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Code That Fits in Your Head: Heuristics for Software Engineering (Robert C. Martin Series) by [Mark Seemann]

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Mark Seemann

Code That Fits in Your Head: Heuristics for Software Engineering (Robert C. Martin Series) Kindle Edition

by Mark Seemann (Author) Format: Kindle Edition

67 ratings

Part of: Robert C. Martin (14 books)

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How to Reduce Code Complexity and Develop Software More Sustainably
"Mark Seemann is well known for explaining complex concepts clearly and thoroughly. In this book he condenses his wide-ranging software development experience into a set of practical, pragmatic techniques for writing sustainable and human-friendly code. This book will be a must-read for every programmer."
-- Scott Wlaschin, author of Domain Modeling Made Functional Code That Fits in Your Head offers indispensable, practical advice for writing code at a sustainable pace and controlling the complexity that causes projects to spin out of control.

Reflecting decades of experience helping software teams succeed, Mark Seemann guides you from zero (no code) to deployed features and shows how to maintain a good cruising speed as you add functionality, address cross-cutting concerns, troubleshoot, and optimize. You'll find valuable ideas, practices, and processes for key issues ranging from checklists to teamwork, encapsulation to decomposition, API design to unit testing.

Seemann illuminates his insights with code examples drawn from a complete sample project. Written in C#, they're designed to be clear and useful to anyone who uses any object-oriented language including Java , C++, and Python. To facilitate deeper exploration, all code and extensive commit messages are available for download.

Choose mindsets and processes that work, and escape bad metaphors that don't
Use checklists to liberate yourself, improving outcomes with the skills you already have
Get past “analysis paralysis” by creating and deploying a vertical slice of your application
Counteract forces that lead to code rot and unnecessary complexity
Master better techniques for changing code behavior
Discover ways to solve code problems more quickly and effectively
Think more productively about performance and security

If you've ever suffered through bad projects or had to cope with unmaintainable legacy code, this guide will help you make things better next time and every time.

Register your book for convenient access to downloads, updates, and/or corrections as they become available. See inside book for details.

Print length

416 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Addison-Wesley Professional
Publication date

November 2, 2021
File size

34025 KB
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Editorial Reviews

Review

"We progress in software by standing on the shoulders of those who came before us. Mark's vast experience ranges from philosophical and organisational considerations right down to the precise details of writing code. In this book, you're offered an opportunity to build on that experience. Use it."
--Adam Ralph, speaker, tutor, and software simplifier, Particular Software

"I've been reading Mark's blogs for years and he always manages to entertain while at the same time offering deep technical insights. Code That Fits in Your Head follows in that vein, offering a wealth of information to any software developer looking to take their skills to the next level."
--Adam Tornhill, founder of CodeScene, author of Software Design X-Rays and Your Code as a Crime Scene

"My favorite thing about this book is how it uses a single code base as a working example. Rather than having to download separate code samples, you get a single Git repository with the entire application. Its history is handcrafted to show the evolution of the code alongside the concepts being explained in the book. As you read about a particular principle or technique, you'll find a direct reference to the commit that demonstrates it in practice. Of course, you're also free to navigate the history at your own leisure, stopping at any stage to inspect, debug, or even experiment with the code. I've never seen this level of interactivity in a book before, and it brings me special joy because it takes advantage of Git’s unique design in a new constructive way."
--Enrico Campidoglio, independent consultant, speaker and Pluralsight author

"Mark Seemann not only has decades of experience architecting and building large software systems, but is also one of the foremost thinkers on how to scale and manage the complex relationship between such systems and the teams that build them."
--Mike Hadlow, freelance software consultant and blogger

"Mark writes, 'Successful software endures'--this book will help you to write that kind of software."
--Bryan Hogan, software architect, podcaster, blogger

"Mark has an extraordinary ability to help others think deeply about the industry and profession of software development. With every interview on .NET Rocks! I have come away knowing I would have to go back and listen to my own show to really take in everything we discussed."
--Richard Campbell, co-host, .NET Rocks! --This text refers to the paperback edition.

