. would also need to be executed as required.

#3) Automation Evaluation Engineers

Refactoring of code can cause operational and non invasive automation scripts to fail.

This may occur Because of the following reasons:

If the page objects change as part of the refactoring campaign and if your Selenium automation scripts rely on the page objects, then the scripts will fail and would need to get upgraded.

When there were minor modifications, then it redirects those Which Were added or removed during refactoring, and existing automation scripts would fail and would Have to Be updated

It is recommended that the functional automation evaluations should just be installed after a feature is stable, otherwise it is going to lead to a lot of rework since the attribute evolves.

Being a developer of automation evaluations, automation test engineers must also think as a developer and aim to create a clean and simple to keep code. Most of the IDE's like IntelliJ IDEA, Eclipse etc., comprise in-built refactoring menu using commonly used refactoring approaches for simple reference.