At Codacy, one of the questions we get the most is:
“What is code review (and do I need it)?”
With code review, a person or a tool reviews the source code of a developer’s program to check for issues like code coverage, security vulnerabilities, duplicate code and more. So, we’ve applied our experience to devise a test that will help determine whether or not you should include code review in your workflow.
Remember to add up the numbers for each option you select:
How often do you commit?
- once a day or less (add 0 points)
- 1–5 times a day (add 1 point)
- > 5 times a day (add 3 points)
- I found this amazing feature called auto-commit (add 5 points)
How big are your commits?
- as few lines as possible (add 0 points)
- each of my commits is a different component of a feature I’m working on (add 1 point)
- each of my commits has a distinct feature/functionality (add 3 points)
- I commit a whole project at a time, and only when I need to restart the machine (add 5 points)
How big is your team?
- It’s just me, really… (add 0 points)
- 2 people (add 1 point)
- > 3 people (add 3 points)
- I have no idea, the open space seems to go on forever (add 5 points)
How old is your codebase?
- we barely started (add 0 points)
- somewhere between 2 months and 2 years (add 1 point)
- more than 2 years old, but not that old (add 3 points)
- some of these lines are older than I am (add 5 points)
How old is the company you work for?
- < 1 year (add 0 points)
- 1–5 years (add 1 point)
- 6–30 years (add 3 points)
- my grandfather used to work here (add 5 points)
What’s your technology stack?
- just one mainstream programming language (add 0 points)
- LAMP (add 1 point)
- modern type-safe language (add 3 points)
- esoteric languages, noSQL databases, distributed filesystems; if we lose a team member we will never be able to understand the code (add 5 points)
How important is your project?
- I doubt that anyone will ever notice it (add 0 points)
- if something fails, we lose money (add 1 point)
- if something fails, lives may be at stake (add 3 points)
- this platform is the only thing separating us from an alien invasion! (add 5 points)
Add the points for each of your answers.
And now, for the results. If…
- …you scored between 0 and 10 points, you should definitely do code review
- …you scored between 11 and 20 points, you should definitely do code review
- …you scored between 21 and 30 points, you should definitely do code review
- …you scored between 31 and 40 points, you should definitely do code review
HTH!