About the Author

Mark Seemann, a former economist, found a second career as a programmer and has worked as a web and enterprise developer since the late 1990s. He is a Certified Rockstar Developer and has written a Jolt Award-winning book about Dependency Injection, given more than a hundred international conference talks, and authored video courses for both Pluralsight and Clean Coders. Mark has regularly published his blog ( blog.ploeh.dk) since 2006. --This text refers to the paperback edition.

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B09D2X43VX
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Addison-Wesley Professional; 1st edition (November 2, 2021)
Publication date ‏ : ‎ November 2, 2021
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 34025 KB
Simultaneous device usage ‏ : ‎ Up to 5 simultaneous devices, per publisher limits
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
Print length ‏ : ‎ 416 pages
Lending ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled

Best Sellers Rank: #135,999 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #6 in C# Programming (Kindle Store)
- #16 in C# Programming (Books)
- #57 in Software Development (Kindle Store)

Customer Reviews:
67 ratings

About the author

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Mark Seemann

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Mark Seemann is a Danish software developer based in Copenhagen, Denmark. His professional interests include functional programming, object-oriented development, as well as software development in general. Apart from writing two books he has also written numerous articles and blog posts about related topics.

Despite being mostly a .NET developer he takes most of his inspiration from sources across a wide range of technologies, including Haskell and lots of pattern books.

Originally poised to become a rock star or (failing that) graphic novelist (in the European tradition) he one day found himself with insufficient talent for either, a masters degree in Economics, and a desire for working with computers. He has been doing the latter intermittently since 1995.

When not working with software or spending time with his family, Mark enjoys reading, listening to and playing music, as well as preparing or consuming gourmet food and wine.

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A E Dobrowolski

Condensed wisdom

Reviewed in the United States on February 26, 2022

Verified Purchase

I have been a professional software engineer for 35 years. Mark Seemann has written a book that condenses the same amount of experience into 350 pages. This book is unique in that it takes a heuristic approach to getting good results: it chronicles what worked for Mr. Seemann in his many years of consulting. It is very easy to read. The "restaurant" project he uses as an example comes as a working fully documented git repo with over 500 commits. Over the course of reading the book I found myself thinking: that's what I now practice. But I got here through painful experience. Mark explains not only what works but also why. Do yourself a favor and take the shortcut. Buy the book.

4 people found this helpful

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Amazon Customer

My Grandson started reading it Christmas Eve. He said he likes it.

Reviewed in the United States on December 29, 2021

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My Grandson looked threw the book, and said he will be reading this one also.

4 people found this helpful

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RB Whitaker

A book with a lot of great advice that felt just a bit disorganized.

Reviewed in the United States on February 24, 2022

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Over the years, I've come to expect great things from books in this series. I don't think this was an exception, but I will say that it was the weakest of the books in this series that I've read (which is nearly all of them). This book fell a bit short of my expectations, but they were likely unrealistically high.

It was definitely worth the purchase, and I'd definitely recommend it to others.

If there's any one thing I'd love to see improved upon in future editions would be that I think it could use a bit of work at the organizational level. The organization, as it currently stands, is basically, "Let's build a project, and I'll introduce you to various good ideas as they are relevant as we're building this." The various principles that came up rang true to me, but going through the book, it just didn't feel like there was a lot of cohesiveness to the ideas that were brought up. I was left wondering if the particular project had been a different one, if we'd have bumped into a totally different set of good ideas to discuss instead.

It was hard to spot the thesis of the book. From the title, I had assumed it was focused on the task of ensuring code is written and structured in a way that makes it easy to figure out and remember for the duration of the time you're working on it. The concept of "code that fits in your head" was one of the many ideas that popped up in the book and was referred back to several times, but it didn't come across as the central tenet of the book, from which every other principle derived from, as I had assumed.

Perhaps you'll appreciate the book a bit more if you go into it knowing that it isn't *specifically* or *only* about writing code that fits into your head, but, rather, a grab bag of good ideas that help you write better code.

