decodeDynamics

This blog underscores the significance of code quality through a structured 3-step approach, recognizing developers and reviewers as key contributors to achieving excellence in coding standards.

Awareness

• Ensuring and maintaining code quality requires leads to take proactive steps in guiding and empowering their development teams. One of the key approaches is providing training in coding standards and best practices.
• By offering comprehensive training sessions, leads equip their developers with the necessary knowledge and skills to write clean, efficient, and maintainable code, these training should be conducted while on-boarding a new team member.
• Enforce strict compliance with coding guidelines, including standardized variable and function naming conventions for consistency.

Analysis :

• Define the rules in early stages of build, including naming conventions.
• Define rules in code analysis tool as per defined coding standards.
• Create a peer review checklist to ensure the validation and effectiveness of the review process.
• Identify and implement the common tasks or functionalities in common DLL or code components, that are used across different parts of your project. These could be utility functions, data access components, logging mechanism, etc.
• Empower developers with constructive feedback, helping them tackle identified issues, and inspire continuous improvements in coding.

Review The Code:

• Code review is a systematic examination of the source code by one or more team members other than the original author.
• Incorporating code review or peer review as a fundamental aspect of your project plan is a best practice that yields numerous benefits for software development projects. By allocating dedicated time for reviews within the project timeline and plan, you foster a collaborative and quality-driven development process.
• Run analysis tools to identify compile time for standard deviations.
• Ensure adherence to coding standards by reviewing file names according to established guidelines.
• Employ code analysis tools to identify unnecessary references to DLLs and unused variables, thereby enhancing code efficiency.
• Clearly define access specifiers to control data access and encapsulation.
• Enhance code readability by employing modular programming principles and providing comprehensive comments.
• Implement thorough null value checks to prevent potential runtime errors.
• Minimize unnecessary loops in the code for optimized performance.
• Use specific error handling blocks by putting try-catch.
• Replace hard-coded values with CONSTANTS in the code for maintainability and flexibility.
• Refrain from storing or hard-coding user credentials in the code to bolster security measures.
• Avoid including GUIDs directly in the code, implement alternative approaches for better security and scalability.
• Analyze the Cyclomatic Complexity – it measures the structural complexity of the code. Re-align the code as required.
• Use “var” datatype when you are unsure about the type.
• Use try-catch blocks for specific error handling to gracefully manage exceptions.
• Utilize inline functions appropriately to improve code organization and performance.
• Additionally, you can incorporate below ones specifically for Dynamics 365 CE:
  • Customization should be always under a Solution
  • Consistently utilize the “Name” field to designate the primary field name for clarity and consistency.
  • Filed schema name should be in small case.
  • Verify that lookup fields include “id” as a suffix, ensuring consistent design and readability.
  • Mark OOB workflow has “delete once executed” is ticked
  • Exercise caution when using the Plugin depth property to avoid unintended consequences.
  • Implement a robust schema management system using an Excel sheet to track and promptly update any changes occurring in environments. This ensures accurate and up-to-date documentation for seamless collaboration and effective version control.
  • Always copy an existing Role, do not create a new Role from scratch
  • Avoid direct access to SQL DB components, prefer using APIs for database interactions.

By adhering to this structured AARC approach, we can guarantee that code quality remains consistently high throughout its entire life-cycle, resulting in a robust and reliable software solution.