It was a good book, worth the money and time I spent on it, just a bit different than I had expected it to be.

6 people found this helpful

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Steve Ragle

I loved that this book whetted my appetite to go deeper on several topics

Reviewed in the United States on May 3, 2022

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A very nice collection of thoughts and opinions about many of the practical aspects of software development. If you are spinning up a new software group this might be the first thing you want to hand to all your developers. You won't agree with everything the author says, but his explanations are clear and his opinions are definite. I found myself agreeing with the majority of his ideas, nodding along as I read. The book is well-written and very readable, and the author has taken a great amount of effort and care to illustrate his points with the associated codebase and references. If nothing else, the book would be an excellent kickoff for discussion.

The bibliography at the back of the book is a great source of info to follow your curiosity where it leads you, and the author's consistent use of references within the book makes finding things there easy. I found myself heading off to read blog articles, watch videos, and I put several interesting books on my 'must read' list.

One person found this helpful

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AdaptableTerran

Great Advice

Reviewed in the United States on June 1, 2022

This book contains a collection of thoughtful and pragmatic techniques for writing better software. Mark Seemann is a very deep thinker -- his blog contains an overwhelming amount of information and opinions on software development. This book, thankfully, keeps things very practical with clear explanations and easy-to-implement techniques. Mr. Seemann validates the techniques presented in his book by referencing other expert developers who’ve reached the same conclusions. I loved the "fractal architecture" metaphor -- it was one of many useful things I learned from this outstanding book.

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paul

Okayish, aber einfach nicht gut

Reviewed in Germany on May 24, 2022

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Das Buch ist inhaltlich OK. Meiner Meinung nach richtet es sich nicht an "erfahrene" Entwickler, die schon ein bis zwei Bücher im Themenkomplex gelesen haben, sondern eher an den ambitionierten Nachwuchs-Entwickler, der ein Problem nicht nur möglichst schnell mit Code erschlagen will. Müssen die Beispiele nicht in C# sein, sind "Growing Object-Oriented Software, Guided by Tests" und "A Philosophy of Software Design" bessere Lektüren.

Bei einigen Tipps und Heuristiken musste ich stark den Kopf schütteln. Sie wirken für mich aus der Zeit gefallen. Ein konkretes Beispiel wäre die unterschiedliche Behandlung bezüglich Abstraktionen von Test und Produktivcode. Bitte befolgt das nicht blind.

Ich habe die Kindle Version gelesen, die zusätzlich diverse Zeichensatzfehler hat. 2011 habe ich das sehr gute Dependency Injection in .NET von Mark Seemann gelesen und angenommen, dass hier die Essenz von 10 weiteren Jahren in der Softwareentwicklung zu finden ist.

One person found this helpful

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Florian Schaupp

Gute Ansätze um den Kollegen die eigenen Spinnereien besser zu verklickern

Reviewed in Germany on June 16, 2022

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Wie war das? >>Jeder Trottel kann Code schreiben, den Maschienen verstehen - die Challange ist es Code zu schreiben, den jeder versteht<< (nicht direkt aus dem Buch).

Hat auf jeden Fall gute Ansätze, um die eigenen Gedanken so zu ordnen, damit andere (oder man selbst Monate später) besser und sicherer damit umgehen können.

Natürlich darf TDD etc. nicht fehlen - wenn auch berechtigter weise.

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Cat

Sehr gut

Reviewed in Germany on January 23, 2022

Verified Purchase

Man sollte wissen, dass das Buch nicht von unkle Bob geschrieben wurde. Dies ändert aber nichts daran, dass es ein ausgezeichnetes Buch ist. Ich kann es jedem empfehlen der sich für Code interessiert.

One person found this helpful

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Amiradel Beygzadeh

The Book Than Fited in My Head

Reviewed in Canada on November 26, 2021

Verified Purchase

This was the book I had been anticipating. Comprehensible, accurate, and useful

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